HARTFORD, Conn. — Amtrak is citing safety as the reason it will not allow some CTrail ticket holders to use its trains on the Hartford Line shared with the CTrail commuter service.
The Hartford Courant quotes an email from Amtrak spokeswoman Beth K. Toll as saying “crew members may ask passengers to wait for the next available train instead of creating an unsafe condition, such as standing in the vestibule.”
When the CTrail service began, it touted the fact that tickets would be honored on either the CTrail or Amtrak trains. But CTrail passengers have regularly been turned away from Amtrak trains, leading Connecticut officials to ask Amtrak expand capacity on its trains [See “Connecticut asks Amtrak to add cars to Hartford Line trains,” Trains News Wire, Oct. 29, 2018.]
Connecticut Gov. Dannel P. Malloy told the Courant turning away riders based on their type of ticket is “a violation of the agreement” between Amtrak and Connecticut regarding what the state Department of Transportation said would be a “one ticket, any train” policy.
In her email, Toll wrote, “We continue to work with (the Connecticut Department of Transportation) to resolve the crowding issues that are occurring on some … trains. The safety of our customers must continue to be our highest priority.”
Since the beginning of CTrail service in June 2018, the Hartford Line has been served by 17 weekday CTrail and Amtrak round trips between New Haven and Hartford. Thirteen of those round trips are extended to serve Springfield, Mass.
