Anyone ride the Amtrak Acela high speed train?

I'm headed to the NEC (Northeast Corridor) and have booked a ride on the Acela? I am going to ride the whole length from DC to Boston.

Ever since its launch, I've been meaning to get on board the fasted train in America. This is where we are a bit behind compared to our European and Japanese counterparts.

I splurged a bit and upgraded to First Class. They say the food is better aside from more room and the separate waiting areas. Any advice, tips for this first time high speed rail traveler?

Of course I'll have a few lights on me. LOD CE on 10440 on my keychain, a SureFire E1B Backup on my hip, a Z2 with Malkoff M60, the Kroma and the M6 with fresh cells on standby in my bag.

UPDATE: Pics shown further down and the video I shot from the trip finally uploaded to YouTube.

I've never had the opportunity to travel by rail, but it sounds like fun. Take some pictures!

DieselTech said:

I've never had the opportunity to travel by rail, but it sounds like fun. Take some pictures!

Click to expand...

Will do. I plan on taking some video as well. Want to try to capture it at top speed confirming on GPS in the little stretch of the journey where it hits 150mph I think.

EV_007 said:

Any advice, tips for this first time high speed rail traveler?

Click to expand...

I have one-be prepared to be glued to the window for the entire ride. I've never ridden Acela, but I did ride Amtrak's regional NEC trains back in the 1980s as they honored my monthly commuter ticket. It was lots of fun when they would get to 125 mph, even in one case in excess of 130 mph (I timed mile markers to determine the speed as GPS was nonexistant back then). This is such a great way to travel it pains me that we don't have electrified passenger rail travel nationwide. So much nicer than loafing along in a car, bouncing around an Interstate full of potholes.

Let us know what your train does on that 150 mph segment. Most of the ride however is at 110 to 135 mph but there are still unfortunately lots of much slower segments. Congress is in the process of appropriating up to $14 billion to hopefully get the NYC-Washinton run times down to 2 hours (still not world class but better than the current 2:40 or so). Let's hope this kind of thing becomes the norm in the US. Japan has been doing it since 1964, France since 1982.

EV_007 said:

I'm headed to the NEC (Northeast Corridor) and have booked a ride on the Acela? I am going to ride the whole length from DC to Boston.

Ever since its launch, I've been meaning to get on board the fasted train in America. This is where we are a bit behind compared to our European and Japanese counterparts.

I splurged a bit and upgraded to First Class. They say the food is better aside from more room and the separate waiting areas. Any advice, tips for this first time high speed rail traveler?

Of course I'll have a few lights on me. LOD CE on 10440 on my keychain, a SureFire E1B Backup on my hip, a Z2 with Malkoff M60, the Kroma and the M6 with fresh cells on standby in my bag.

Click to expand...

I've taken the Acela when I went on business from NYC to Boston. It's a very nice atmosphere, but the business class seats are smaller than the business class seats on regular trains.

The ride was smooth and quiet. It was winter, and evening-time, so I never got to watch the scenery... but it was cool to see the train quickly passing cars on a parallel highway, which were traveling >70mph.

I have been on it, and while it supposedly can go 150mph, last time I talked to the conductor, it averages more like 70mph. Part of the problem are old track that has not been fully updated yet. It is a minor step up in travel quality over business class, saving you about 20-30 mins between NYC and Boston.

Make sure you check Amtrack's schedule, because there are some down days as they are replacing track and bridges in June. There are several days where during bridge replacement, they will stop all service in New London, CT and put you on a bus to go to next station in Rhode Island.

Back a few years I used to ride it a lot. It was nothing special in my book. As another poster said I don't think they go as fast as they advertise, or if they do it is only for a short stretch. I think you only save like 20 minutes from NY to DC over the normal train. I prefer to sit in the quiet car which is available on most coach trains to the Acela Express.

Just got back from riding the Acela. Will have to download videos I shot. All in all it was a fun ride. True, the train rarely, if at all hit the 150mph mark, although we were pulling a lot more cars than normal and the the weather was foggy.

Meals were good and served on real dishes. Nice touch. Waiting in the separate first class area with WiFi access and food and drink was nice alternative to waiting in the busy cattle call style general lobby.

Will upload video and post link soon.

Re: Anyone ride the Amtrak Acela high speed train? Pics added

Here are some pics from my Acela ride.



Quick shot from within First Class car. meals are served at seatside.



The Bistro or Cafe car where they have small stools to discourage long term seating. This is where I like the standard Amtrak Dining cars better for their booth style seating.



I was impressed with the bathroom. It did not look utilitarian as the standard Amtrak train bathrooms on board with the stainless steel "space station" look to it.




OH, a quick shot of some of my "junk" I brought with me. The scanner came in handy when we were delayed and I was able to listen to the chatter. HD camcorder used to document trip along with iPod. And of course the Garmin GPS 60Csx to determine position and speed as well.




This is the First Class Club Acela lounge in Union Station Washington D.C. Wi-Fi and snacks along with a quiet, comfy waiting area separate from the busy cattle call main hall is what you get when opting for First Class. I think sleeper car passengers on standard Amtrak and some Airline premier members have access to these lounges as well.








Boston's Club Acela is pretty impressive with the old style ceilings and more spread out design which looks over the main waiting area.

I will have to check out Penn Station's lounge on my next trip.

and the video I shot from the trip finally uploaded to YouTube.

Exellent post EV_007! and the vid is a nice touch as well, now I just need a reason to catch a train! (high gas prices might do it lol)

great job!:wave:

Mayo

Pretty cool. Thanks for taking the time to snap some photos and video for us!

