Sunset Limited

The Sunset Limited is a long-distance passenger train run by Amtrak, operating on a 1995 mi route between New Orleans and Los Angeles. Major stops include Houston, San Antonio and El Paso in Texas, as well as Tucson, Arizona. Opening in 1894 through the Southern Pacific Railroad, Sunset Limited is the oldest continuously operating named train in the United States.

With three round-trip journeys per week, the Sunset Limited is tied with the Cardinal for the lowest frequency of any regularly-scheduled Amtrak route. Each end-to-end journey takes about two days. West of San Antonio, the train runs combined with the Texas Eagle.

From 1993-2005, the Sunset Limited operated an extended service to Miami, Florida, becoming Amtrak's longest and only coast-to-coast train route. Major stops between New Orleans and Miami included Mobile (Alabama), Jacksonville, Orlando, and Hialeah (Florida). However, the route east of New Orleans was permanently halted in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

Southern Pacific
Before the start of Amtrak on May1, 1971, the Sunset Limited was operated by the Southern Pacific Railroad. The Sunset Limited is the oldest named train in the United States, operating since November 1894 along the Sunset Route (though originally named the Sunset Express). The Sunset Route (originating in New Orleans) is the southernmost of the three gateways to the West Coast envisioned through the Pacific Railroad Acts. The other two embarked from Chicago and St. Louis. However, the Sunset Route had two major advantages over the other two routes. It was an all-weather, year-round route that did not face the crippling snows of the Wasatch or Sierra mountain ranges to reach the Pacific Coast. Additionally, the other two routes had to assault the front range of the Rockies.

In addition, opened 20 years before the Panama Canal, the Sunset Route vastly shortened the time to reach the West Coast from the Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea, as New Orleans was already an established seaport for Atlantic shipping lines’ passengers, seeking to reach the US interior. The Sunset Limited allowed passengers to reach the West Coast in a few days, not weeks.

The Sunset Limited was Southern Pacific's premier train. Initially, the Sunset Limited was an all-Pullman train, with sleeping cars and no coaches, running from New Orleans to San Francisco via Los Angeles. From its beginning in 1894, until streamlining in 1950, all the train's cars had 6-wheel trucks and dark olive green paint, with black roofs and trucks. In the summer of 1926, it was scheduled at 71 hr 40 min New Orleans to San Francisco; it then carried a coast-to-coast sleeper from Jacksonville to Los Angeles.

The San Francisco–Los Angeles portion of the Sunset Limited was cut on January 5, 1942. The cut was intended to last only several months to allow for equipment overhaul, but became permanent. On June 2, 1949, the Southern Pacific introduced faster schedules on several named trains. The Sunset Limited was reduced to $49 3/4$ hours eastbound and 48 hours westbound.

In contrast to its earliest Amtrak years, the Sunset Limited, up to its later years, made stops not only at Phoenix, but also at Mesa and Chandler, Arizona.

Amtrak
Amtrak assumed operation of most intercity passenger train routes in the United States on May1, 1971, including those of the Southern Pacific. Amtrak retained the Sunset Limited and initially left its route unchanged.

On October2, 1981, Amtrak began operating the Chicago-bound Eagle (known as the Texas Eagle since 1988) in conjunction with the Sunset Limited. The routes operate as one train between Los Angeles and San Antonio, Texas.

Extension to Florida
The Louisville and Nashville Railroad had operated the Gulf Wind between New Orleans and Jacksonville, Florida, from 1949 to 1971, when Amtrak dropped the route. This corridor saw limited service over the next two decades: in 1984–1985 the Gulf Coast Limited ran between New Orleans and Mobile, Alabama, and from 1989 to 1995 the Gulf Breeze served the segment from Mobile to Atmore, Alabama.

On April4, 1993, Amtrak extended the Sunset Limited eastward to Miami. The train followed the former route of the Gulf Wind between New Orleans and Jacksonville, restoring service on that corridor, and used the route of Amtrak's Silver Meteor south of Jacksonville. It was serviced at Amtrak's Hialeah yards for the return trip. It was only the second direct rail link between Orlando and Miami, following local trains by the Atlantic Coast Line and Seaboard Coast Line in the mid-1960s.

Schedule unreliability caused the Sunset Limited's eastern terminus to be truncated to Sanford on November10, 1996. Service was re-extended to Orlando on October26, 1997, and the train deadheaded (operated empty) between Orlando and Sanford for servicing. Sanford was, and still is, the servicing point for Amtrak's Auto Train.

1990s accidents
On September22, 1993, the three locomotives and four of the eight cars of the eastbound Sunset Limited derailed and fell off a damaged bridge into water near Mobile, Alabama, in Amtrak's worst train wreck, the Big Bayou Canot rail accident. 47 people died.

On October9, 1995, in an event known as the Palo Verde derailment, saboteurs derailed the Sunset Limited near Harqua, Arizona, by removing 29 spikes from a section of track, and short-circuited the signal system to conceal the sabotage. The attack killed one person and injured dozens of others. The crime still remains unsolved.

