“Train travel offers a number of advantages over other modes of transportation, and with the new amenities offered on Acela Nonstop, we are raising the bar even higher to enhance the journey,” said Vice President of Amtrak Northeast Corridor Service Line Caroline Decker. “On the Northeast Corridor, Acela’s savvy, sophisticated customers expect a premium experience when they board our trains, and that’s what they will be getting with these new amenities and with nonstop service.”
The schedule is one southbound in the morning and one northbound train in the afternoon with an approximate trip time of two hours and 35 minutes. The southbound train will depart New York at 6:35 a.m. and is scheduled to arrive in Washington around 9:10 a.m. The northbound train will depart Washington at 4:30 p.m., and arrive in New York around 7:05 p.m.
While the Acela Nonstop is currently only available once per day only on weekdays between New York and Washington, Amtrak will be weighing potential expansion in terms of location and frequency. In its 2018 Fiscal Year, New York and Washington were Amtrak’s top two busiest stations across the national network.
— An Amtrak news release. Sept. 12, 2019
As I live nowhere the NEC (Iowa) and have never used any Amtrak services other than its Western/Regional runs. What benefits would this non-stop service offer to NYC-DC customers? We put up with several hours delays constantly due to freight “interference”, but I’m guessing that doesn’t happen too often on the Goose’s Golden Egg on the NEC.
Based on the success of Empire State service NYP to A-R it would seem that 2 H 35 M is the key to competitiveness. Although the timing of the train might not be perfect, let’s see that happens.
David Wire, yes, Amtrak has tried express and/or non-stop trains before. Not sur about the NEC, but on LOS-SAN corridor in CA, they have tried express trains at twice in the past fifteen years. They last about a year. By skipping some of the intermediate stops, they loose far more passengers, than they will gain in additional endpoint to endpoint passengers (who gained about ten minutes less travel time). If you search YouTube for the matrix theory, by tje late Dr Adrian Herzog you see how adding additional stops anywhere on a network increases the possible city pairs at a much faster rate.
Of course, one stop, or non-stop is all Richard Anderson knows! This will start with fanfare and quietly end in the middle of the night.
JOHN – Quite agree. I’m not sure how much time is saved by skipping stops (five minutes per stop minimum — decelerate, dwell, accelerate) but not so much anyone would choose the schedule on that basis. The time is trivial, not even measurable – compared to getting out of bed, shaving, showering, dressing,eating breakfast, getting to Penn Station through Manhattan traffic and building in enough slack time to assure not missing the train. Ditto at the other end, one must plan on arriving at Washington Union Station early enough before one’s first appointment in DeeCee. One must get up several hours before the departure, what’s the difference if the train runs fifteen to twenty minutes slower.
I agree with Mr. Chiarella about the boxed meals for sleeping car passengers paying premium prices and YES the Acela is underpriced but I guess they can being the rest of the system long distance & state svcs are the slush fund for these trains.
It’s not really clear as to whether first class pax will still be served an at-seat hot meal.
Today two Acela’s, 2110 and 2160, broke down between Washington and New York and the passengers had to be transferred to other trains. Not a good way to operate a premium train service. Information is on the Amtrak Northeast Twitter, @AmtrakNECAlerts .
And the most of the rest of the riders will be having a sandwich in a box handed to them soon, maybe as punishment for staying on the train for longer distances.
It seems like Amtrak tried this some years ago when Acela was new. It didn’t work out so well then, somewhat confirming that one of the advantages of trains is serving intermediate points. But we’ll see how this works out.
I just looked at Expedia for flights from LaGuardia to Regan on September 23 in the morning and returning in the afternoon. Both Delta and American has flights at 6, 7, 8 and 9 AM. The flight is about an hour and 15 minutes and there are still tickets available for $600 to $800 round trip, but not many. If you live on Manhattan and want to go to downtown Wash D. C, the Amtrak offering could be a lot cheaper and a lot more pleasant. Maybe Amtrak is under priced.
Correction to my last post. As of today, the saver fare on regional is $53, Acela is $173, more than three times the price. Points for regional 4k and change, Acela 6k and change.
Might have been a mistake, but I grabbed it.
I rarely ride the Acela because of the price point. It is more comfortable and has nice big windows but is not that much faster and a lot more money or points. I just made a reservation coming back from DC to NYP the end of October, needed to leave about the right time. The cash price on the non-stop Acela was more than twice the regional, but in points it was only about 50% more, about 2000 points, so I booked it. Looking forward to checking it out.
I feel snarky today: 1. I have never seen a train schedule that informs me “around” when my train will arrive. Never be late that way, huh? 2. These “unique amenities” will definitely get me aboard and must be costing Amtrak a bloody fortune – Let’s see, a cup of coffee, or a cup of hot water, or a “light” snack (can’t wait to see what they mean by “light”), or cart service (not free) similar, I suppose, to the candy butchers who used to ride the clockers between 30th street and North Philly – “Cigars, cigarettes, Baby Ruth, Clark Bar,…”, oh, and a phone charging kit, but that’s not free either – can’t bust the budget with the cheap fares these passengers are paying, can we?