Amtrak is reintroducing fine dining and real china

Thanks for the tip on this read.  It's been years since I rode the Empire Builder from Chicago to Seattle and I enjoyed the update.  I'm happy to hear this route is alive and well.

Mike

GOOD.....   Sounds like its time to use some Amtrak points

Yeah. Lets be clear that fine dining is on long Distance [L.D.] trains going west from Chicago. East coast L.D.  trains have this...

Prepackaged and only heated airline food. Maybe next year? Amtrak will expand fine dining on the East Coast?

Yep that's what they did last time they lost dining cars, restore west of Chicago first, then east.

They ought to open up dining car service to coach passengers. I should be able to purchase a sit down meal on board.

Dining cars in the USA were never segregated by class until Amtrak began the practice.

My tax dollars are good enough to buy those diners and subsidize their operation. My money ought to be good enough to purchase a decent meal and have it served to me as well.

@Nick Chillianis posted:

They ought to open up dining car service to coach passengers. I should be able to purchase a sit down meal on board.

Dining cars in the USA were never segregated by class until Amtrak began the practice.

My tax dollars are good enough to buy those diners and subsidize their operation. My money ought to be good enough to purchase a decent meal and have it served to me as well.

I don't know where you got the idea that they're not. Although all meals are included with the fare for passengers in the sleeping cars, there's nothing to prevent passengers in the coaches from coming to the dining cars and purchasing a sit-down meal!

Here's part of the Empire Builder menu fro 2014:

@Nick Chillianis posted:

Nick,

In all of my trips on Amtrak over the years, I've always rode in coach (my mother, whenever she travelled alone always went via sleeping accommodations) and always had access to the Dining Car.  That went for the South Florida to/from New York/Boston trips, and even when I take the train to Winter Haven in Central Florida to visit the in-laws.  Even though the trip to Winter Haven was only 3-4 hours, I would always go straight to Dining Car once boarding and have breakfast or lunch depending on the time of departure from Fort Lauderdale.  Pricey?  Yes.  Restaurant quality?  Not really.  But to me, part of the thrill of riding the rails was eating in the Dining Car watching the scenery go by, so I always took advantage of it.

When riding coach I always had access to diner.

@Nick Chillianis posted:

Dining cars in the USA were never segregated by class until Amtrak began the practice.

My tax dollars are good enough to buy those diners and subsidize their operation. My money ought to be good enough to purchase a decent meal and have it served to me as well.

Nick,

When exactly did they begin this practice?  My Amtrak travel experience goes back to the 1980's.  Since then I have neither seen Amtrak exclude coach travelers from the dining cars, nor known of any policy that states that they do.

Your tax dollars are safe.  Gentle suggestion: Why don't you try taking a trip on Amtrak at some point to find this out yourself?

Mike

Just to chime in...

I recently rode AMTRAK coach, and had full access to the dining car.  No issues at all.

@EscapeRocks posted:

Just to chime in...

I recently rode AMTRAK coach, and had full access to the dining car.  No issues at all.

Thanks, David.  And how was the food?  :-}  Like Kevin, I especially enjoy the "dining" part of a train trip. Sadly, my last "dining" experience was having a microwave hamburger in the Cafe car on the way to Portland, ME.   But I did it 'cause that's part of the fun.  I'm definitely looking forward to eating something a bit better the next time.

TRRR

@TomlinsonRunRR posted:

Thanks, David.  And how was the food?  :-}  Like Kevin, I especially enjoy the "dining" part of a train trip. Sadly, my last "dining" experience was having a microwave hamburger in the Cafe car on the way to Portland, ME.   But I did it 'cause that's part of the fun.  I'm definitely looking forward to eating something a bit better the next time.

TRRR

This was a shorter route going east from Arizona.   It was that menu pictured above "pre packaged" stuff. It didn't bother me at all since I knew that's what I would get.

For me the fun was sitting at a table with a couple other people and enjoying conversation and views out the window while we ate.

I do look forward to redoing the trip we did as a family when I was just a kid in 1974 (I was 12):  Chicago to Los Angeles. I spent hours on end in the dome watching the world go by

Anyway, I digress.    The trip I took a couple months ago was pleasant.   The staff was cool.

@Mellow Hudson Mike posted:

Nick,

When exactly did they begin this practice?  My Amtrak travel experience goes back to the 1980's.  Since then I have neither seen Amtrak exclude coach travelers from the dining cars, nor known of any policy that states that they do.

Your tax dollars are safe.  Gentle suggestion: Why don't you try taking a trip on Amtrak at some point to find this out yourself?

Mike

I took a trip last August, with sleeping car accommodations and did eat in the diner.

