COMMUTE: Fri Jan 6, 2005; #642 (late) and #187 (on time)

My commute for Friday January 6, 2006.

Morning leg - took Amtrak Train #642 (PHL-NYC):

• PHL 9:06, +22
  
• TRE 9:34, +24
  
• NWK 10:06, +24
• NYC 10:24, +24

Had an empty seat next to me, train much less than half full. I learned why #642 always departs late, they say that two trains come into 30th Street at the same time. #642 comes in from Harrisburg and the locomotive needs to change from a diesel one to an electric one. Same deal with the other train that comes in at the same time apparently. They say there's not enough Amtrak engineers to work on both trains, so they work on #642 after they get done with the other train. This results in #642 always departing 20-30 minutes late. Amtrak should just schedule this instead of keeping the departure time at 8:44.

Evening - I took Amtrak Train #187 (NYC-PHL):

• NYC 7:36, +1
  
• NWK 7:51, -1
  
• TRE 8:31, +5
• PHL 9:01, +5
  

Empty seat next to me but the train was much more than half full. Friday night at Penn Station was quite busy.