Published on The San Jose Mercury News website, on 2000 Oct. 09,
by Gary Richards, aka Mr.Roadshow.
Q. I take the ACE train from Fremont to Great America to avoid driving
on our overcrowded freeways. All we need is three trains running in
the morning and three in the evening. That is it. That will solve most
of our commute problems. But we again are seeing another round of
tensions among Union Pacific, Amtrak and ACE. Just when we have an
option to keep our cars locked up, Amtrak and Union Pacific come back
with all sorts of hurdles. Why is it so hard to keep a scheduled train
running without hiccups?
Baqar Zaidi and about 3,000 ACE regulars
A. You should have a third train by the end of the year. Transit
officials thought they had an agreement in June to start running three
daily trains. But Union Pacific, worried that the extra train would
affect its freight service, balked. Any compromise probably means that
ACE trains would operate on the Caltrain tracks between Santa Clara
and San Jose, which also will take ACE into the downtown Santa Clara
station. Several other issues need to be resolved, so hang tight.
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