I’m riding around again this year, in coach. Frankly, I didn’t find the sleeping accommodations worth it. I have disk issues in my neck and the 1-1/2 inches of padding on those berths wasn’t cutting it for me. One night, the pain got so bad that I asked the conductor if I could move to coach and sleep in the reclining seat instead.

i must have gotten bad information because I was told that the diner was for first class passengers and the lounge car was for the coach passengers.

The dining car “experience” was nothing special. After being asked if we were eating in and replying in the affirmative, we waited for quite a while until the attendant returned with our half-heated, half-semi-frozen entrees in a plastic bag and dropped, not placed, them on the table.

I’ll see if, as a coach passenger, I have access to the diner on this trip.

i will be happy to have been wrong.

Fortunately, I had one authentic dining car experience, on the Southern Crescent, in 1976 when Southern Railway ran the train. You would have to ride a private car to experience the premiere level of service that I, as an 18-year-old punk kid, received aboard that train. It was all linens, silverware, China and old school waiters with meals prepared from scratch on board, in a proper kitchen by proper chefs.

This is from the Amtrak website:

@NKP Muncie posted:

This is from the Amtrak website:

As an exclusive, complimentary offering for customers traveling in private rooms, traditional dining service is provided in the Dining Car on the Auto Train, California Zephyr, Coast Starlight, Empire Builder, Southwest Chief, Sunset Limited and Texas Eagle (between San Antonio and Los Angeles).

David

David,

I'm glad you posted this.  Commas can be dangerous in the wrong hands.  Additionally natural language, i.e. English, German, Japanese, is not well designed to ensure that interpretation is unambiguous.

From experience many of us know that this sentence was not intended to mean: "Passengers traveling in private rooms have exclusive, complementary access to the Dining Car, thereby excluding everyone else on the train."

Those of us that have traveled with Amtrak have seen this instead, in practice: "Passengers traveling in private rooms have complementary access to the Dining Car, with meals at no charge.  Everyone else on the train has access to the Dining Car as well but has to pay for their meals."

I guess that one of us will have to point this out to the Amtrak marketing staff.  Who's going to volunteer?

Mike

Great news! Now If they would only let me take my little dog into the sleeping car, I'd make Amtrak my go to mode of transportation between Florida and NY.

@Mellow Hudson Mike posted:

Those of us that have traveled with Amtrak have seen this instead, in practice: "Passengers traveling in private rooms have complementary access to the Dining Car, with meals at no charge.  Everyone else on the train has access to the Dining Car as well but has to pay for their meals."

I guess that one of us will have to point this out to the Amtrak marketing staff.  Who's going to volunteer?

The Amtrak website is correct, currently, traditional dining options are only open to sleeping car passengers. Coach passengers are still reduced to only the café car options. The plan is to eventually reinstate dining car options for coach passengers but the company is too short-staffed to allow both classes to enjoy the dining car. 

RJ,

Is there possibly an online link to your source for this revelation?

(Before I wrote my comments above I searched and could not find anything  that was clearly definitive on the topic.)

Mike

Here's a link to an Amtrak news release:

https://media.amtrak.com/2021/...ong-distance-routes/

My beef with Amtrak's wording in my earlier post is this: "Café service is also available to all customers along these routes...." Well, no — café service is not ALSO available to all customers — it is available to all customers. The dining car is, at present, only for those with rooms.

A story from Railway Age, with a quote from the Amtrak spokesman, explaining it:

https://www.railwayage.com/pas...ong-distance-trains/

David

@NKP Muncie posted:

Here's a link to an Amtrak news release:

https://media.amtrak.com/2021/...ong-distance-routes/

My beef with Amtrak's wording in my earlier post is this: "Café service is also available to all customers along these routes...." Well, no — café service is not ALSO available to all customers — it is available to all customers. The dining car is, at present, only for those with rooms.

A story from Railway Age, with a quote from the Amtrak spokesman, explaining it:

https://www.railwayage.com/pas...ong-distance-trains/

David

David,

Thanks for the links.  The change in practice originally came about because of the pandemic, and was missed by most of us in the process.

Mike

@Nick Chillianis posted:

My tax dollars are good enough to buy those diners and subsidize their operation. My money ought to be good enough to purchase a decent meal and have it served to me as well.

Nick,

Nevermind.  My apologies.  Please feel free to resume your rant.

Mike

Check out the Chef's Marketplace Special item - the garlic mashed tomatoes sounds delicious.

Must be something new.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bVpnUHGpFDk

George

@Mellow Hudson Mike posted:

Nick,

Nevermind.  My apologies.  Please feel free to resume your rant.

Mike

No apology necessary. I am able to confirm that this is still the practice as I am aboard Number 5 as I type this.

At this time, dining cars are exclusively for sleeping car passengers only.

That was also in effect, last August 13-23, when we had sleeping car accommodations.