It's incredibly unfortunate that the International was discontinued. Of course partly because of all the bureaucratic BS with the border crossings. Hopefully we'll be able to find some better way to pre-screen passengers so there isn't so much of a time-waste. I'd love to see it run again.
So basically airport style security before you board? Literally one of the main reasons people prefer trains is the lack of airport style security, nobody's clamoring for more TSA
It’d be nice to have an overnight train between Montreal and Chicago jointly operated by Amtrak and VIA, but the cars and locomotives could have the logos of both railroads to resemble their joint operation/ownership with pre-screening as people board
VIA did retain the 85 and 88 numbers for a while up until the pandemic. It ran from sarnia to Toronto but then it was cut back to London. It ran with an F40 and 2 Budd coaches for a good majority of its run time until its final days with an lrc and Budd coach
I’m slightly surprised you didn’t mention the Maple Leaf, which still runs as a joint Amtrak-VIA Rail train from Toronto to New York City. Though always run using entirely Amtrak equipment, it’s fully staffed by VIA crew from Toronto to Niagara Falls, complete with VIA uniforms, VIA radio call signs, bilingual announcements, and VIA cafe car products. After the border, it’s a fully Amtrak crew with English announcements and Amtrak cafe products.
@@AMT1345 The Adirondack, like the Cascades, is run exclusively by Amtrak even though it does terminate/start in Canada. Also, it’s been suspended since March of 2020 with no return date in sight.
@@casey6556 Amtrak has begun crew requalification runs, but so far there is no date for a return to service yet, but it seems clear that Amtrak intends to bring the train back.
If a better solution existed for border crossing such as pre clearance, i think this train in one form or another could totally come back. As it stands there are still the Cascades, Maple Leaf and Adirondack trains for US/Canada train travel
For years there has been talk about implementing pre-clearance at Montreal Central Station for the Adirondack, so they already appear to be moving in that direction. In this case, I'd say we have an 85% chance of seeing it happen. Though the problem with pre-clearance is it only applies one way: when entering the United States. Canada doesn't have an equivalent system, so passengers entering Canada would still need to pass customs at the border.
I really hope we get the Chicago-Detroit-Toronto service. I think it could attract ridership now, especially when routed through Detroit. I've heard about people driving across the border to take the VIA service from Windsor to get to Toronto.
Great to see a video on the origin story of the channel's numbersake train. I would hope that Amtrak provides some sort of connecting cross border service sometime in the future, as well as increased frequencies on both routes since they seem to be relatively popular.
It's insane that the only way to cross the border is via car, in both Port Huron and (currently) Detroit. Unless you can get a taxi willing to cross into Canada, the Windsor Bus is the only non car link, and that's been suspended for a while. And even if they add a bus in, none of the train schedules line up between Detroit/Windsor, and the Port Huron/Sarnia transfer has to happen at midnight with a 6 hour wait. Nearly a direct line east from Lansing to Toronto and no possible way to get between.
Side Note:Amtrak's Niagara Rainbow, known as the Empire State Express before 1976. It was an American passenger train service operated by Amtrak between New York City and Detroit via Buffalo with 2 stops in Southwestern Ontario in Canada. The service ran between October 31, 1974, and January 31, 1979 on the CASO. The 2 Canadain stops were Windsor&St Thomas.
Not likely, our via locomotives aren’t equipped with PTC. But being that we are moving to chargers and venture equipment, it would be more likely that they Amtrak equipment ran all the way to Toronto as it does on the Maple Leaf
@@HunterBHolmes Amtrak Michigan Wolverine equipment is now all chargers locomotives and the new venture rail cars.The Michigan Wolverine line will be the line extended to Toronto.
Yay the best corridor Amtrak route. What I never ever understood was why Amtrak never extended the blue water under the St. Clair tunnel and harmonized all border checks in Sarnia, keeping the connection to the VIA corridor service. This route would be an insanely good night train route. It's too bad people at Amtrak and VIA haven't been able to come up with a creative solution to the corridor's challenges (on-train pre-clearance in a particular car?)
I went thru the the st. Clair tunnel on a field trip in grade school which was a event done by the schools each year 60 + years ago. Still remember seeing the water around the ties.
We use to rail fan in East Lansing. On Sundays you could catch 364 to Durand, watch trains in Durand for a couple of hours and then catch 367 back to East Lansing. We got to know the crews really well so they usually would just let us ride for free. Those were the good old days.
What a bummer. The USA & CANADA need this service once again. It was nice to see all these equipments of engines & coaches coupled together. Gives me model railroading ideas. 😃
You should do a video discussing the maple leaf and or the Empire Service one time. And if you need photo video ETC I should have plenty. Love the video man!
