a project by an optimization elitist - spring 2010 episode

I thought that I would head up to Antioch, Illinois to visit my parents.  Antioch is about an hour or so north of Chicago, just south of the Wisconsin border.

I’ve made the trip several times by car (about a 22 hour trip with kids), by plane (about 8 total hours when you count the layover in either Houston or Memphis), and now, by Amtrak.

Amtrak is that sweet spot between flying and driving.  While the travel time itself is about the same (22 to 26 hours) the stress of driving is gone and the stress of dropping $400 to $1000 on airline fares is gone as well.

Getting tickets on Amtrak is a snap.  Their web site makes it easy to find the train stations, select your times, upgrade your accommodations, and, if you have to, change your itinerary.  Now, my situation may be a bit easier than most as my departure and destination were all on the same travel route, the Texas Eagle which originates in Los Angeles, goes through Fort Worth, and ends in Chicago.  So I’m lucky in that I don’t have to deal with train changes and layovers.

Another great thing about Amtrak is, if you need to change your travel times after you have purchased your tickets, no sweat, you don’t have to do a thing as long as you use them within a certain amount of time from purchase (which I think is a year).  My daughter has several times delayed her return trip back home and at worst she was charged a $29 fee and I believe that was because she changed her return city from Dallas to Fort Worth.  They’re very flexible.

On this trip I decided to bring my son along for some man bonding time.  Both round-trip tickets, one adult and one child, came to about $400 total, which is a a far cry from the $800 to $2000 it would be on Continental.  This price is based on coach class, for a fairly steep bump you can choose a “roomette” which is a cabin for two to three people.  That runs about an extra $300 or so per trip.

We started our trip on Sunday.  We did this because the trains from Chicago to Antioch don’t run on the weekends and I wanted to avoid having my parents make the trip down to fetch us.

We left almost on time, about 2:30pm.  The first part of the trip is pretty much a stop and go affair.  Dallas and Fort Worth are major railroad hubs of which the lines are owned by various companies of whom, Amtrak is not one.  So every freight carrier has right of way over Amtrak.  On top of that there are about 4 stops after Fort Worth before you get out of Texas.  There we have the reason why the trip takes about 23+ hours.  There are about 10 or so stops between Fort Worth and Chicago.  Some stops are about 10 minutes which allows the smokers to advance their progress towards cancer.  The nice thing about leaving in the afternoon is that many of these stops occur while you’re asleep and you barely notice them.

If you already have your tickets and you’re carrying under two pieces of luggage per person, you can walk right up to the train, no need to bother with checking your bags or anything.  You first visit a conductor who verifies you are who you say you are and you are going where you say you are going.  After that you’re pointed to another conductor who tells you which car you are assigned.  The assignment of cars is key as they try to keep people with similar stops together, ex., all Chicago bound travelers are assigned to car #4, all Little Rock bound travelers and put in car #3, etc.

Once in the correct car you are directed upstairs (downstairs is reserved for travelers who need assistance).  From there it’s first come first serve, you find a seat (or seats) that aren’t taken and stake your flag (or place the ticket given to you by the conductor over your seats).  The nice thing about departing from a major city is there were lots of people who left the train which gave us a plethora of options for my son and me.  Additionally, having Dallas as the next stop, where more people board, kept my son and I from having to dash for decent seats (a la Southwest Airlines).

The seats are really nice.  Their much larger than the 737 seats you’d have if you were flying.  In addition, the leg room is incredible.  You can recline the seats and extend the leg rests without bothering the people behind you or in front of you.

Now, my first complaint.  Each row of seats has two power sockets which is nice for laptops and cell phones.  However, our sockets didn’t work, in fact, none of the sockets in our car worked.  So it was all battery all the time.  Luckily I have a brand new laptop (Apple MacBook Pro, 15″ high res monitor, 8GB RAM, 500 GB hard drive…pretty much the best thing ever made by human hands) and my battery was fresh and would last about 8 or so hours.  My son however was using my old Dell which I almost never let drain, so he had about 2 hours of life.

To combat battery fatigue we were forced to use one of three available power sockets in the observation car.  Of course, there were three cars full of passengers battling for the same three available power sockets, so it was pretty much like Thunderdome.

