I consider myself very lucky to have close access to transportation by train. Real train, not light-rail or connected bus service, but Amtrak passenger train service. Now some will obviously want to debate about the term “service” and want to qualify it with their personal assessment of what “service” to them entails and how to rate the quality and delivery of said “service”, but not here and not now. (And I am a Service Manager with pretty much my entire working career in some manner of frontline customer focused, personally engaged, client-first, direct point-of-contact “service” position, so I know good and bad “service” – some other time I’ll get into this). Lucky to have Train service, because of its nostalgia for me and for its differences in user “feel” and experience. Public transportation yes, but “travel” is at the heart of it. And to define “travel” in this context I don’t mean the act of going from point to point, a means solely of being transported, I mean “traveled”, as in “I traveled across the state”, “I traveled across the country”, “I traveled trough-out Europe”, the journey of travel. Also to clarify the point of public transportation and “travel”, because you can travel in your car, or on your motorcycle, or bicycle, or by motor-home, even in a private plane.
Consider this, in an airplane when you go from here to there, you “fly”, you “flew” from here the there. When you hop on the local bus or school bus, you were “bused”. In your own car you “drove”. Ah but a Train, see you don’t get “trained” to your destination, you “travel” by Train. Now don’t go looking all this up in a dictionary or decide to start the argument about other stuff and the whole English language crap, yada, yada, yada . . . I know you can “ride” on a Train, you can “ride” on a bike, you can “ride” in car or bus or taxi or Train, and even a plane too. This whole aspect of language could go on for a long time.
Travel by train allows you a certain freedom. Like a bus and some airlines, you generally get on a choose your seat, window, aisle, facing forward in the traveling direction to see where you are going, or facing backwards to see where you’ve just been. You see country side, and small towns, and big cities, and places in those locations you wouldn’t usually see. You go over bridges, through tunnels, some under rivers or through mountains, even under cities and through buildings. You can go through forests, over mountains, across prairies and plains and deserts. You can nap, or read, or chat or listen to your music, or watch your movie, or talk (quietly) on your phone – on some Amtrak cars they have designated at quiet zones – nice. You can work on a laptop, or fold down the table and eat, or play cards. You can get up and stretch, walk around, change seats pretty much when you want depending on how full the train is.
The seats are relatively spacious (a hell of a lot better than a plane), decent with regard to comfort and there not three and four and five across like some planes. The isle is fairly wide so two people can pass one another without lying across the back or lap of a seated occupant. Then there is that rocking motion and slight rhythmic sway, and the whirr of train on metal track, a melodic tick, click and clack, only the sound a train can make. It’s calming, loud enough to hear and notice, but not deafening or so loud to drown out normal conversation. A conductor, in uniform, with appropriate cap, comes to check and punch your ticket, or to sell you one if you got aboard without. That’s pretty much their job, no snacks or drink carts to push down the aisle, no oxygen or life preserver, or seatbelt seminar to give, no seatbelt light to monitor and scolding to give if one rises from their seat while said light is on. Just punch tickets, help with bags as needed, and announce the next stop.
Train stations and stops are all very unique too. From the massive and beautiful, to the small town depot, to the platform, to quite literally a stop at a trailhead. There is an Amtrak stop, not more than a sign and what looks almost like a couple wooden pallets laid down at the track, on the Appalachian Trail. Now how cool is that ? Google it. You can even plan a trip with your bike, roll it on and roll it off for some specific trips.
We have an Amtrak stop about five miles from our house in a small town named Mount Joy. That stop is only a low platform, outside and uncovered. Further on west we can get on at Elizabethtown where they recently rebuilt a small indoor station, or we can go about 12 miles into Lancaster to their station. Built in 1929 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It is pretty cool but doesn’t of course compare to Philly’s 30th Street Station. That “Keystone” Amtrak train runs right past our house, across the street and just behind the old brick grain mill, one truck fire station, and other old early 1800 brick warehouses. It runs several times a day. We can hear the whistle blow over in Mount Joy as is passes a railroad crossing near the edge of town, then a few minutes later if you are outside you’ll hear the whhhiiirrrrrrrrr as the train zips past, usually just the engine and five passenger cars long.
I always get a good feeling and a slight smile when I hear it go by, and I wonder who is on it, where they’re going, where they’ve been where their travels and adventures carry them. I think about that track, originally traveled by the Pennsylvania Railroad, and how people since the mid 1800s have been traveling along that line, traveling by rail. Traveling on a train. Traveling.
