CHICAGO — Midwest Amtrak service has resumed after a storm stretching from Arkansas to the East Coast disrupted routes with downed trees and power outages. Beginning Friday, March 31, many trains were held at stations while tracks and grade-crossing highway warning devices were cleared and inspected.
Weather issues continued today (Sunday, April 2), when catenary was brought down west of Philadelphia, resulted in the cancellation of Keystone Corridor service to and from Harrisburg, and a bus bridge for the Pennsylvanian. WPMT-TV reports a downed tree was at fault.
City held overnight
The longest en-route delays occurred to north- and southbound Friday departures of the City of New Orleans. They were held overnight and well into Saturday morning at Memphis, Tenn., and Carbondale, Ill., respectively, while Canadian National’s ex-Illinois Central tracks across the Ohio River and through Fulton, Ky. were cleared of debris and deemed safe.
Train No. 58 arrived into Chicago at 12:54 a.m. Sunday morning, 15 hours, 39 minutes late. Its southbound counterpart rolled into New Orleans at 11:55 p.m., 9 hours, 38 minutes late.
Equipment from the northbound morning arrival normally flips at the Windy City to the southbound evening departure the same day. Assessing the situation, Chicago shop forces were able to cobble together a fourth City of New Orleans trainset of at least seven Superliners so Saturday evening’s New Orleans-bound train could depart.
This is significant, because lack of available equipment following numerous recent disruptions on routes of the California Zephyr, Empire Builder, Southwest Chief and Texas Eagle have caused cancellations that cascaded for a week [see “Amtrak service begins to return …,” Trains News Wire, March 26, 2023].
Midwest impact
Also on Friday, the company moved in advance to truncate the Eagle in both directions between Fort Worth and St. Louis, before tornadoes caused destruction and fatalities along the train’s route near Little Rock, Ark. Service resumed over Union Pacific’s tracks through Arkansas the following day.
Three Chicago-St. Louis Lincoln Service trains were impacted in central Illinois. After southbound late-afternoon train No. 305 was held 3 hours at Bloomington-Normal, Ill., it cautiously proceeded south, immediately followed by evening No. 307. Both trains met northbound No. 306, which had been held for 6 hours at Springfield, Ill. The resulting early-morning arrivals ranged from 4 hours late to St. Louis for No. 307 to 7 hours, 10 minutes late into Chicago for No. 306, which arrived in Chicago at 6:15 a.m. Only one Chicago-St. Louis round trip was canceled Saturday.
Mechanical issues contribute
Other lengthy delays to long-distance trains were triggered by a combination of equipment problems and mandated operating-crew rest, as well as weather. Friday’s westbound California Zephyr left Chicago 5 hours late due to “mechanical issues,” and lost another 5 hours across Illinois, Iowa, and Nebraska to speed restrictions and mandated crew rest.
Its 5:30 p.m. Denver departure Saturday and 7:37 a.m. Salt Lake City arrival Sunday morning almost exactly mimicked scheduled times of Rio Grande’s overnight Prospector, discontinued in 1967. The westbound Zephyr was running more than 9 hours late across Nevada today
Weather-related restrictions also hobbled Friday night’s eastbound Lake Shore Limited by 3 hours across western Ohio. The train lost another 4 hours at Syracuse following a mechanical breakdown, arriving into New York City after midnight instead of 6:42 p.m.
East Coast issues
As the storm moved east, the Saturday afternoon Northeast Regional departure from Roanoke, Va., was delayed more than an hour north of Lynchburg, Va., by a downed tree. Several trains were held north and south of Baltimore on the Northeast Corridor Saturday evening because of “signal issues and weather conditions.”
Early today, the Pittsburgh-New York Pennsylvanian and all Keystone corridor service was cancelled between Philadelphia and Harrisburg, Pa., for the rest of the day a large tree brought down catenary on the right-of-way near Radnor, Pa., 13 miles west of Philadelphia. Pennsylvanian passengers were bused across the outage. According to the Amtrak NEC Alerts Twitter feed, all trains were expected to be running by Monday morning.
Update: Amtrak will not resume Keystone service until Monday AM. SEPTA also will not resume rail service until Monday AM. This seems to involve SEPTA’s ENTIRE Paoli-Thorndale line.
There is local bus service along the entire SEPTA route although potential riders should know the schedules and transfer points before riding.
The downed tree on Amtrak’s Harrisburg Line also affected SEPTA’s service beyond Malvern on the way to Thorndale Saturday. There was no SEPTA bus bridge because SEPTA has schedulled bus service between Malvern, [change at Exton], Thorndale and Downingtown. There seems to have been no Amtrak service other than the Daily Pennsylvanian, not even a bus shuttle between SEPTA’s bus service at Downingtown and Harrisburg. [Note: Krapf Group is a bus operator in nearby West Chester.]