ABOUT TIME, INDEED.

I've had occasion to gripe about dubious Norfolk Southern dispatching laying out eastbound Amtrak trains for hours, before the train even gets to its first stop at South Bend.

The corporate suite at Amtrak might be engaging in a slow-motion liquidation of the overnight trains, but a business model of dependable day trains requires that the day trains be dependable.  The cooperation of the freight railroads that sold their passenger losses to Amtrak is desirable.

A lawyer for Norfolk Southern sent a formal letter to Amtrak demanding that Amtrak stop tweeting information about Amtrak trains running late and identifying the cause—specifically that they were stuck behind slow moving NS freights.

I’m guessing the Norfolk Southern attorney knew that the letter was a dumb idea, but was goaded into it by one of the railroad’s top executives.

At any rate, the fallout was 100-percent predictable: an Amtrak executive wrote back to Norfolk Southern and said, in so many words, “We’re sick and tired of you guys not giving a damn and constantly making our trains run late.”

And then the Amtrak guy did what until this incident would have been unthinkable: he released copies of both letters to the media! Of course that triggered news reports of the dust-up, including a front-page story in the Wall Street Journal!

Here's more, from the Rail Passengers' Association.  By all means read the whole thing, but note this.

Your letter is surprising mostly because it focused on just a single tweet about train 20(15) from the @AmtrakAlerts Twitter feed. While train 20(15) was initially delayed by a mechanical issue, the subsequent 198 minutes of delay due to Norfolk Southern compounded this problem, which is sadly all too common. While you complain this was due to the train being “off plan,” the thousands of severe delays to Amtrak passengers caused by Norfolk Southern make clear there is no Norfolk Southern “plan.” In 2018, Norfolk Southern delayed Amtrak trains for 464,342 minutes, the equivalent of 322 days. For many Amtrak customers, enduring severe delays caused by Norfolk Southern are the norm. In 2018, each Crescent train was, on average, delayed nearly 2.5 hours by Norfolk Southern freight trains alone, in addition to many other Norfolk Southern- caused delays.

In just the first two months of 2019, a single Norfolk Southern freight train (Train 21M) was responsible for over 1,346 minutes of delay to Amtrak trains on Norfolk Southern territory.

That's a delay to the eastbound Southern Crescent, there are probably freight trains on The Water Level Route that account for the bulk of the delay to the Capitol and Lake Shore.  And I love that deflection about "off plan."  If freight train interference west of Birmingham lays out the eastbound Crescent, does that justify further interference with the Crescent onward toward Atlanta or Washington City?

Closer to home, yes, it is often the case that an eastbound Capitol or Lake Shore will be held for late-arriving connections off the (knocked off plan by one of the western trunk lines?) Texas or West Coast trains, as protecting those connections is cheaper than buying hotel space and rebooking sleeper passengers in coach.  On at least two of my trips east, the Capitol or Lake Shore I was on left Union Station on the advertised, and it was a decision by a Norfolk Southern dispatcher to knock the train off plan somewhere in the vicinity of Ogden Dunes.

There's more in the letter.  I can't walk into the dispatcher's office and show them how it might be done, but I can submit Facts to a candid World.