COMME-N-TARY: Today’s Amtrak – How to Add Passenger Service to a Modern Era N Scale Railroad
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Today’s Amtrak operates a variety of service types, from short “locals” to long-distance sleeping car service. You can create prototypical passenger consists for your own railroad using readily-available models from a variety of manufacturers. John Drye is our N scale editor and columnist. Click here to learn more about John.
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mtrak was formed in 1971 to replace the individual railroad’s intercity passenger service. Today, it operates on over 21,000 miles of track in 46 states and three Canadian provinces while carrying almost 30 million passengers a year. Most of Amtrak operates with diesel locomotives on trackage owned by freight railroads. Service ranges from short trains with 3-6 coaches plus a single locomotive to long distance trains with two or more locomotives and a variety of coaches plus food service cars and sleepers; all the way to the world’s longest passenger train – the
Page 148 • Issue 8 • Jul/Aug 2010 • Comme-N-tary Column, page 1
FIGURE 1: Amtrak #195 arrives at the Amtrak station in Quantico, VA, home of the US Marine Corps. Virginia-to-Florida Auto Train that can include more than 30 passenger and automobile-carrying cars. The US’s national rail service has recently received an economic boost as part of the program to reinvigorate the economy. We’ll take a look at Amtrak equipment, some examples of Amtrak consists and modeling options for representing Amtrak on your own freight railroad.
Amtrak Equipment A number of N Scale manufacturers provide a selection of motive power and passenger equipment to allow those who model the modern era to include Amtrak service.
Diesel Locomotives Most of Amtrak’s trains outside the electrified Northeast Corridor are led by General Electric “Genesis”
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