Acela+Wifi and HSR in Brazil

The AP reports that Amtrak will be rolling out AmtrakConnect, it's free wireless internet service, on all 20 Acela train and in the gate areas of the following Northeast Corridor Stations:

• Washington Union Station
• Baltimore Penn Station
• Philadelphia 30th Street Station
• New York Penn Station
• Providence Station
• Boston - Route 128 Station
• Wilmington Station (2011 - once station renovations are completed)

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Air Rail News has word that Brazil is looking to have a High Speed Rail Corridor (Rio de Janeiro - Sao Paulo - Campinas) up and running in time for the 2016 Olympics.

A new Union Station is on the way!

Today, the Tribune's Blair Kamin reported on the Amtrak sponsored contest to redevelop Chicago's Union Station, one of Amtrak's most valuable assets, for the first time since it's 1992 renovation by Lucien Lagrange Architects of Chicago.
The firms chosen to compete are:

1. Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (Chicago)
2. U.S. Equities Realty (Chicago)
3. Jones Lang LaSalle (Chicago)
4. Goody Clancy (Boston)
5. Wallace Roberts & Todd (Philadelphia)
6. Ehrenkrantz Eckstut & Kuhn (New York)
7. KlingStubbins (Cambridge, MA and New York)
   

Late last month, the Tribune called for a redevelopment of Union Station to accommodate the increased ridership that will result from Chicago's position as the hub for high speed trains in the Midwest. Hopefully a strong proposal by one of the above 7 firms, will help secure additional TIGER funding, the same way New York was awarded $85 million for Phase 1 of Moynihan Station.

Today's announcement arrives on the heels of last week's TIGER grants, which will support high impact CREATE programs, such as the 75th Street Corridor project, that will shift Metra SouthWest Service trains to LaSalle Street station in order to free up Union Station for increased Amtrak and Metra service.

You can help the cause for a modernized Union Station by sending an email to Mayor Daley, via the Midwest HSR Association's proposal for Union Station as Chicago's downtown airport.

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On a separate, but Midwest related note, the EPA will invest $2.2 billion for the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative Action Plan which was signed by President Bush in 2002, to clean up their polluted beaches and water.

The Amtrak World Series

2 Months ago the St. Louis Cardinals took Amtrak from DC to Philadelphia. It appears that the Cards set a trend because "for the first time in recent memory, the [Philadelphia Phillies] boarded the Phillie Express from 30th Street Station in Philadelphia about 4:45 p.m., bound for New York’s Penn Station."

The article goes on to state, "When the first members of the team emerged from Penn Station on the corner of 32nd Street and Eighth Avenue, they were greeted by a couple of Phillies fans. Their voices were soon overtaken by more lusty locals chanting, “Let’s go, Yankees.”"

What a shrewd move it would be for Amtrak and Major League Baseball, the NHL, the NBA and possibly the NFL, to utilize Amtrak for travel and marketing purposes. Hannah Kirkner, a native Philadelphian living in New York, was delighted to see her team on a Manhattan sidewalk. “It’s very representative of our city to take the train. It’s so human.”

Hannah is absolutely right! Making players accessible to their fans in a great public space like a train station is a win-win-win for the sport, the fan and the profile of passenger rail. Imagine Cardinal fans greeting their team in Chicago's Union Station as they arrive for a series against the Cubs, or Twins fans wishing their team well before leaving from St. Paul's Union Depot before a divisional series against the White Sox.









Professional and collegiate sports are a key part of American culture, especially in the Midwest. Amtrak/passenger rail must become a larger part of our culture and a stronger public relationship with major athletics is an excellent place to start.



Yankees in 6

St. Louis Cardinals utilize passenger rail. Why not other teams?

Thank you to NPR for this story and interview -- http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=106939004&sc=emaf

On July 24th, the St. Louis Cardinals took three privatized Amtrak cars, from Washington, D.C., where they were playing the Nationals, to Philadelphia for a series against the Phillies.

Professional sports teams taking trains to road games opens up an exciting can of marketing and publicity worms for passenger rail. During the playoffs, or before rivalry games on the road, pro teams could have, for lack of a better word, pep rallies at their city's train station where the media could interview players and coaches, while fans seek autographs and wish their team well on the road. Sure it sounds a little corny, but it has to be better than always leaving to and from some private air strip where only the Travel Secretary knows that you're there, or in the case of the Yankees, Assistant to the Traveling Secretary, George Costanza.


Fans would get to meet the players, passenger trains and stations would receive much need publicity and it would be a new and innovative way for teams to market themselves. With better funding for faster and more reliable trains throughout the Midwest, and the country for that matter, I imagine it would be more enjoyable for professional athletes (on road trips of 500 miles or less), who often times happen to be a little bigger than the rest of us, to travel by rail where they can stretch their legs walking from car to car, recline their chair without hitting the knees behind them and arrive in the middle of the city they're playing in and likely much closer to the hotel and stadium than the airport would be.