BRATTLEBORO — It was one of Amtrak's best kept secrets, and now it is gone.
For the past couple of years, it was possible to take the Vermonter to any station in the state for just $12. Amtrak did this to help boost ridership inside Vermont, but never really publicized it.
“The fare seemed to us to be successful in raising short-distance ridership,” Christopher Parker, executive director of the Vermont Rail Action Network (VRAN), a rail advocacy group, wrote in an email.
“However it was troublesome, requiring a special code to obtain (which changed every year) and of course, you had to have knowledge that the discount even existed,” Parker wrote. “Amtrak reservations agents tended not to know about the fare and, when you called the 800 line, they had to get their supervisor or spend a long time looking it up - an expense that was billed to the state of Vermont.”
Now, Amtrak has replaced the $12 fare with a new pricing policy with no special code needed. The only catch is that you have to buy the ticket at least three days in advance on the amtrak.com website.
Parker said VRAN worked with Amtrak and the Vermont Agency of Transportation, which subsidizes Amtrak's two passenger trains in Vermont, to change the fare discount to make it more user-friendly.
“As an example of the new fares, which may be adjusted over time, travel between Brattleboro and Essex Junction or Montpelier will now cost as low as $18,” Parker wrote, “while travel between White River Junction and Brattleboro will be as low as $14. While more than $12, these fares are a discount on previous regular fares.”
Schedule changes coming
Some long-awaited scheduling changes to the Vermonter will be coming sometime in the next month or so, according to Parker.
Once the changes are in place, the southbound train would depart about a half-hour later from Bellows Falls and Brattleboro. The new scheduled departure times are 12:30 p.m. from Bellows Falls and 1:01 p.m. from Brattleboro.
Arrival time in Springfield, Mass., would be slightly earlier, 2:35 p.m., even with the three new stops for the train in Greenfield, Northampton, and Holyoke, Mass.
The southbound Vermonter would then arrive at New York City's Penn Station at 6:25 p.m., reach Philadelphia at 8:07 p.m., Baltimore by 9:20 p.m., and Washington, D.C., by 10:05 p.m.
The northbound Vermonter would reach Brattleboro and Bellows Falls at a slightly later time. The train would leave New York at 11:30 a.m. and reach Brattleboro at 4:56 p.m. and Bellows Falls at 5:26 p.m.
According to Parker, there are still five “slow orders” in place on the Vermonter's route in Massachusetts, as track and infrastructure improvements to the Connecticut River Line are being completed.
“The new times haven't been loaded into the computer, Parker wrote, “so anybody making reservations into the future may have their travel times updated.”
The good news, according to Parker, is that these times may be speeded up by another 15 to 30 minutes as track work in Connecticut is completed next year.