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Tags: Amtrak / Trains / Train Travel / Acela / On-Track WiFi / Technology / → All Tags

Amtrak Competes With In-Flight WiFi By Adding Internet To Acela In 2010

Alright so how broke Amtrak is and how badly they need more passengers and cash is old and negative news. So how about some good news for train travel? Just a few days ago, it was announced that Amtrak is planning for WiFi on its Acela trains by 2010. This is what their passengers badly need, and hopefully the Northeast's few Acela routes are just the beginning.

2010 may be just around the corner, but frequent Amtrak passengers have been vainly attempting to connect to a network onboard for months now. For instance, when we chugga-chugged our way for fifteen hours (each way) between NY and the Midwest in March. Oh yes, we found an open network or two that moved with our train, but couldn't successfully connect. What's that about?

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Tags: Crime / London Travel / Travel Crime / Trains / Train Travel / → All Tags

UK Forger Gets Busted For Fake Train Tickets

Back in middle school, one of our friends got a scanner for his computer—it was cool at the time, we promise. The logical thing was to immediately make fake hall passes, so we totally understand what Jonathan Moore was thinking when he did something similar. Instead of wandering the hallways, this IT expert made more than £12,000 in fake train tickets. His copies were pretty good since they allowed him to travel totally free for about two years.

He would have continued on his merry way except a ticket taker with a good eye finally ruined his free ride. One day in Brighton an inspector noticed a color variation in his ticket, and then another 11 fake tickets were discovered in the plastic wallet where he kept all his contraband. So instead of getting busted for just one ride, he pretty much got busted for every ride he ever took. It didn’t help that the local police found over 70 designs for forged tickets on his computer.

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Tags: Amtrak / Trains / Train Travel / Vancouver Travel / Seattle Travel / Portland Travel / Olympics Travel / → All Tags

Amtrak Opening Up Northwest With Even More Seattle-Vancouver Service

Amtrak's Northwest Corridor, already busy in anticipation of the 2010 Olympics, just got a little bit busier. As of August 19th, the train company has added a second daily train to the Seattle-Vancouver portion of their Cascades route, a network of rails that bind Portland to Vancouver and back. The new train means that travelers now have direct daily round-trip service starting all the way at the bottom of the route and all the way till the end.

Amtrak Cascades connects Portland to Seattle with four daily round-trips, and then travelers are routed to their final destinations accordingly. They're celebrating their 10th anniversary this year, with the expanded Seattle-Vancouver route being a part of that. For the rest of the celebrations, which include promotions and events, there's even a dedicated 10th anniversary page.

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Tags: Japan Travel / Trains / Train Travel / Travel Health / Travel Safety / → All Tags

Groping Epidemic On Tokyo Trains Has Us Watching Our Butt

On the whole, Japan is a dream for travelers; it's full of polite people who go out of their way to help tourists. But that can all come to an abrupt stop when you get on a train in Tokyo (or, to be fair, probably any big city). That's when the gropers appear, and we don't mean the fish.

Authorities are warning travelers—especially females—to watch out for subway passengers who feel the need to grope them. They say they're particularly concerned at the moment because many of the recently-nabbed gropers say they have been inspired by websites on groping. One recent offender said in his defense: "He had viewed a website that detailed how and when to grope people and wanted to confirm if the hints worked..." And he'd even traveled 60 miles out of his way to ride a train line the website listed as being "easy" for groping.

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Visit The Last Of The Great Railway Stations in Los Angeles

Urban blog Infrastructurist just published a heartbreaking post bemoaning 11 gorgeous American train stations that have been demolished. One that's thankfully been spared: downtown Los Angeles's Union Station, routinely referred to as "The Last of the Great Railway Stations."

Opening in 1939 and costing $11 million, the station quickly became a central destination for the West Coast's passenger trains. It was not uncommon during the 1930s and 40s for 7,000 passengers a day to crowd into the station, which still provides the hub for Greater LA's many rail services. Even if you're not a passenger it's an architectural treasure worth incorporating into your Los Angeles tour.

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Amtrak Discounts Summer Fares, Insists Trains Are Cooler Than Buses

Ok, so they didn't actually say "Trains are cooler than buses" but Amtrak must be feeling the pressure of the new cheap bus travel craze. Their trains don’t have power plugs at every seat, and don’t have WiFi beaming through their cars. So the only thing they can do to compete is to cut fares on their routes, in hopes that people haven’t permanently forgotten about the train.

Regional routes in the Northeast will be cut by up to 25 percent for the peak summer travel season. If high-speed is more your thing, Acela price cuts from earlier this year will stick around through the summer. Start booking your New York to Washington tickets now, they start at about $50 each-way. Too bad that’s like $49 more than taking Boltbus.

To take advantage of these lower rates you need to travel between June 2 and September 3, and you’ll have to book two weeks before you’re ready to go. Maybe if they allowed you to book a bargain fare at the last minute, they could get a few more butts in the seats.