Glad you guys liked it. I thought that it would be a lot faster than the standard express, but as mentioned, you only beat the regular trains by a half hour or so.

However, the newer, sleeker design of the Acela with excellent service on board makes it all worth while.

Next time I'm going to take it into New York and check out their lounge.

I had video of me flying on board the Concorde, but cannot find the video clips I stored on my PC. When I find it I'll post it as well. One of my PCs crashed and I had to reformat, I'm hoping it is not that one.

jtr1962 said:

I have one-be prepared to be glued to the window for the entire ride. I've never ridden Acela, but I did ride Amtrak's regional NEC trains back in the 1980s as they honored my monthly commuter ticket. It was lots of fun when they would get to 125 mph, even in one case in excess of 130 mph (I timed mile markers to determine the speed as GPS was nonexistant back then). This is such a great way to travel it pains me that we don't have electrified passenger rail travel nationwide. So much nicer than loafing along in a car, bouncing around an Interstate full of potholes.

Let us know what your train does on that 150 mph segment. Most of the ride however is at 110 to 135 mph but there are still unfortunately lots of much slower segments. Congress is in the process of appropriating up to $14 billion to hopefully get the NYC-Washinton run times down to 2 hours (still not world class but better than the current 2:40 or so). Let's hope this kind of thing becomes the norm in the US. Japan has been doing it since 1964, France since 1982.

Click to expand...

Even thought it did not stay at top speed very much, it was nice not having to stop at every station along its route.

Now if they put in a MAG-LEV, then we would be talking serious competition to the airlines. Which brings me to another point, compared to flying that same distance, this was a much nicer experience. No long security lines, delays or lost luggage. People seemed to be in a more relaxed mood instead of the nervous shuffle you see at airports.

jtr1962 said:

Let us know what your train does on that 150 mph segment. Most of the ride however is at 110 to 135 mph but there are still unfortunately lots of much slower segments. Congress is in the process of appropriating up to $14 billion to hopefully get the NYC-Washinton run times down to 2 hours (still not world class but better than the current 2:40 or so). Let's hope this kind of thing becomes the norm in the US. Japan has been doing it since 1964, France since 1982.

Click to expand...

Did I hear that correctly? $14,000,000,000 to let a few thousand passengers a day get there 20 minutes faster?

And since it will usually be the same people riding it all the time, we're talking thousands or tens of thousands of dollars per passenger in improvements???? This does not seem to be a viable way to go.

Daniel

gadget_lover said:

Did I hear that correctly? $14,000,000,000 to let a few thousand passengers a day get there 20 minutes faster?

And since it will usually be the same people riding it all the time, we're talking thousands or tens of thousands of dollars per passenger in improvements???? This does not seem to be a viable way to go.

Click to expand...

No, 40 minutes faster and we're probably taking about hundreds of thousands of passengers a day since the commuter rail lines which also share the NEC trackage will benefit. NJTransit is in the process of designing a faster-accelerating, 110 mph EMU which will get its NYC-Trenton local's running time from the present ~75 to 80 minutes down to about 59 minutes. That's 59 minutes to go 58 miles on a local. You can imagine how much of an impact knocking that much time off will have on attracting passengers. When the train is as fast as driving, even counting stops, it's suddenly a very attractive option. 2 hours NYC-Washington on the Acela door-to-door beats flying by a large margin, too. Think of all those NYC-Washingtom shuttles taken out of the air by this. In fact, I doubt such a thing will exist when the running times are 2 hours. The Paris-Lyons flights disappeared soon after the LGV Sud-Est was opened in 1982.

Hundreds of thousands of pax a day, maybe 100 million trips a year, and these improvements should last at least as long as the original Penn-Central catenery which dates from the 1930s. That's well under $1 per trip which these improvements will cost once the new ridership is factored in. Unlike EVs and plug-in hybrids the corridor is offering clean, fast trasnportation to millions annually right now, not at some indeterminant time in the future.

I'll also add that the old Pennsy catenary has to be replaced anyway, so it makes sense to also do other upgrades. $14 billion is a bargain when you consider what it buys. Rail transportation in general is a bargain in the proper market.

Never went on the Acela (obviously), but I did ride on the italian version of a high speed train, the so-called Pendolino (frst version). It was supposed to reach 200 or 220 km/h, don't really remember. What I do remember is that I was disappointed at the apparent... quietness of it all. Just like a normal train. Actually quieter, as our normal trains are clanging, screeching heaps of junk, but still.

There are so many ways to amortize the cost of a transport system:
passenger miles vs passengers per day vs unique passengers per day/month/year.....

When I look at the SF Bay Area Rapid Transit's claims of 350,000 passengers (max) per weekday, I divide by two, since these are largely commuters who travel both ways. Because it's used mostly by commuters, it's the same 170,000 people who are using it all year round, so only those 170,000 people out of the many millions in the area that get direct benefit. I'm guessing that the "Hundreds of thousands of pax a day" breaks out the same way.

But we should talk about that in a different thread.

Back on subject:

I'd love to experience a high speed train like the Acela. We don't have anything close to it around here. We do have rail lines going in all 4 cardinal directions, but all of them are either normal speed or multiple stops..

The last time I took a tain long distance I was a child, and I loved it.



Daniel

The Acela isn't perfect, but it is a good start. I can't think of a more efficient way to move mass amounts of people consistently than a rail system. Just look at the New York subway system.

However, we Americans are so in love with our cars, well, maybe not at 4+ dollars per gallon...