posted
Once upon a time, consists were (mildly)somewhat captive to their routes.
You could count on the 5-6 trainsets of the Super Chief/El Capitan (4 in motion and either 1 in cleaning at Chicago or 1 each in turn at Chicago and LA) being the same sets. Outside of the shopping of a car, the sets stayed together.
As I understand it, Amtrak's system has trains 3-4, the Grand Canyons, roll out of Chicago to DC as the Capitol Limited (?? on train title).
The upshot of this, for me last year, was simple and ugly: THE CAR CLEANERS IN DC AND CHICAGO sat down on the job Dec 23 and 24. None of the microphor holding tanks were emptied! By the time the WB got to KC on Christmas eve, my car was all but full. Over Christmas Day, it came down to almost every car save the Lounge had toilets out of service. By San Bernadino on December 26, not a toilet on the train was servicable.
And no, Amtrak did not give a service guarantee for that.
John who after that trip, saw Amtrak fall a bunch of notches in his opinion.
------------------ The City of Saint Louis (UP, 1967) is still my standard for passenger operations
posted
The Southwest Chief is the same consist from the Capitol Limited, however, an extra Sleeper and Coach are added to the rear in Chicago during peak travel periods. The train is usually all Superliner I, but a Superliner II does pop up occasionly.
Posts: 33 | From: Massachusetts | Registered: May 2002
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posted
Hey there SWC: I have never worked the SWC, as it is usually staffed out of LA. However, in all the time I have spent out in the Chicago yards, it did seem that most of the time, it was just the inbound #4 that was wyed, and became the next days #3. However, I have also noticed that because of a lot of our equipment shortages, a lot more changes have been happening. Hope this helps!
Posts: 92 | Registered: Nov 2002
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posted
Conversely, Allen, I did work the SWC this summer and also rode it as a pax in October and both times all but the rear coach and sleeper had operated as the Capitol LTD into Chicago.
btw, we know each other, send me an email rmiller22@wi.rr.com
quote:Originally posted by Southwest Chief: Thanks everyone for the info.
It seems that every time I'm on the SWC, that one sleeper is a II and the other is a I. Guess which one I get? I noticed that Superliner II sleepers on the SWC are usually asigned to long haul passengers(LA-Chicago and similar distances). Short haul, as in my case, get the I. Has anyone else noticed this?
[This message has been edited by Southwest Chief (edited 11-17-2002).]
It's mostly a mixed bag of equipment except a huge chunk of Superliner II cars got to the 4 Coast Starlight trainsets and the 2 Auto Train trainsets, plus the Sunset Limited seems to run with mostly Superliner II as it comes out of the Auto Train base.
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I noticed that Superliner II sleepers on the SWC are usually asigned to long haul passengers(LA-Chicago and similar distances). Short haul, as in my case, get the I. Has anyone else noticed this? 