Related Stories:
·Amtrak Cuts Northeast Fares By 25% [Boston Globe]
·National Train Day Means Amtrak Is Still Chugging Along [Jaunted]
·Train Travel [Jaunted]

[Photo: jmueller99]

Tags: Panama Field Trip / Panama Canal / Boats / Trains / → All Tags

Oh Yeah, About That Canal…

Our own Brendan Spiegel is down in Panama this week and will be reporting back on all that he's seen and done. Whether or not he's wearing a Panama Hat, we can't say. But if you have any questions or suggestions for him, let us know.

Hopefully, our two weeks of raving about this Caribbean-Pacific paradise have led you to think of Panama as more than just a man, a plan and a canal.

But when you come back from Panama, all anyone ever asks about anyway is the canal, so you still kind of have to go. And even given all the hype, it is pretty awe-inspiring to see. Even just viewed from the plane, the sight of all those giant ocean liners queuing up to get through is something else.

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Tags: High-Speed Trains / Train Travel / Milan Travel / Trains / Silvio Berlusconi / → All Tags

Freccia Rossa Rides Its Inaugural Route From Milan to Rome

Italy's new high-speed train service, Freccia Rossa ("Red Arrow"), made its inaugural high-speed rail service yesterday from Milan to Rome. The new service now lets travelers get from the fashion capital to the Eternal City in just three hours. (Currently, the trip takes about four hours.) Passengers can also get from Florence to Bologna in just 35 minutes, down from one hour.

Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi rode the inaugural trip, even posing in the pilot's cabin wearing the chief engineer's hat. He looks so...cute?

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Tags: Train Travel / High-Speed Trains / Trains / → All Tags

Turkey Launches High-Speed Train In Hopes Of Impressing Europe

For a long time now, Turkey has been trying to play with the big boys in Europe. Joining the European Union couldn’t be going slower, and it wouldn’t surprise us if they never got into the club. However, one thing that may help its chances, albeit ever so slightly, is a high-speed train. If Europe has one thing going for it—it’s awesome trains—so what better way to get on their good side than to build your own?

Last week, Turkey launched the first trip of their new speedy rail transportation system, the Yuksek Hizli Tren, or YHT. Not only did the new train depart Ankara with speeds over 150 mph, but it also featured some pretty nice on-board amenities that would make even the shower-equipped A380 jealous—or not. Anyway, business class seats have access to personal televisions as well as power ports to keep your iThis and iThat all charged and ready to go.

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Slow Travel: NYT Guy Takes Amtrak Across the USA

We've often lamented the sad state of the U.S. passenger rail system, especially when it's compared to other countries, but when it comes down to it, Amtrak is not nearly as bad as its detractors would have you believe. For example, did you know that it's possible to take a train from New York City to Emeryville, California (near San Francisco) in less than four days? It is, and if you're able to add an extra couple of days you can visit a string of neat towns without ever needing an automobile. A writer from the New York Times recently did just that, taking a January journey through the heart of America that he chronicles in an interesting story in this weekend's Travel Section, and it makes us want to ride the rails ourselves.

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Atlantic City in Freefall: How to Get People Gambling Again

The timing couldn't be worse for the ACES train. New Jersey Transit is launching its New York City - Atlantic City service on February 6, providing a long-awaited rail link between the east coast capitals of money-making and money-taking, but it looks like the money is drying up on both ends. As the AP reports, revenue at Atlantic City's eleven casinos was down dramatically in December, falling nearly 19% as compared with a year earlier and marking a bleak end to a disappointing year. Not only is everybody broke these days, but those who have a few bucks left have more options than ever to gamble them away, with new slots parlors in Pennsylvania and New York and big pushes by Connecticut casinos continuing to siphon away visitors.

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Tags: Train Travel / Trains / Luxury Travel / → All Tags

Ride the Rails in Style as Luxury Trains Proliferate

We're big fans of luxury trains here at Jaunted, but we're not alone in our predilections. Newsweek has a major roundup of all the luxury train journeys around the globe, and it's making us want to ditch work, max out the credit cards, and head to the station. As the story points out, the Venice Simplon-Orient Express is the alpha and omega of the luxury train world, having kicked off the whole fancy train trend when it began service in the 1980's, but it now has a few serious competitors.

There's no better way to get to your beach party in Goa than by hopping aboard the Deccan Odyssey in Mumbai, which has "cars resembling a maharajah's palace." The Blue Train in South Africa, meanwhile, connects Pretoria and Cape Town by means of a rolling resort, with butler service, two lounge cars, and an observation car that's perfect for spotting wildlife. And for those who have $12,795 and at least two weeks of vacation time, there's the Golden Eagle Trans-Siberian Express (pictured), which takes people from Moscow through the plains of Siberia to Vladivostok.

New luxury trains in China and Southeast Asia will likely be a big hit with tourists and moneyed locals alike, fueling demand for further rail adventures. I wonder if the proliferation of such journeys will be enough to take a bite out of the cruise industry? I somehow think it's unlikely, because no matter how comfortable your cabin is, you'll never have the elbow room you'd enjoy on a cruise. Now, if my idea of double-wide trains ever got of the ground, we'd be getting closer.

[Photo: PR Web]

Related Stories
· The Rails Less Traveled [Newsweek]
· Venice Simplon-Orient Express [Official Site]
· Deccan Odyssey [Official Site]
· Golden Eagle Trans-Siberian Express [Official Site]
· Train Travel Coverage [Jaunted]