First-quarter Amtrak ridership edges up

The Missouri River Runner makes a trip across the state.
The Missouri River Runner makes a trip across the state.

Thanks to a strong January, the Missouri River Runner Amtrak service saw a small increase in ridership for the first quarter of 2017.

"For January through March, we were up nearly 1 percent from this time last year," said Kristi Jamison, Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT) railroad operations manager. "In January, we were up 10 percent, but that went down in February and March."

Jamison said the passenger numbers at the Jefferson City Amtrak station were down a half percent from this same time last year.

"I still believe we're being affected by low gas prices, and we're still seeing fewer riders coming into St. Louis because of work on a high-speed rail service to Chicago," she said. "The infrastructure on that should be done by the end of this year, so we'll see how we rebound from there. Thirty percent of the traffic we have on the River Runner are passengers making connections in either St. Louis or Kansas City. So when you have delays like what we've seen in construction of the high-speed rail service in Illinois, that drops the ridership level."

Jamison said on-time performance remains good, coming in at 90 percent for the first quarter.

"We've seen a little more congestion from freight traffic, but I like to think that's good because that indicates the economy is doing well," she said. "We also benefited from a mild winter, which decreases delays caused by cold weather and its effects on the tracks."

Also helping ridership is the increase in incentives offered. This summer, two promotions will run through the end of August - mid-week fare sales with a 25 percent discount when traveling Tuesday through Thursday and a Kids Ride Free sale for weekend travel Friday through Sunday for children ages 2-12. For more details on these promotions, visit amtrak.com/deals.

Final word on state funding that lets the two cross-state trains run should come in the next few days, as the Legislature wraps up work on the state's budget by May 5.

In 2017, the service was initially allotted $9.6 million, but Gov. Eric Greitens' administration withheld $500,000 from that amount, so the service's final budget was $9.1 million. The budget request for the service in fiscal year 2018 was $14.1 million, but Greitens has recommended staying at $9.1 million. The House approved that amount, and the Senate is debating it.

"We're not anticipating any changes to our service due to the level of state funding we're getting," Jamison said.

Jamison added travelers may have noticed a change to the Amtrak trains lately.

"Typically we would run with three cars, but we've added three to four cars to our trains as a safety measure," she said. "We're wanting to make make sure as our trains go through the corridor they trigger safety lights and gates to activate at crossings. We discovered a few locations where that hasn't been happening, so increasing the weight of the train to make sure that happens should take care of the problem."