Rail Britannia: Newly found pix reveal train travel was once glorious experience, not shabby ordeal

The Daily Mail (U.K.) / various ^ | December 12, 2008

[Stoat]

Actually, the first class cars on the Penn were quite nice back in the day as well.

My mother has fond memories as that also  :-)

Nevertheless, I still prefer the Acela to any of the airlines when I need to go to DC.

 

Very stylish....I hope that they will be able to keep it going.

[Stoat]

As a youngster I grew up in Canada. I’m old enough to remember coal fired steam trains & cabooses. As a kid I was always fascinated when watching station masters stand on the train platform, hold up a pole with a loop on the end, the train engineer would catch it as the train passed the platform by hooking his arm through it. There was a message attached to the hook pole, this was back when the telegraph (dit daa dit daa dit dit) was still being used to communicate between RR stations. No radio communication with the train engineer.

Wonderful memories of a gentler time.  Thank you so much for posting  :-)

[Stoat]

Heading to Chicago on AMTRAK over Christmas .... roomette and all ..!!!

I hope that you'll have a wonderful time and that everyone will treat you well  :-)

[dalereed]

Just an improvement on the stage coach waiting for aircraft to put them out of business!

rail travel sucks!

[JRios1968]

One of the better known engines from the GWR

Can you tell I have kids?

[Stoat]

One of the better known engines from the GWR

Kids are quite often rather adept at picking out the better things in life  :-)

 

[StormEye]

Does anyone here think that Biden will still ride the Acela to Delaware. He's so green conscious you know.

[Stoat]

Has Biden ‘ever’ passed up on a photo op? :-)

[Publius]

I've traveled Amtrak cross country many times. Empire Builder between Seattle anmd Chicago. Then the Lake Shore Limited or the Capitol Limited or even the Three Rivers (when it was running), any of which would get me between Chicago and Philly. I've only had one bad trip in 11 years.

I've done the Coast Starlight between Seattle and L.A. on a number of occasions, and I only had one bad trip, which was caused by 9/11. (But if it hadn't been for Amtrak, I would have been stranded in San Jose for a few weeks.)

I've taken Acela service between Philly and New York, and Philly and Washington. All the trips were just fine.

Amtrak gets a bad press, and only some of it is deserved.

[neb52]

I think the big part of the bad press is the lack of understanding concerning the sharing of lines with the freight companies outside the New England Corridor. Having to sit aside for hours or even a day to wait for a freight train to come through can ruin your day, not to mention that it makes hotel reservations undoable. For us “West of the Mississippi” people a lack of a SE to NW route makes Amtrak useless. Looking at the map, most of the lines WotM is designed to feed back into Chicago. We really could use a route from Fort Worth through Denver and then maybe cutting across to Seattle.

[Mercia]

hmm, very cool. I do like a bit of train travel, but you have to really be careful which lines you use. The east coast mainline is appalling, creaking trains and smells of urine all the time. The Central line, or the Arriva North Western's are excellent. Fast trains, good service. If you want to chance your arm you can sometimes get away with sitting in 1st Class and not get challenged.... Keep that one under your hat though... UK recently built her 1st steam loco for 50 years, here is a link to the story. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A1_Steam_Locomotive_Trust

[tommix2]

I remember traveling by train to Calgary and Edmonton in the winter, going over the bridge at Lethbridge, Alberta. Quite an experience. And I traveled with my parents by train in the early thirties from Denver to New York and back. It was all steam then. And I got to ride in the engine and watch the fireman shovel the coal into the firebox, Had to keep that fire going hot to maintain steam to keep enogh power to pull all the cars behind.

I had forgotten about the pole with the loop for messages that you mentioned. Lots of memories come back.

[Guenevere]

bttt

[nd76]

I’m a railroad enthusiast too.

This year, I was lucky enough to spend 9 glorious days in Japan, and rode on three of the shinkansen (bullet train) lines—I did Niigata on the Joetsu line, Utsunomiya (on the way to Nikko) on the Tohoku line, and Kyoto, Osaka and Kobe on the Tokaido & Sanyo line. I had an unlimited ride pass for green car (first class) travel. It was remarkable.

I also was in France, and took the TGV from Charles de Gaulle airport to Lyon, 336 miles in 2 hours 6 minutes with one stop. I took a small local train up the Rhone valley to Geneva (2 hour ride), then took the Elipsos Trenhotel which left Geneva around 2330 and arrived the next morning in Barcelona at 1000. That was a fantastic experience.

I also rode on the new Spanish AVE trains; the Barcelona-Madrid run, which covers something like 420 miles, stops five times and starts at maybe 100 feet above sea level and ends at about 2,100 feet above sea level, took just 3 hours 17 minutes—there was even a digital speed readout at the end of the car in which I was riding, and the speed got as high as 301 kmph (187 mph). The Madrid-Cordoba-Sevilla run is also amazing.

I’ve done the Eurostar also in the past. That is really worth doing—the new London terminal (at St. Pancras International Station, next to Kings Cross) is beautiful, and they still haven’t finished all the work on it.

There is one really good train line in the UK to ride on, and that is the London Kings Cross-York-Newcastle-Edinburgh line served by National Express Kings Cross (the former operator, GNER, went broke). Virgin Trains out of Euston Station have good service to places like Manchester (they used to have a great breakfast in first class). Most trains in the UK are commuter class—they may or may not have small first class sections, where the seating is no different than standard class, but are “exclusive” and glassed off. Next month I’m going to London and have bought a four day standard class rail pass, since on the routes I’m traveling there’s not much difference between first and standard classes.

I take Amtrak’s Capitol Limited once or twice a year on the 16 hour run between Washington and northern Indiana; I ususally take my own picnic and adult beverages, get into my roomette, and stay there until Indiana. Wonderful.

[mysterio]

Airplanes never had windows that large. Especially ones that could be opened. The photo was probably taken as the train was going over a bridge or something.

[SkyDancer]

I think it’s going to be fun - restaurant, dome car, bar ...and you can get away to your roomette if you want ...

[Stoat]

very cool.

I'm delighted that you've found it to be worthwhile, and thank you for your info as well  :-)

More on the Tornado here:

Really chuffed First full-size British steam locomotive for 50 years fires up

[Stoat]

I’m a railroad enthusiast too.

WOW! You certainly are  :-)

Thanks very much for the interesting information....it all sounds like grand fun!

[Stoat]

I think it’s going to be fun - restaurant, dome car, bar ...and you can get away to your roomette if you want ...

I'm sure it will be!  A great way to travel and see the country.

[sinsofsolarempirefan]

Does every single thread involving Britain have to be ‘hijacked’ by idiots who are obsessed with muslims?