Amtrak has turned down a private company’s proposal for a transcontinental passenger train that would have also hauled vehicles on a 72-hour coast-to-coast schedule.
WPMT-TV reports that Amtrak said in a statement that it reviewed the proposal from AmeriStarRail and “found it to be lacking a fundamental business case to support its lofty proposal.”
Earlier this year, AmeriStarRail proposed partnering with Amtrak on a “Transcontinental Chief” train offering 72-hour service between New York and Los Angeles. The train, to launch in 2026, called for drive-aboard service for truckers and Auto Train features for passenger cars and other vehicles, including charter buses.
Under its plan, the new train would have replaced Amtrak’s Southwest Chief and Pennsylvanian using existing Amtrak equipment and freight cars from the TTX pool owned by railroads. Amtrak declined comment when the proposal was released.
AmeriStar is one of several entities that have proposed private passenger trains to run on tracks owned by Amtrak or freight railroads. It regularly proposes changes to Northeast Corridor passenger service, including privately funded high speed trains, new infrastructure, and three-class high-speed service. Those proposals either do not address funding or do so only in general terms.
The last U.S. transcontinental passenger train was Amtrak’s Sunset Limited, which operated from Los Angeles to Orlando until 2007 when the route east of New Orleans was terminated following damage from Hurricane Katrina.
AmeriStarRail Chief Operating Officer Scott Spencer told the television station that Amtrak never held “serious meetings and discussions” about the proposal. He said he will now aim to get Congress, the Federal Railroad Administration, and the U.S. Department of Transportation to push Amtrak into negotiations, with the idea of starting the service by the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles.
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