Trains

This is blog #420 for me, but I already did the “legalize it” blog, so no “420” connection this time around.

The other week I drove my ’76 Firebird down to Stafford to have the floorpans replaced.   The shop had no means of chauffeuring me back up to Falls Church, so I had to take the train up to Union Station and the Metro out to Falls Church.   After some confusion on the platform – apparently VRE/Amtrak isn’t set up to allow you to simply buy a ticket and get on a train – I was able to sit back and leisurely watch the train choo-choo-choo its way past Quantico and up to DC.   Although the route is theoretically parallel to 95, which I’m very familiar with, the rail lines pass miles off from the highway and show a radically different picture than the 8 lane highway.

It reminded me how rarely I take the train.   It’s completely impractical for intercontinental travel (take the plane) or even long distances in the US (e.g. L.A. or Florida).   For the area it is useful, East Coast USA, driving is more practical and much cheaper. 

More of my train experiences are from living in Europe.   Two ski trips to Switzerland; one school trip to Italy; a family trip to Lourdes, France; a family trip to Normandy on June 6, 1984; and a much later ski trip to Garmisch, Germany.   The Garmisch and Normandy trip were day trips, whereas the others were overnight.  I’ve already explained how, even in a sleeper car with a “bunk” the clip-clop of the train prevents much real sleep.   I’ve never been in a sleeper car in the US.

US train travel has been: NYC In summer 1988, a quick trip to Philadelphia in 1992 to drop off legal documents to local counsel in a NJ case; and this most recent trip back up from Fredericksburg.  Thus a 4 hour voyage was the longest I’ve taken on a train in the US.   Like buses, trains have NO security, aside from the conductor who simply makes sure you have a ticket and aren't an overdressed hobo.  You just get on.   No metal detectors, no surly TSA goons, no erotic x-ray machines.   That much I can appreciate.

The train is the oldest form of cross-country travel we have in the US.  It predates the Wright Brothers, Model T’s, commercial aviation and buses.   Even if the cars are brand new with Wi-Fi and electrical outlets, the travel mode itself is nineteenth century.   No matter how new the cars are, they’re not as modern as a jumbo jet, nor as modern as buses, which give a 50s-70s vibe no matter what.   Face it: to Americans, trains are by their nature “old-fashioned.”   Even if you’re commuting to your dot.com job carrying your laptop, you may as well be Harold Hall going to River City, Iowa, in 1912 to scam the locals with a band uniform & equipment sale.

So here’s my advice for Amtrak.   RETRO the trains.   Give us the turn of the century look, on every train, going everywhere.   Commuter train?  Yep.  Sleeper car?  Give us the Pullman look.  Cross-country train – you mean they still have those? – fool us into thinking Butch Cassidy or the Lone Ranger will be making an appearance.   The kids can imagine it’s the Hogwarts Express.  Keep the Wi-Fi and the outlets, keep modern technology under the surface, but please, please, please, give us the retro deal inside.   Hell, you can keep the diesel locomotive and not the steam (Punk) engine, as we really can’t see them when we’re inside the train anyway. 

Bullet trains.  I haven’t been to Japan, so I can’t comment on those.   Nor have I been on the TGV, France’s equivalent.  They sound cool, but the expense of doing that in the US with no guarantee that anyone would ride it more than once, makes it unlikely that we’ll see that here in the US. 

Toy trains.  I suppose I should cover this topic.  My dad loved these, but he couldn’t pass that passion on to my brother or sister, or me.  For that matter, neither my nephew nor my nieces show any interest in this either.   And even if I see a well-built setup, with tunnels, stations, switches, water towers, etc., no matter what the scale, my impression is still nothing more than a bored, “that’s nice.”