Auto Train - Sanford, Auto-Train Corporation, Lorton (Paperback)

Chapters: Sanford, Auto-Train Corporation, Lorton. Source: Wikipedia. Pages: 26. Not illustrated. Free updates online. Purchase includes a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Excerpt: Amtrak's Auto Train Route Auto Train is an 855-mile (1,376 km) long scheduled train service for passengers and their automobiles operated by Amtrak between Lorton, Virginia (near Washington, D.C.) and Sanford, Florida (near Orlando). Although there are similar services around the world, the Auto Train is the only one of its kind in the United States. Specialized equipment enables customers to take along their automobile, van, sport utility vehicle, motorcycle, small trailer, or jet-ski as they travel up or down the East Coast of the United States. Passengers ride either in wide coach seats or private sleeping car rooms while their vehicles are carried in enclosed automobile-carrying freight cars, called autoracks. The train also includes lounge cars and dining cars, and is the only Amtrak route to allow smoking while on board the train. The Auto Train service offers its passengers dual benefits: they avoid the long drive on busy Interstate 95 in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida, and instead of the expense and unfamiliarity of a rental car they have the convenience of the use of their own vehicle upon arrival. The service operates as train 53 southbound and 52 northbound, making no station stops between its terminals at Lorton, Virginia and Sanford, Florida. Amtrak's Auto Train is the successor to an earlier similarly-named service operated by the privately-owned Auto-Train Corporation in the 1970s. The original Auto-Train operated on Seaboard Coast Line Railroad and Richmond, Fredericksburg