(The Associated Press circulated the following article on February 23.)
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — Starting next week, people traveling on Amtrak trains through western Missouri may instead find themselves riding a bus.
Union Pacific Railroad, which owns the tracks Amtrak uses, will be performing track maintenance for several weekly periods beginning next Monday, the Department of Transportation said. When the tracks are closed, passengers will travel by bus along the route with stops in Jefferson City, Sedalia, Warrensburg, Lee’s Summit, Independence and Kansas City.
Amtrak runs twice-daily service across the state connecting Kansas City and St. Louis. Bus travel will only be necessary in place of the early trains. Riders on the early trains may also experience delays of up to an hour. But the evening trains should be unaffected by the maintenance work.
The construction – and bus trips – are scheduled for March 1-8, March 16-23, April 1-8, April 16-23 and May 1-8.
Amtrak will determine how many buses are needed each day based on advance ticket sales, said Marc Magliari, an Amtrak spokesman based in Chicago. Buses will stop at each train station along the affected route, Magliari said. If there is an especially high number of passengers one day and several buses are required, one bus may be able to skip a few of the stations to get passengers to their destination faster.
The cost of chartering the buses must be footed by Amtrak as part of its contract with the state.