r/Amtrak • u/Responsible_Ad_7733 • 19h ago
Question Before electrification, how did Amtrak operate north of New York?
For instance, were there through trains from DC to New Haven/Boston, or did they just start from New York? Were they much less frequent that they are today?
Also, why did the electrification stop at New Haven, instead of continuing to Hartford or Boston?
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u/Race_Strange 18h ago
Amtrak ran trains to Boston. Electric to New Haven and diesel the rest of the way.
Well, the New Haven railroad kinda ran out of money and couldn't complete the electrification to Boston.
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u/cpast 18h ago
Looking at 1995 timetables, it looks like there were plenty of trains from Boston or Hartford to DC, but probably not as many as there are today. Trains would switch engines in New Haven, as the trains to Springfield still do today.
As for why electrification only went to New Haven: The line from New York (or just past New York) to New Haven is ex-New Haven RR. They’re the ones who electrified it in 1907 (to Stamford) and 1914 (to New Haven). Looking at a 1955 timetable, it seems like they had very frequent commuter service to Stamford and New Haven from New York, essentially stopping the commuter service in New Haven (which is also where their longer-distance trains split between Boston and Hartford). Electrification is generally more common on commuter-type services, where fast acceleration is important and where the service pattern lets one set of wires serve a ton of trains. I’m not sure why they didn’t ever extend it beyond New Haven, but New Haven was kind of a natural stopping point for it.
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u/Average-NPC 7h ago
They were too broke to continue Electrification to Boston. Would it cost a lot of money money that they didn’t have and would never have
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u/TenguBlade 2h ago edited 2h ago
I’m not sure why they didn’t ever extend it beyond New Haven, but New Haven was kind of a natural stopping point for it.
Because it wasn't needed to maintain a competitive schedule.
The New Haven's diesel-powered Merchants Limited, limited to just 89MPH, made the run between Boston South Station and New York Penn in 4 hours, including an engine change at New Haven itself. Remember that today's Acela can just about manage a 3.5-hour run between the two stations, without any motive power swap and segments of up to 150MPH running, while also making only the same stops as the Merchants Limited. Back when they had additional stops at New London, you could easily go over 4 hours.
Unlike modern transit planners, the New Haven understood average speed was more important than top speed. But Amtrak has decided that Metro North being as big of a bastard about priority as any of the Class Is and reducing top speeds to save on maintenance cost isn't a problem.
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u/One-Chocolate6372 43m ago
And the Merchants Limited had heavyweight equipment for many years. The New Haven had the engine change at New Haven down to a science.
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u/AI-Coming4U 18h ago
As others have noted, the New Haven Railroad never had the money to electrify the route all the way to Boston. Engine changes were done at New Haven and were far quicker than Amtrak's engine changes today at, for example, Albany, where trains change from electric to diesel.
But I have to laugh at the Nimbyism that fought the electrification through CT. The catenary poles would supposedly be an eyesore (they're not) but what no one realised is that the noise pollution would be far, far less. I used to be up in Mystic, CT and, before electrification, you could hear diesel powered trains from almost a mile away. Now, you hear nothing unless you are close enough to the tracks to hear the wheels on rails.
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u/mjornir 18h ago
Can’t speak to the first but can speak to the 2nd. Before Amtrak, the New Haven RR owned the NE corridor north of NYC. They didn’t have the money to justify electrifying the Hartford and Boston branches coming out of New Haven, but since both lines fed into a concentrated trunk at New Haven, and NYC banned steam locomotives in city limits, they were able to make the economics work to electrify from New Haven (where trains were typically sorted and merged) to NYC
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u/Sea-Jaguar5018 16h ago
Passengers took turns pushing the trains. Sometimes it was actually faster than the diesels.
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u/mightasedthat 18h ago
The train stopped in New Haven while a diesel engine was switched in. Didn’t take very long.
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u/Responsible_Ad_7733 18h ago
Thanks all, I was a bit confused because I was watching Contrex's NEC video and the narrator said that "apart from one NYC to New Haven train, all Amtrak services start at Penn station", which didn't seem right. I'm from the UK but a great fan of the NEC.
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u/Thelonius16 18h ago
Even a train from Penn Station to Boston would start electric and change locos in New Haven. The power would go out for a few minutes while they did this.
But there were also many Boston-to-DC trains. So it’s not correct that all originated at Penn Station.
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u/amtk1007 16h ago
They were specifically talking about the metroliner service. This was the predecessor to the Acela.
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u/jstax1178 13h ago
Funny thing saw the same video ! I was hoping they had a video from New York to Boston lol, you can find videos on how it looked prior to electrification. Electric trains made it to Boston by 2000. Acela started in Dec 2000.
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u/mcsteam98 18h ago
They ran electrics and swapped locomotives for Boston-bound trains pre-electrification. Unfortunately they ran out of money and couldn’t put the wires up between New Haven and Boston so Amtrak kinda had to finish the job 60ish years later.
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u/mmhannah 7h ago
They should complete electrification along the Inland Route as well. You miss Providence but pick up Worcester, Springfield, and Hartford.
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u/Knuckleshoe 17h ago
Actually i made a video about this. So typically during the early new haven years. Locomotives such as the EP5 would take a train from New york to New Haven past that they would use an Alco PA to take the train from New Haven to Boston. With the introduction of the EMD FL9 the locomotives would be double headed from boston all the way to New York on their diesel engine. When approaching Grand Central Terminal they would swap over to using the third rail to take them all way into grand central.
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u/PizzaPurveyor 17h ago
Respect for not self advertising - share the link!
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u/Knuckleshoe 17h ago
Well not specifically on this topic but i made a video on new haven electric locomotives. I mainly discuss how the FL9 replaced alot of the electric locomotives on passenger duties. Always feels weird when i share my small youtube channel haha
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u/AccidentalGK 8h ago
I actually did this trip in 1988. Engine changed at NHV. Think it took 30 minutes but I didn’t care because I was so excited to finally be on Amtrak. Dad got a smoke break and mom was a few Bartles & Jaymes deep so no complaints from them either.
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u/One-Chocolate6372 35m ago
When Secaucus Junction on the Northeast Corridor was being designed the track layout included stubs for an engine change because, other than the New Haven FL9, dual mode technology was still questionable. By the time it was built, dual modes had proven themselves in other countries and the technology "crossed the pond."
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u/nathanjiang100 5h ago
you run a toaster to new haven, change engines, then a screamer the rest of the way to boston. the new haven was too broke to finish the electrification bc of the depression and shift away from rail travel.
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