HARTFORD, Conn. — Amtrak is citing safety as the reason it will not allow some CTrail ticket holders to use its trains on the Hartford Line shared with the CTrail commuter service.
The Hartford Courant quotes an email from Amtrak spokeswoman Beth K. Toll as saying “crew members may ask passengers to wait for the next available train instead of creating an unsafe condition, such as standing in the vestibule.”
When the CTrail service began, it touted the fact that tickets would be honored on either the CTrail or Amtrak trains. But CTrail passengers have regularly been turned away from Amtrak trains, leading Connecticut officials to ask Amtrak expand capacity on its trains [See “Connecticut asks Amtrak to add cars to Hartford Line trains,” Trains News Wire, Oct. 29, 2018.]
Connecticut Gov. Dannel P. Malloy told the Courant turning away riders based on their type of ticket is “a violation of the agreement” between Amtrak and Connecticut regarding what the state Department of Transportation said would be a “one ticket, any train” policy.
In her email, Toll wrote, “We continue to work with (the Connecticut Department of Transportation) to resolve the crowding issues that are occurring on some … trains. The safety of our customers must continue to be our highest priority.”
Since the beginning of CTrail service in June 2018, the Hartford Line has been served by 17 weekday CTrail and Amtrak round trips between New Haven and Hartford. Thirteen of those round trips are extended to serve Springfield, Mass.
George Pins is spot on. Richard Anderson is no transportation advocate. He has proven to be the worst kind of miserly bean counter who’s primary mission appears to do anything to dissuade the public from riding Amtrak. No capacity to meet demand? Starve the beast of revenue until it collapses under it’s own weight.
Now that the D’s are back in control, Perhaps Mr. Anderson should be brought in front of the House Transportation sub committee for a OFFICE SPACE style grilling “What would you say…you do here?…..”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4OvQIGDg4I
Amtrak had to lower their fares to match CT Rail, I guess Mr. Anderson thinks he has already done enough.
Actually, there exist occasions when the so-called “Hiawatha” service (may the denizens/progenitors of the namesake RIP) has standing room only, i.e., sitting on your suitcase by/near/in the vestibule, or whatever you called it between Chi. and Milw.
Maybe they can site “safety” in not expanding passenger rail over the last 48 years.
In 1980, when both Amtrak and New Joisey Transit were running ex-PC or ex-PRR m.u. commuter cars and I didn’t know which was which, I ran into the same situation at New Brunswick. The only reason I even remember after almost 40 years was the rudeness of the Amtrak trainman. I chalked it up to a Midwesterner (me) out of my element in New Joisey.
So apparently two months have gone by since the issue was raised with Amtrak, and they can’t or won’t find more than two coaches to field on their trains, and who cares about some agreement they have with some State or other? This seems to me to be in complete harmony with the actions and policies of Mr. Anderson for the past year, outlined in the Newswire piece naming him as the top story of the year, so forgive me when I am not surprised to read this. “The public be damned,” 21st century version.