(The following article by Tom Howard was posted on the Billings Gazette website on March 13.)
BILLINGS, Mont. — Lorine Schlecht hadn’t ridden a train in four years, but the North Dakotan quickly regained her train legs during a stroll up and down the aisle of the Amtrak Empire Builder.
Some passengers call it the Amtrak Shuffle, that lurching semi-stumble that rail passengers use as they move between cars, clutching seat backs and leaning against doorways as the train speeds across Montana at 79 mph.
“I love to watch the cows go by,” Schlecht said, leaning on a wall and gazing out the window as the train whizzed past wheat fields and ranch houses.
Schlecht said she had spent 58 years milking dairy cows and raising beef cattle on the family farm near Medina.
“My husband always said (the income from) 10 milk cows can put gas in the car,” Schlecht said. She and her husband, Clarence, don’t often venture far from the family farm where they built their own house, nurtured an erosion-blocking shelter belt and raised three children. But when they visit relatives in Battle Ground, Wash., the Schlechts prefer to take the Empire Builder, which they described as a relaxing, economical way to travel and a good way to meet people.
“Four years ago, we met a couple that we corresponded with for quite a while,” she said.
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Bob Kemp, a physician from Williston, N.D., was accompanying his wife, three children and a niece to Whitefish to go skiing at Big Mountain. It was their first family trip by train.
“One reason for doing this is that we didn’t know if we would be able to take the train next year or the year after,” Kemp said.
Kemp said Amtrak is the most reliable public transportation for thousands of people living in North Dakota and along Montana’s Hi-Line.
“There’s no bus service and air connections aren’t that good,” said Kemp, who grew up in Culbertson.
“I like driving better,” said Kemp’s 4-year-old son, Hayden, as he sat on his father’s lap watching the Montana landscape speed by. “It’s faster.”
“No it isn’t,” his father responded. “It’s slower when we drive with you because we have to stop so much.”
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Greg Saxerud of Lisbon, N.D., and his girlfriend, Pam Stenson, boarded the train in Fargo, N.D., at 4 a.m. with their five children. They were on their way to a ski vacation at Big Mountain.
“This is my first time on the train in 20 years,” Saxerud said. “My dad used to take us there all the time when we were kids.”
“One of the reasons to go by train is to experience the ride,” Saxerud said. He noted that warnings of Amtrak’s demise are nothing new. “They’ve been talking about it for 10 years, but it provides major transportation for a lot of people.”
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Photo diary
Photographer Larry Mayer describes the people and places he encountered while riding Amtrak along the highline.
Click here.
James Alofs, a musician from Heartland, Wis., was on his way to Seattle to visit friends.
Alofs said he’s glad he disregarded his father’s advice and took the train, in part because it’s fun meeting other riders in their 20s and 30s.
“It’s just so much easier than flying or driving, and it’s economical,” said Alofs.
Dave Clemmons, a theater manager from Seattle, boarded the Empire Builder in Chicago. To earn extra money, Clemmons trucked a butterfly exhibit from Seattle to Chicago and decided to ride the train back to Seattle rather than fly.
“You meet a lot of people,” Clemmons said, sitting across from Alofs in the lounge car. “We never met each other, but now it seems that we’ve known each other all of our lives.”
Socializing is part of the Amtrak experience, he said.
“You start out just visiting and chatting. And after some snacks or a glass of wine you get more friendly, and around midnight the cards start coming out,” Clemmons said. “Pretty soon it’s 2 in the morning.”
Looking out at the brown, treeless plains between Wolf Point and Havre, Clemmons wondered, “When do we get to the scenic part of the state?” Clemmons wondered. Informed that the Empire Builder won’t pull into Glacier National Park until after 8 p.m., two hours after sundown, he simply nodded his head and stared out the window.
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William Brewer, a retiree moving from Indianapolis to the Seattle area, worried that Amtrak’s days may be numbered.
“It looks like Amtrak needs the money, but old George W. wants to cut the funding,” said Brewer, who spent 20 years in the Air Force. “If he gets his way, it looks like Amtrak isn’t going to be around anymore,” Brewer said.
Brewer said he rode the train because it saved him money. His Amtrak ticket cost $114, compared to $172 for a bus ticket.
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Mick O’Connor, a conductor aboard the Empire Builder, said the train was about two-thirds full, with 88 coach passengers, 45 in sleeping berths and a crew of 14. Winter tends to be Amtrak’s slow period, and fewer people ride during the middle of the week, he said.
“During the summer, every seat is sold,” O’Connor said.
O’Connor said Amtrak employees hope that Congress will not only approve funding for Amtrak in the 2006 budget, but that money will be set aside so that the railroad can invest in badly needed new equipment.
In Havre, the train stops twice. The first is a refueling stop and the second is to load passengers and allow smokers to light up on the station platform. Amtrak trains are smoke-free.
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The afternoon shadows lengthen as the Empire Builder heads toward Shelby. Passenger Mark Weyrauch’s cell phone rings. He excuses himself and within five minutes he returns to his seat and announces to his friend Rod Engleson that railroad dispatchers have gone on strike.
“I don’t think it will affect us,” he said. Weyrauch, of Ray, N.D., and Engleson, of Minot, N.D., were on their way to Spokane for a conference of the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employees, one of several unions that represent railroad workers.
“It’s hard for me to think that this country wouldn’t fund Amtrak,” Weyrauch said. “Sure the money is tight, but a lot of people use Amtrak.”
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At Shelby, Great Falls residents Ted and Debbie Horning head for their car after leaving the train. They were on their way back home after visiting Ted’s family in Pennsylvania.
The trip was mostly pleasant. “You don’t get to see much of the country when you’re flying at 30,000 feet,” he said.
But the Hornings will never forget one mishap in an otherwise routine trip.
In Pennsylvania, the car in which the Hornings were riding decoupled from the rest of the train. The stranded passengers were in no danger because the car’s automatic brakes kicked in and stopped the car, but he remembers that it soon got stuffy in the stranded car during the half-hour it took to get recoupled and under way again.
If Congress doesn’t approve new money, Amtrak itself could come to a halt, just like the Hornings’ rail car.
“It’d be a shame if it goes under,” he said.