Tag Archives: amtrak
Google gets closer to building its own city in San Jose
Apple Maps displays nationwide Amtrak train routes
Amtrak’s next-gen high-speed trains, and more in the week that was
Amtrak’s next-generation high-speed trains arrive in 2021
Congress Taking Action After Amtrak Crash – and It’s Not What You’d Think
Amtrak boosts WiFi on select trains, more upgrades coming this summer
There are plenty of wonderful things about train travel: the leg room, the scenery, the lack of security pat-downs. The WiFi, on the other hand, has long been the slowest thing about Amtrak. The company announced today that it's finally doing something about its frustratingly sluggish service, upgrading wireless on select trains, including the Acela express between Boston and Washington DC and a few California lines like the Capitol Corridor, Pacific Surfliner and San Joaquin. Travelers to other destinations will have to wait a bit longer for quicker load times -- Amtrak has promised that the rest of its WiFi-equipped trains will be upgraded by "late summer."
Via: Slashdot
Source: The New York Times
Amtrak to roll out high-efficiency trains with regenerative braking (video)
Some of us look at electric trains as efficient transportation almost by definition, but that's not entirely true when they consume a lot of power and give little back. Amtrak is about to strike a better balance now that it's close to receiving the first of 70 high-efficiency Siemens ACS-64 trains destined for routes across DC, Massachusetts, New York and Pennsylvania. Each engine centers on a regenerative braking system that can recover up to 5MW of energy, much of which goes back to the power grid. The machinery is smarter, too: it can self-diagnose problems and mitigate the impact until repairs are possible. Commuters won't immediately notice the difference when ACS-64 trains reach the rails between this fall and 2016, but there should be important behind-the-scenes savings. Amtrak reckons that the new vehicles could lower energy consumption by 3 billion kilowatts in the long run, which might help both the company's bottom line and local utilities.
Filed under: Transportation
Source: Amtrak
Amtrak readies conductors to trade in their hole punchers for iPhones
Pilots aren't the only ones updating their workflows with modern technology. Amtrak conductors have been getting schooled on how to use iPhones to scan passenger tickets on select routes since November -- forcing hole punches to collect dust on a lonely shelf at the station. By the latter part of this summer, 1,700 conductors will be using the aforementioned smartphones on the outfit's trains throughout the US which allows them to track passengers with more ease than manual ticketing. The $7.5 million system affords passengers the choice of printing the tickets or loading a bar code on their smartphone of choice before getting the iPhone's scan. Inside the dedicated app, riders can book and modify reservations easily without having to worry with a refund from an agent first. There's only one small hiccup: currently Amtrak's app is only available for iPhones. But, the government-owned corporation says that an Android release is in the hopper and should see daylight this fall. For now, non-iOS users must load their tickets though a mobile site in order to save a tree or two.
Amtrak readies conductors to trade in their hole punchers for iPhones originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 07 May 2012 13:25:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Permalink | | Email this | Comments