The observation car is pretty cool.  The top level of the car is pretty much all windows with comfortable seats that face the sides of the train.  There are small tables for drinks and the seats are situated where your half facing the window and half facing another set of seats which promotes conversation.  The lower deck is where they sell snacks as well as mixed drinks, wine, and beer (which also promotes conversation).  Cameron spent most of his time there (drinking soda pops of course).

After the observation car is the dining car.  There they serve breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  Dinner requires reservations which are done by a conductor walking the cars and giving you times that are open.  We ate at 7.  The car is made up of booths which seat two to a side.  They ask that parties of two sit on the same side and then you are paired up with another party of two to eat with.  Now, if you know anything about me you know that I’m a big time introvert and the idea of eating with a couple that I don’t know isn’t my idea of leisure (which Amtrak promotes so heavily).  So after downing a bottle of Corona to promote conversation I engaged the poor couple who had to deal with me.  They turned out to be incredibly cool.   They lived in Los Angeles and worked in the film industry.  They were both involved in set design and art direction and were returning from Austin where they just wrapped a remake of True Grit.  Of course, situations like this are primed with people who will lie about what they do in order to give the impression of glamor (I told them I was former secret, SECRET service).  However they gave some serious details about some of the projects they worked on which.  She worked on the Lost pilot and was responsible for the crashed plane and how the half that landed on the beach looked and how the part that landed in the trees in the jungle looked.  She went into who they purchased the plane (a 737), the problems they ran into setting it up (it was delivered to the set with fuel still in the tanks), and the issues with getting it to look right (suspending parts of it in the trees of the jungle).  She was offered to stay on with the series after the pilot but she knew that the writers really didn’t have a grasp of where they were going and she thought it wouldn’t go far.

Her husband was the lead set designer for freaking Avatar (he spent 7 months in New Zealand), Alice in Wonderland, The Good German, etc.  He was also brought into True Grit at the last second to replace a guy that was fired so he and his wife were able to work together.

The cool thing about the couple was that they didn’t just jump out at me with their resume, there was no sense of “do you know who we are”, and they put up with me bragging about my son being in his school’s musical, my oldest daughter’s painting ability, and my two youngest daughters writing gifts.  They talked to Cameron about acting, who did he like, was he going to act over the summer, etc.

So after Corona and steak I headed back to my seat to watch a movie on my laptop at my battery’s expense.  Cameron listened to some music in the observation car (securing one of the holy power sockets).

I took a sleep pill around 9 and feel asleep around 9:30.  So begins my second complaint.  I woke up around 12am and the entire car was freezing.  I mean fuh-reeeee-zing.  It had to be 60 degrees and I’m in my shorts and t-shirt…cause you know…it’s summer in Texas, not December at Scientific Outpost Bravo in Antarctica.  Thankfully my sleeping pill (or the onset of hypothermia) kept me drowsy enough to only cuss for about 10 minutes and then I’d fall asleep for about an hour, cuss for 10 minutes, sleep an hour, etc.  Note to future self, pack the Northface -10 degree rated sleeping bag for the next trip.  It’ll go nicely with the snow dome that you build in order to survive the night.

The next morning we had breakfast in the dining car.  Cameron had French Toast to which he said “man, I forget how much I love French Toast”, so it must have been good.  I had eggs, bacon, biscuit, and three cups of coffee (which warmed the seven fingers I didn’t lose to frostbite).

We arrived at Chicago’s Union Station about about 2pm and found our way around enough to buy tickets for the train to Antioch.  We grabbed a quick bite to eat, stopped by the stairs where they filmed that cool scene from The Untouchables, and got on on Metra train 7.  The ride from Chicago to Antioch was a little over an hour with about 10 stops.

All in all, from climbing aboard our train in Fort Worth to stepping into my parents house it was about 25 hours of travel.  The fatigue of car travel wasn’t there and the money not spent on airlines was there.  All in all, Amtrak is the way to go.  If available, for our trip home I’m going to see if I can upgrade to a roomette.  Sure it’s more expensive but when you’re made of money you have to find little ways to spend it before you die.

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