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An enjoyable rail experience | |||||||||||||||||
In Japan, taking the train across long distances is a pleasant experience, complete with attendants similar to airplanes. In the US, the experience is quite different. Since most travelers have time to kill anyway, why not make the train experience more luxurious? Just imagine going to go from New Haven to Washington DC and being able to get a massage? Or get a quick haircut or shoe shine? Watch a movie? Or get your suitcoat button quickly sewn back on before stepping off to that meeting? Or have a store to buy stockings when you realize the ones you have on are ruined? In addition, having a train attendant come by with sandwiches, drinks, and newspapers would sell better than just having one food court at the far end of the train that most people forget is there. The labor costs would be relatively low compared to the revenue generation if merely 1 in 5 people bought something from the attendant.
Anna Blanding, Jan 25 2008
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Nice thought, but they are trying to make trains lighter and faster. Such as this would go the opposite direction.
There are expensive multi-day excursion tours by train to scenic sights, such as the Copper Canyon in Mexico, where some of these services are provided. (There may even be an association of such train operators.) These would be the first people to suggest this to--and I'm sure they are already providing some of these services.
Or maybe Amtrak would consider this on one of its runs as an experiment. It ought to do so.
PS: Instead of hiring people to perform these services, they could just let free-lancers board the train and try to sell them. So the experiment needn't cost much to the experimenter.