Acela

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This article is about the use of Acela as a brand. For the high-speed train service, see Acela Express.

Acela is a brand applied by Amtrak to its high-speed trains along the Northeast Corridor in the Northeast U.S., called Acela Express. Prior to 2003, the Acela Regional name was applied to most local trains on the corridor, now simply called Regional to avoid confusion. The Acela Commuter name was proposed but never used for the Clockers, and Acela Regional was planned for all trains on the Empire Corridor and Keystone Corridor in addition to the Northeast Corridor. In fiscal year 2006, a total of 2,668,174 passengers rode Acela, an 8.8% year-over-year increase. ^[1]

1 History
2 Comparison of Speed
3 External links
4 References

[edit] History

Southbound Acela stopped at New Haven.

Amtrak Northeast Corridor services
*The Acela* brand**
Acela Express
Northeast Regional (including Virginia and NHV-SPG)
Former services: Clocker - Metroliner
Other Amtrak trains on the NEC: Cardinal - Carolinian - Crescent Keystone - Palmetto - Pennsylvanian Silver Meteor - Silver Star - Vermonter
Commuter services on the NEC: MBTA Providence/Stoughton Line - SLE MNRR New Haven Line - NJT NEC Line SEPTA R7 - SEPTA R2 - MARC Penn Line
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Acela Express First Class car 3219

On March 9, 1999, Amtrak unveiled its design for its new high-speed service, and announced that most services in the Northeast would be branded Acela. The name was a portmanteau of "excellence" and "acceleration", pronounced "ah-cel-la" [ə'sɛlə] (though a great many riders and staff call it "ack-cel-la" [ək'sɛlə], in keeping with the name's derivation). At that time, there were three classes of trains on the Northeast Corridor (and its extension south to Newport News, Virginia) — the hourly Philadelphia-New York Clockers, the express Metroliners, and the umbrella term NortheastDirect, applied to all other local trains on the corridor (in addition to unique names assigned to each departure). Empire Service trains used the Empire Corridor from New York City to Niagara Falls, and Keystone Service ran along the Keystone Corridor from Philadelphia to Harrisburg. Other named trains also used the corridors, branching off or continuing beyond their stations.

As announced, the original plan was to rebrand all services but those continuing beyond the termini as Acela. The Metroliners would be replaced with Acela Express. All NortheastDirect, Empire Service and Keystone Service trains would become Acela Regional. Finally, the Clockers would be Acela Commuter.^[2]

In practice, the Acela Regional name was first applied to NortheastDirect trains 130-133 on January 31, 2000. Those trains, 130 and 131 running weekdays only and 132 and 133 running every day, were the first electrified trains to run on the full Northeast Corridor.^[3]^[4] As more trains were electrified, they too were rebranded. Regular Acela Express service began December 11, 2000; at the time there were still part-diesel NortheastDirect trains.^[5] On March 17, 2003 the Acela name was dropped from the Acela Regional, with the trains simply being called Regional. Technical difficulties have led to a joke about Acela standing for "Amtrak Customers Extremely Late Again" trains.^[6] The Acela Commuter service never appeared. It simply remained known as the Clocker service up until October 28, 2005, when it was discontinued and New Jersey Transit introduced four new express trains between Trenton, NJ and New York City to make up for the lost service.

[edit] Comparison of Speed

Although the Acela is marketed as a high speed train, in reality it is not much faster than standard speed service. For example, at an average speed of 86 miles per hour, it is not significantly faster than the Denver Zephyr service that ran at an average speed of 77 mph between Chicago and Denver in the early 1960s.

In comparison, other true high speed trains around the world are much faster. Japan's Shinkansen trains average more than 125 mph. France’s high speed TGV trains average 173 mph, Germany’s high speed trains average 153 mph, and South Korea’s averages 125 mph.^[7]

The lack of speed is explained by poor implementation of "Tilting Train" engineering which allows the trains to travel at higher speeds on curved sections of track than would otherwise be possible. The technology has been implemented successfully on other service lines such as Virgin Train's Pendolino British Rail Class 390 trains which run at a speed of 125mph on Britain's Victorian era rail lines. Because the Acela rail cars were designed too wide, they cannot tilt in many places along the route without the danger of hitting oncoming trains on the opposite track. Thus, the Acela's speed has to be artificially limited. Another reason for the speed restrictions is that the tracks the Acela runs on weren't adapted for its high-speed travel, that is they were already in use by other trains before the Acela started running. Many curves are too sharp to be taken at the high speeds, even with the "Tilting Train" technology. Thus, the speed must be limited.

Had the Acela been capable of traveling at 125mph, the current six and a half hour journey between Boston and Washington, D.C. would be just under four hours and 45 minutes.