This is a trip I wish I had completed! Living in Brampton back in 90s, my GO Train would be held up regularly by the outbound Amtrak train hauled by a Dash 8 at the time. One early morning, I had to use this train from Union to Brampton and really enjoyed the comfort levels on the superliner economy coaches
I rode the Blue Water once - between Flint and Toronto, back in 1992(?). The train was aprox 5 hours late from Chicago, the car was extremely cold, there was no leg room and the back of the seatback was made of aluminum(I think). All combined, this made for a miserable trip! These days, I take the Wolverine often. The modern cars/seats are infinitely more comfortable!!!
Awesome job amtrakguy! This is probably one of the more interesting trains Amtrak (and Via) has operated! I guess now we have a history of the blue water and the Pere Marquette now! Any plans for a Wolverine video?
This video is great, showing off a train that was mostly overlooked, would recommend looking at the Atlantic City Express, quite an interesting topic that is overlooked, would make for a great video to talk about.
Interesting to see that service improved with the splitting of the route. My guess is the timetable was less restricted and less vulnerable to delays, while giving better connections
I was conveniently just in Canada and crossed into it (by bus) for a day at Stratford festival. I bought a CNR lantern while I was there. Interesting to see this video only one day after it came out and the minute I came back from canada.
Nice video., Missed a few points but very informative. Also at 6: 45 you have me candidly in one of the photos from train web. To this day I still miss the international. I used to ride it every other month between Chicago and Toronto. It definitely suffered from the long route Amtrak and via both gave it. It would have done much better going through Detroit'/vwindsor if a connection was made to the Sania station through the GM factory. At the time of its cancellation I was actually in talks with David Gunn himself who would personally write me and said the option I put forward was great. Unfortunately, the freight railroads and the governments of US and Canada did not want to fund it. He was at the time a great raill advocate. However, once he left all hopes of returning a international crossing were tossed to the wind.
There’s still an Amtrak train that runs between the US and Canada the Maple Leaf between New York City and Toronto it’s an all Amtrak train locomotive and coaches but when it crosses the border it’s classified as via rail 97/98 between Toronto and Niagara Falls Ontario and Amtrak 63/64 between Niagara Falls NY and New York City. It didn’t run during most of the pandemic with the border being closed and it just restarted this summer
Fantastic video! Do you think you’ll ever create a video of the Bluewater traveling eastbound to Port Huron? It would be nice to watch the journey traveling the other way for a change.
At 03:54 and elsewhere are puzzling images of what appears to be an LRC coach. But it's door is very different and the windows have the telltale separator seen on Amtrak coaches but not on VIA LRCs (and smaller windows). Googling reveals these coaches are from the one protype LRC delivered to Amtrak in very early days and promptly returned due to unreliability. (Amtrak's "made in America" had specified different components than MLW had chosen (MLW designed the LRC but was purchased by Bombardier prior to first delivery). (And the MLW design as delivered to VIA ended up with many teething problems too so the Amtrak one would have been far worse). VIA F40s arrived late 1980s , the prototype train to Amtrak was early 1980s and reportedly scrapped well before. I saw it it rusting away at Ville St-Pierre for many years with ever fading Amtrak livery. And had been told that they were scrapped because it would be too much work to bring them into VIA service. So it is quite surprising to prototype LRC given to Amtrak for evaluation in service in VIA colours in late 1980s. Wonder what happened to the coaches. These ex Amtrak LRCs were never in seen on VIA's main routes.
There's a halfway decent chance that the Wolverine will gain a cross-border service through the Michigan Central tunnel between Detroit and Windsor. Amtrak has expressed enough intent that permission for Amtrak to use the tunnel was made a condition of the CP-KCS merger. Ford, owners of the Michigan Central Station in Detroit, have expressed intent in retaining two tracks and platforms should Amtrak decide to use the station again. The Wolverine, pre-Amtrak, did once go all the way to Toronto. And Amtrak themselves have used the tunnel before, for the very brief Niagara Rainbow which ran from Detroit to New York via the CASO line, which belonged to Conrail at the time. Most of the CASO is gone now, and the station in Windsor was a victim of arson in the 90's.
