Amtrak

Über, your personal driver is now in Maricopa serving Amtrak passengers to anywhere in Phoenix metro area at up to half the cost of a cab or airport shuttle.
New customers can sign up here for their first ride free (or credit of $ 20)

We didn’t ake the amtrak anywhere, but we did stop and look at their «Museum??» By museum, I mean the one busted down train car they have sitting on the side of the road. We had looked at prices to ride the amtrak, and I guess I don’t see the benefit since it is so expensive. Our kid was more excited watching the working trains go by every 10minutes on the active train tracks 30 yards from the «museum»

We recently took the Sunset Limited from Maricopa to New Orleans. We really enjoyed the sense of real travel that you don’t get in an airliner and the relaxation you don’t get when you drive a great distance.
First, a bit about Amtrak. Private companies bailed out of the passenger rail business for good in 1971 and Amtrak was formed as a government owned corporation. Passenger rail traffic had been declining since the 1920’s with the widespread use of the car and later, airliners. Private companies were losing money and decided to focus on freight. Amtrak has never broke even and has never been well capitalized. Even so Amtrak has managed to increase ridership consistently now to 30 million passengers a year and has improved on-​time performance. I, for one, am glad that there is a nation rail alternative. I am old enough to have travelled on some of the passenger trains run by Santa Fe, Southern Pacific, and Penn Central. They had considerably better service and amenities, so I do wish some of that could be incorporated into Amtrak.
We boarded one of the superliner sleeping cars (vintage 1980/90’s) and went to our bedroom. This is our favorite accommodation on Amtrak, it has two fold down beds, sink, shower, and toilet in the cabin. During the day, there is a wide couch and a reading chair. The rocking of the car makes sleeping easy. Included in the fare are all meals. In this case, out trip was about 30 hours long, so we ate 2 breakfasts, 2 lunches, and 1 dinner.
Dining for sleeper passengers is in the dining car. In the pre-​Amtrak days, there was an extensive cook to order menu. With Amtrak, it has been pared way down to about 6 items on each menu. The dining room is on the upper level of the car and the kitchen is in the lower level. Government run quirkiness begins in the dining car. Each passenger fills out the bottom of an imposing multipart form, which has all combinations and permutations of BLD. The waiter then fills out the boxes as you order. If there is any mistake or changes, an entirely new form must be filled out.
The food is not bad. It is above school lunch and below Denny’s. Service can vary from grumpy to very attentive. The coach passengers eat at the snack bar in the lounge car. As befits a fully vested government worker, Vinny (the snack bar guy), would announce over the PA at 12:30 that «he was about to take his meal break and would be back in an hour to reopen». Sure enough, Vinnie enters the dining car and sits down to take his meal right during lunch primetime for the coach passengers.
Much of the first day is traveling through Texas. At 8a, we arrive in El Paso. At 9p we arrive in San Antonio for a 3 hour layover. We were able to take a taxi to the Riverwalk (1 mi. away) and walk most of it.
Our cabin steward was a likable fellow, but no amount of cajoling could get him to actually service our bedroom in a timely manner. He had to spend too much time in the dining car or chatting. Kindly reminders were listened to and promptly forgotten.
The next day, we were in Louisiana most of the day. It was incredibly picturesque to travel through cajun country, sugar cane fields, and rice paddies. Our train arrived in New Orleans 1 hour ahead of schedule!
All in all it was a good trip. Much better than on an airliner (if you have the time). The employees range from very service oriented to plodding and self-​absorbed. The government run nature of the train was evident, but some employees would not let the system get them down and made great effort to serve.