Bypassing of Phoenix
On June2, 1996, the Sunset Limited was rerouted to a more southerly route between Tucson, and Yuma, Arizona, bypassing Phoenix. Union Pacific, which had acquired Southern Pacific earlier in the year, wanted to abandon a decaying portion of its Phoenix–Yuma "West Line", particularly the Roll Industrial Lead, that had previously been used to serve Phoenix. UP demanded that Amtrak pay for the maintenance, which they woud not do. This made Phoenix one of the nation's largest cities without direct passenger service; although the designated Phoenix-area stop is in Maricopa, a suburban community about 40 mi south of downtown Phoenix. Amtrak Thruway service, run by Stagecoach Express, connects the two cities.

Hurricane Katrina
On August29, 2005, the Sunset Limited route was truncated east of San Antonio, Texas, as a result of damage to trackage in the Gulf Coast area caused by Hurricane Katrina. In late October 2005, service was restored between San Antonio and New Orleans, as the line through Louisiana had been repaired. Service east of New Orleans was suspended permanently despite CSX Transportation completing repair of the track in January 2006.

Recent years
The Sunset Limited received a modified schedule on May7, 2012, moving its westbound movements from New Orleans to a Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday circuit. The times allow several 7- to 12-hour rides between major-city pairs; for example, overnight between Tucson or Maricopa (for Phoenix) and Los Angeles in both directions.

While most Amtrak trains saw service reductions in 2020–2022 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Sunset Limited and its existing sub-daily schedule were not affected. The Texas Eagle was reduced to tri-weekly from October 2020 and May 2021, temporarily matching the Sunset Limited.

On July 11, 2023, the Surface Transportation Board announced that it was opening an investigation into the poor on-time performance of the Sunset Limited.

Re-extension to Florida
As time has passed, particularly since the January 2006 completion of the rebuilding of damaged tracks east of New Orleans by their owner CSX Transportation, the obstacles to restoration of the Sunset Limited's full route have been more managerial and political than physical. Advocates for the train's restoration have pointed to revenue figures for Amtrak's fiscal year 2004, the last full year of coast-to-coast Sunset Limited service. During that period, the Orlando–New Orleans segment accounted for 41% of the Sunset's revenue.

Section 226 of the Rail Safety Improvement Act of 2008, signed into law by President George W. Bush on October16, 2008, gave Amtrak nine months to provide Congress with a plan for restoring service that "shall include a projected timeline for restoring such service, the costs associated with restoring such service, and any proposals for legislation necessary to support such restoration of service."

In January 2016, Amtrak and the Southern Rail Commission announced jointly that a Gulf Coast passenger rail inspection trip was to be made from New Orleans to Jacksonville, with elected officials among those on board during the February 18–19 excursion. Stops were planned for all of the stations formerly part of the Sunset Limited's route between those two cities. In June 2018, the commission missed the deadline for submitting a request for service restoration along the Gulf. It said that it could not apply for the Federal Railroad Administration's (FRA) fiscal-year 2017 Consolidated Rail Infrastructure Safety and Improvements (CRISI) funding because Alabama and Mississippi were unwilling to assist with funds. Alabama's share would have been $5.3million. The Louisiana governor, on the other hand, was willing to provide the funds. The three states' cooperation was needed to secure the $35.5million in federal CRISI funds.

New Gulf Coast service
On February 23, 2021, following the conclusion of one year of negotiations with CSX and Norfolk Southern, Amtrak officials announced that a new Gulf Coast corridor service between New Orleans and Mobile would start as early as January 2022. Amtrak plans to pay for repairs along the route. In late 2022, with lengthy negotiations with Norfolk Southern and CSX, Amtrak expected, the Gulf Coast service was projected to begin sometime in 2023. However, in early August 2023, it was reported that an agreement between Amtrak, CSX, and the city of Mobile on the design and construction of the station there had not yet been reached, and that the service was now not expected to start until the first quarter of 2024. In late August the working name of the train was reported to be Mardi Gras Service. As of February 2024, negotiations between Amtrak and the city of Mobile are ongoing and a new service start date has not been announced.

Restoration of the Florida Panhandle Service
In terms of the rest of the route for the restoration of Florida Panhandle service, Amtrak stated that their "focus has been on restoring service from New Orleans to Mobile, Alabama," and they would be "willing to explore such service [on the Florida Panhandle] with the state’s financial support." The mayors and city councils of Pensacola, Tallahassee, and Lake City have shown much interest in resuming the service. The corridor would eventually need to be upgraded for speeds greater than 45 mph, and some of the stations require refurbishment or replacement.

, Amtrak's schedules and maps describe the route between Mobile and Orlando as suspended.

Daily service
In 2009, Brian Rosenwald, a now-departed Amtrak executive, outlined ideas for a complete overhaul of the route, including daily service. It was to have the Texas Eagle operate over the Sunset Limited's route west of San Antonio, with a stub train connecting San Antonio (with a cross-platform transfer) and New Orleans. The plans were halted when Union Pacific stated that to get a daily Sunset Limited, Amtrak would need to pay $750million for infrastructure improvements.

