Finally! I saw these new trains stationed at Philadelphia Train Station. They're beautiful. I just wished they could operate at real high speed throughout the NEC.
The fact they don't mention they are any faster is disappointing. I'm all for a better cabin experience (I take the Acela at least once a month) although first class was perfectly acceptable. Much better than flying.
> In the coming months, Amtrak will be operating both the current Acela equipment and the NextGen Acela trains as the new trains transition into the fleet.
I do hope that at the time of booking they make it clear which Acela it is. Airlines do this: they usually mention the type of plane while booking. I might just do a trip on the new Acela to experience the train.
Love how they mention they’re built in the US by union workers…likely at 10x the cost of making them elsewhere. Modern day unions in the US is not what you think they are. They are the reason why we can’t have fast infrastructure upgrades. People in Japan/Korea/EU figured it out why can’t we have them here in the US?
Great news! I hope prices go back down a bit thanks to the extra capacity. I used to take Acela 3 times a week about a decade ago and they were rarely completely full. Now they're more expensive and fully booked much of the time, which is a real shame.
Unfortunately, this doesn't seem like it will speed up travel much at all.
Based on my understanding, travel times in the northeast are limited not by the top speed of the trains, but by the tracks, and the fact that freight is prioritized.
I have traveled a fair amount via Amtrak, and in general, I don't really like their newer cars. The old ones were fabric, huge bathrooms, spacious and comfy. The double decker ones had a feeling like you were almost in a traveling apartment. These new ones feel like the new plane interiors: more cramped, more plastic, etc. Nothing to scream at the sky about, but solidly a step down IMO. Maybe I'm just getting old lol. I suspect they are more economical though, and therefore more profitable.
As others have noted, the bigger bottleneck on the Northeast Corridor is the tracks themselves (or more precisely, a small number of problematic old railroad bridges and tunnels). Amtrak has been moving to replace them under the Gateway project[1], but it's a significant undertaking given how critical the existing lines are.
I don’t really see what’s newsworthy. Acela already runs in the NE corridor and many trains have outlets. Other than the 27% increase in trains, it’s hard to tell what’s different
The cutting edge for high-speed rail around the world is 350 km/h, with the fastest lines having average speeds (taking stops into account) of about 275 km/h. At those speeds, it would take:
* DC to NYC: 80 minutes.
* NYC to Boston: 80 minutes.
* NYC to Toronto: 2 hours and 45 minutes.
* NYC to Chicago: 4 hours and 35 minutes.
That would put a massive dent in air travel. One can only dream, I guess.
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[ 2.5 ms ] story [ 35.1 ms ] threadEveryone's using ChatGPT these days.
I do hope that at the time of booking they make it clear which Acela it is. Airlines do this: they usually mention the type of plane while booking. I might just do a trip on the new Acela to experience the train.
Based on my understanding, travel times in the northeast are limited not by the top speed of the trains, but by the tracks, and the fact that freight is prioritized.
[1]: https://amtraknewera.com/gateway/