RAILforum: How many miles per gallon (gallons per mile)?

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Posted by Konstantin (Member # 18) on :

I am wondering about passenger miles per gallon on Amtrak trains. I looked through some books and found absolutely no information on gas (diesel) mileage for locomotives.

How much fuel does a typical Amtrak locomotive, or Amtrak train use per mile?

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Elias Valley Railroad (N-scale) www.geocities.com/evrr

[This message has been edited by Konstantin (edited 08-25-2002).]

Posted by atsf3751 (Member # 1538) on :

A diesel locomotive with a 3,000+ gallon fuel tank can make it across BNSF's "transcon" (L.A. to Chicago) without a refill and still have a little left over. That's about 2200 miles which means that a typical locomotive uses somewhere around 1 gallon per mile once it gets the train moving. It will use more when starting or going uphill. Passenger locomotives have smaller fuel tanks, but probably similar fuel efficiency. The trains they haul are generally lighter, so they probably are a bit more fuel efficient, but probably not by much.

Posted by Konstantin (Member # 18) on :

Thank you atsf3751

That does not sound like as good of mileage as I thought. I was speaking to a long-distance bus driver. He drives a typical tour bus. He says it gets 5 miles per gallon, which ends up to be about 250 passenger miles per gallon. On a typical Amtrak train with two locomotives, it sounds like it is getting about 0.5 miles per gallon or better. I believe there are typically about 400 people on board, so that would make 200 passenger miles per gallon.

I realize that this is a very rough estimation.

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Elias Valley Railroad (N-scale)
www.geocities.com/evrr

Posted by Mr. Toy (Member # 311) on :

Konstantin, here's a table from the USDOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics which breaks down energy consumption per passenger mile. This table measures it in BTUs, rather than miles per gallon, since the energy contained in different sorts of fuel cannot be directly compared by volume.

Here is the link: http://www.bts.gov/btsprod/nts/Ch4_web/4-20.htm

Unfortunately,it doesn't go beyond 1998, but you can compare to years going back to 1960. The good news is that energy consumption per passenger-mile on trains beats out everything else, including motorcycles!!!

Here's the breakdown for 1998, BTUs per passenger mile:
Train: 2,138
Motorcycle: 2,330
Passenger car: 3,672
Bus: 3,729
Airline (domestic): 4,123

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Trust God, love your neighbor, and never mistake opinion for truth.
-Mr. Toy

The Del Monte Club Car

[This message has been edited by Mr. Toy (edited 08-27-2002).]

Posted by Buslady (Member # 1266) on :

If that bus driver was getting 5mpg on his bus he ain't driving that great. I get 7-9mpg on my MCI102DL3; Greyhound runs many of these types of buses.

quote:
Originally posted by Konstantin:
Thank you atsf3751
That does not sound like as good of mileage as I thought. I was speaking to a long-distance bus driver. He drives a typical tour bus. He says it gets 5 miles per gallon, which ends up to be about 250 passenger miles per gallon. On a typical Amtrak train with two locomotives, it sounds like it is getting about 0.5 miles per gallon or better. I believe there are typically about 400 people on board, so that would make 200 passenger miles per gallon.
I realize that this is a very rough estimation.

Posted by Konstantin (Member # 18) on :

That was interesting information Mr Toy. It is interesting to see how busses (The table calls them Transit busses, so I assume that means city busses rather than greyhound type) use quite a bit of fuel.

According to Buslady, the long distance busses use little fuel in terms of passenger miles per gallon.

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Elias Valley Railroad (N-scale)
www.geocities.com/evrr

Posted by Mr. Toy (Member # 311) on :

Yea, I looked at that again and realized it said transit bus. I should have caught that earlier, for I seem to recall reading somewhere that intercity busses come in closer to trains (and motorcycles).

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Trust God, love your neighbor, and never mistake opinion for truth.
-Mr. Toy

The Del Monte Club Car

Posted by wally (Member # 1910) on :

i looked at your reference, thank you.

But i wonder if you know where I could find a comparison of truck and rail frieght efficiency? The BTU per ton mile.