Passenger totals would double with daily service, according to the PRIIA study that looked at Texas Eagle/Sunset Limited service. It forecast an incremental improvement of more than 100,000 passengers from the daily service, which is already running in excess of 100,000 a year. In the meantime, the Union Pacific has double-tracked much of the route with its own money. However, Amtrak still lacks the equipment and funds needed to move to daily service.

In June 2021, Senator Jon Tester of Montana added an amendment to the Surface Transportation Investment Act of 2021 which would require the Department of Transportation (not Amtrak itself) to evaluate daily service on all less frequent long-distance trains, meaning the Sunset Limited and Cardinal. The bill passed the Senate Commerce Committee with bipartisan support, and was later rolled into President Biden's Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), which Congress passed on November5, 2021. The report is known as the Amtrak Daily Long-Distance Service Study and must be delivered to Congress within two years.

In June 2023, Amtrak submitted an application for a federal grant to increase Sunset Limited service to operate daily.

Return to Phoenix
Since its Wellton Branch closure, officials have intermittently considered different options for how to reopen the line and restore Sunset Limited direct passenger service to Phoenix and potentially launching intercity service to LA. The most recent study was conducted by ADOT in an effort to understand the existing condition of the Wellton Branch and to develop improvement scenarios and capital cost estimates for freight and passenger rail service between Arlington and Wellton, a distance of 90.8 miles. In that study, it was determined that freight demand along the Wellton Branch line/ Phoenix Subdivision does not warrant re-opening the Wellton Branch and that Re-opening this corridor solely for passenger service is not cost effective.

Howewer, in February 2023, the FRA indicated that it was studying a re-route of the Sunset Limited from Maricopa back to Phoenix as part of the Amtrak Daily Long-Distance Service Study ordered by the IIJA. The move would revert a 1996 route change that cut direct service to Arizona's most populous metropolitan area, with stops at Phoenix, Tempe, and Coolidge.

In June 2023, Amtrak submitted an application to the FRA seeking funding for a project to return Sunset Limited service to Phoenix, paired with increasing the route's frequency to once-daily service.

In December 2023, as a part of the Corridor Identification and Development Program, the Federal Government awarded a $500,000 grant to the State of Arizona to study Phoenix–Tucson passenger rail. The new rail line plan would send trains from Tucson to the far East Valley, through downtown and on to the West Valley, before reconnecting to UP's mainline in Wellton, near Yuma. Part of this route would include trackage needed for the Sunset Limited's return to Phoenix service.

Operation
Between Los Angeles and San Antonio, the Sunset Limited consist includes two GE P42DC Locomotives, a Viewliner II Baggage Car, a Superliner II Transition Sleeper, a Superliner (I/II) Sleeper, a Superliner (I/II) Diner, a Superliner (I/II) Sightseer Lounge, a Superliner I Coach-baggage, and a Superliner (I/II) coach. There are two addition cars, a Superliner (I/II) Coach and Superliner (I/II) Sleeper, that come from from the Texas Eagle.

Since 1981, the Texas Eagle has combined with the Sunset Limited between San Antonio and Los Angeles. The rear coach and sleeper cars split from the eastbound Sunset Limited at San Antonio station and continue to Chicago as part of the Texas Eagle. Three days per week two cars are joined to the westbound Sunset Limited for the journey to Los Angeles, with the remainder of Texas Eagle trains terminating at San Antonio.

As is already happening on all its long-distance routes, Amtrak will replace the P42DCs with modern Siemens ALC-42 locomotives by 2027, and the Superliner cars with new long-distance cars by 2032.

Route
For most of its existence, the Sunset Limited route was owned by the Southern Pacific Railroad. The name Sunset Limited traces its origins to the Galveston, Harrisburg and San Antonio Railway, a Southern Pacific subsidiary which was known as the Sunset Route as early as 1874.

Most of the current route from New Orleans westward is now owned by the Union Pacific Railroad, which acquired Southern Pacific in 1996. However, the route within Louisiana and some of Texas was partially sold to BNSF Railway in 1995 in return for BNSF not objecting to the UP-SP merger.

On the portion of the route east of New Orleans, service was suspended after Hurricane Katrina. Those tracks, between New Orleans and Florida, include parts of the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad, the Seaboard Air Line Railroad, and the Louisville and Nashville Railroad—all now merged into CSX Transportation. Currently, the segment of the former Atlantic Coast Line Railroad between DeLand and Orlando is owned by Orlando's commuter service SunRail, and the segment of track from Pensacola to Baldwin is now owned by the Florida Gulf & Atlantic Railroad.

The train uses the following route segments, identified here by the names of their original owners:

Ridership
Along with the Cardinal, this train is one of Amtrak's two long-distance services which operate thrice weekly. Consequently, the Sunset Limited carried the third-fewest passengers of any Amtrak train in fiscal year 2019, 92,827, a 4.4% decrease over FY2018. It had a total revenue of $10,769,179 in 2016, marking a 7.5% decrease over FY2015.