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There's something alarming and charming about the latest in the not-working Acela soap opera. The high-speed trains, which are popular plane alternatives for New Yorkers traveling to DC and Boston, are out of service for the next week because of cracks found in the brakes. Now, it seems that the company that made the trains don't have enough disc brakes in stock! Amtrak needs to replace 300 of the 1400 brakes, and Canadian train manufacturer Bombardier only has 80 brakes. A Bombardier spokesman said that the life of a disc brake should be 1 million miles, but Amtrak says the trains have only gone half that distance. Which makes Gothamist wonder what kind of warranties Amtrak has on the trains. And we wonder what this will mean for President Bush's proposal to cut Amtrak funding (it's totally in the red) and privatize the trains.
This story also remind Gothamist of how only two companies in the world can help replace parts for the subway's signal system. It must be nice to be so specialized.
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High Speed my ass. I’ve taken it from Penn Station to Boston and its usually late. It was more worth it taking the LimoLiner Bus (Which I Extremely recommend for any NY - Boston Trip).
Thing is you have a high speed train running on Quasi High speed tracks which it has to share with Metro North, Conn Rail and even NJ Transit only the way to Washington, so its basically being delayed by slower trains in front of it.
Then there are so many turns on the line that it can’t even run at its designed high speed most of the time. High speed trains such as the Shinkansen, French TVG, and the Eurostar mostly avoid the turns by blasting through mountains or going through communities to ensure the fastest and smoothest ride. The entire Acela Service is Half baked, but Its still impressive considering how cash strapped Amtrak is.
What's tragicomical about Acela is that between NY and DC, the fares are twice as much as regular trains ($147-156 vs $76 one way) but they only save about 30 minutes each way.
Meanwhile, if you can handle a little discomfort and Chinatown chaos, you could do the same trip for $20 ($35 round trip).
Amtrak is one of the many bains of my existence...