RailPAC: Rail Passenger Association of CA & NV

How to Operate Passenger Trains at a Profit

By Noel T. Braymer It is no secret that the key to being profitable is to bring in more money than you spend. To run a profitable passenger railroad the keys are maximizing productivity and increasing revenue with increased ridership. Here are basic steps that other successful transportation services use to do more than just…

October 12, 2013
eNewsletter for October 7, 2013

Dan Richards, Chair of the California High Speed Rail Authority addressing the RailPAC/NARP Joint Meeting in San Francisco on October 5, 2013. Mr. Richard gave the funniest and most charming talk of the day about the many problems he has faced at the High Speed Rail Authority. He admitted that in 2008 the Authority was…

October 12, 2013
Notes on the October 5th’s RailPAC/NARP Meeting San Francisco

By Noel T. Braymer I wasn’t in the mood this time to ride buses for 2 night in a row for this year’s meeting in San Francisco. So I got a flight out of San Diego at 7:56 AM for an arrival at 9:35 AM at San Francisco. Since the first Coaster Train to San…

October 6, 2013
The Future of Wireless Electric Trains

By Noel T. Braymer Recently there was excitement among techno-geeks about a patent application by the Tesla electric car company for a hybrid metal-air/lithium ion battery car. The speculation was this could be Tesla’s 400 mile range electric car it has been working on. So what is a hybrid metal-air/lithium ion car? The idea is to…

October 4, 2013
eNewslettter for September 30, 2013

We’re holding ACE in drive for SJ Valley employment Manteca Bulletin- Sep 28, 2013 The real game changer for the economically challenged in the San Joaquin Valley won’t by California High Speed Rail. It’ll be well-run traditional rail modeled after the Altamont Corridor Express service. That’s because high speed rail will serve one of three classes: Upper income…

October 4, 2013
RailPAC PHOTOS of the Month (September, 2013)

Here are this month’s 5 photos by RailPAC photographers. Click on each photo to see it full size! Contributions to this page are welcome. Send your jpg rail photos to RailPAC Photo Editor, at [email protected]. 1. Two Metrolink trains connected together, at the Oceanside Transit Center. On September 20 RailPAC’s Noel Braymer was on board.…

October 1, 2013
How to Save the Chief

By Noel T. Braymer The prospects for the future of the Southwest Chief don’t look good. The BNSF has made it clear that they will not spend more money on the route between Albuquerque, New Mexico and Newton, Kansas to maintain the tracks to passengers standards with so little freight traffic on them. BNSF wants…

September 27, 2013
eNewsletter for September 23, 2013

BART was the first of several subway systems over the last 40 tears to operate with automation. Except in yard limits at slow speeds with operators at the controls BART trains have been mostly run by computers for over 40 years. The primary job of the operators is to check the doors at the station…

September 27, 2013
Stuck in Pico Rivera on Metrolink

By Noel T. Braymer Everything was normal until we left the City of Commerce station on Metrolink #604 after leaving LAUS on time at 4:30 PM on Friday September 20, 2013. We barely cleared the station around 4:45 PM when we came to a halt. That’s not usual if the problem was signals or a…

September 22, 2013
Capitol and other CA Corridor Statistics (August, 2013)

From David B. Kutroksy, Managing Director Capitol Corridor Joint Powers Authority Capitol Corridor Service Performance After a bounce in ridership in July 2013, ridership dropped in August 2013 by 2.2% compared to August 2012. A total of 143,080 passengers rode Capitol Corridor trains in August. Initial evaluation of conductor counts indicated that ridership for August…

September 20, 2013