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What happened to the Turboliners that Amtrak/NY had started to refurbish? I heard they completed 2, with a 3rd almost finished. Are they still around? What about the others? And who owns them?
20th Century Member # 2196
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I believe there was a disagreement between New York State and Amtrak as to who will assume the cost of certain facets. Amtrak decided not to run them because of it. If anyone is more informed please chime in. I rode the turboliner once in the late 70's from Grand Central Terminal to Utica N.Y. It was a very nice ride.
notelvis Member # 3071
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I don't know the particulars but from what I've deduced from snatches of information heard here and there, the refurbished Turbotrains did not live up to expectations and Amtrak removed them from service. The renovations have ceased. They are now in storage at Amtrak's Bear, DE shops near Wilmington. At one point Amtrak owned them but it seems like ownership may have passed to the state of New York.
The funds for renovations were provided by the state of New York which may have sued someone by now. NYDOT was incredibly unhappy with Amtrak for taking the turboliners out of the state and also terribly unhappy with the company doing the renovations.
I am certain that some of our regular posters in the northeast who are close to the story can give you better information
SubwayNut Member # 3948
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About 2-3 years ago their was an article in the New York Times about this program, and how it was flopping. I believe the problems were caused by issues in the air conditioning units. I do remeber walking up the Hudson River near the Empire Connection line (It leads from NYP up the Hudson joining metro-north) and saw one go by.
I believe the State of New York was suing Amtrak for not upholding their contract to run the service, and for moving the cars out of state.
George Harris Member # 2077
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this has been fairly extensively discussed in the past. There may be some sort of search function on this site, but I have never tried to even find it. I believe that a brief summuary of the debacle revolves around the deal being made under Warrington and having many financial holes and assumptions and also being of doubtful benefit to anybody except the politicians that got the rebuilding work to be done in his home district.
These trains have been from the beginning high-maintenance fuel hogs, and by now they are old high-maintenance fuel hogs. So, unless they resulted in a huge increase in ridership, also doubtful due to their fixed consist, in the end they would result in a net revenue reduction. Also, it presumed that CSX would do some things to increase track capacity and speed without being adequately paid for it. That was not going to happen. These are just a couple of high points. There was quite a bit more.
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