Amtrak is currently working with Michigan and Ontario to restart the International Limited the new route will go through Detroit and Windsor.Michgan currently runs 3 round trips daily from Chicago to Detroit on the Michigan Wolverine line . Michigan and Amtrak own the tracks from Porter Indiana to Dearborn Michigan,and they have been upgraded to 110mph.On the Windsor Canada side there are 3 to 4 round trips to Toronto to Windsor.So it definitely makes sense to run with thru Detroit and Currently if you wanna travel from Chicago to Toronto you hop on Amtrak 350 get off in Detroit walk outside the station and get on the Q-line street car to downtown,then catch tunnel bus to Windsor,then catch crosstown 2 to VIa station in Windsor.This will take about 45min to an hour but way cheaper than a cab or Uber or Lyft.From there hop on Via to Toronto.From Toronto to Chicago take first train of the day to Windsor,hop on crosstown 2 bus,then Tunnel bus,then Q line street car to Amtrak Detroit station.You will have a couple hours layover in Detroit
If it's frequently sold out and uses a bunch of coaches, it's time to add more frequency. Many of the midwest trains can sell out. It's super frustrating.
(First coment!!) Oooo nice i wish it still ran, as i only see the amtrak maple leaf sometimes in canada. i rarley see it cuz it departs oakville GO/VIA Station heading to toronto at 7:17 PM.
The only way to make this work is to construct a high speed line, otherwise it's just not competitive with flying. Currently the Canadian government is developing a Toronto - Ottawa - Montreal high speed line. It will be a considerable amount of time before such a line extends to Sarnia, Windsor or Niagara Falls, so I don't really see international rail between Canada and the US growing beyond the Toronto - New York line anytime in the near future.
The plan is to extend the Wolverine line from Chicago to Toronto to 1 daily round trip.In Michigan tracks are already owned by Amtrak and MDOT between Dearborn and Porter Indiana and most of it is already 110mph
You can get between Detroit Amtrak and Windsor VIA Rail stations using transit but it requires 2 transfers so theyre not doing a great job of getting Chicago-Toronto passengers off cars or planes.
I remember that route when I was younger Amtrak coming through the tunnel here. New sub to your channel Amazing video and review on how it use to be. There was rumours that it was going to start up again. At this point I’m not sure if that will happen unfortunately 🇨🇦🇺🇸🚂👍🏻👍🏻Thanks do sharing
North America has a lot of potential for High Speed Rail, lots of space and even more money. Hopefully we see a future where the countries have close rail ties to eachother
amtrak needs an american freedom train (you see 611 and 765 run with a pepsi can and genesis unit with a lashup of private coaches, superliners, and amfleets
I did actually see a VIA F40 Diesel pulling Amtrak passenger cars in The Alphabet Train and Choo Choo Christmas respectively, and this is the first time I ever heard of this service.
Also, I’m I am actually having a theory at this point that maybe Amtrak coast starlight and Pacific surf liner could be extended to Mexico City Mexico, making it the first Amtrak train to go straight to Mexico
Now that VIA and Amtrak have better track and share the same equipment: (Siemens Chargers and Ventures) this train MUST have a comeback... CN plays dirty with the Adirondack on the Canadian side, but the Cascades and Maple Leaf dont seem to have much if any issues at all...
Although VIA spent money to have CTC installed on the Guelph subdivision, the track is in poor shape between London and Kitchener where the maximum track speed is 30 MPH except for a small segment east of Stratford that is 60 MPH maximum.
I'm having a hard time remembering the trip I took in 1976. Lake Shore Limited, Chicago to New York for the Bicentennial. Then Amtrak to Montreal. Then Montreal, through Toronto, to Chicago. Does anyone know what the carriers or train names would have been for the return? Also, I know I had a slumber coach going to New York, and a roomette to Montreal, but I can't remember the return accommodations. Thanks!
I’ve always wondered why via or Amtrak won’t just get past whatever red tape is preventing their own drivers from operating in both countries and expand services
That would mean train crews would have to qualify on American rules and Canadian rules Now Amtrak trains only have only an engineer on the headend where Via rail has two
This was one intresting video about one intresting train with VIA and AMTRAK but i hve one reqeust... Could you do something about Australian Trains since you talked about Europe with the UK the Canada and the USA. Why not finish the british union with Australia like say. An Australian train in the UK or 3801 going to the US or Australia.
@@maxjanssen9616 Let me see if I can summerize it for you in the form of a question: Would you rather ride in a European style coach with uncomfortable airline-style seats, and doesn't feel like anything more than a normal commuter train mixed with an airline cabin, Or a vintage-looking American style coach with looks that respect our country's rail heritage, and feels like the luxurious trains of the 20th century, with extremely comfortable seats, and top notch service?
:30 it would be impossibly stupid to serve Montreal Toronto and Buffalo Niagara Falls then on to Chicago. It means the train would have to go the wrong direction for hundreds of miles. 5:01 LOL Super Mario 64 music. Thats funny.
