The ''Shenandoah'' was a daily passenger train operated by

Amtrak The National Railroad Passenger Corporation, Trade name, doing business as Amtrak () , is the national Passenger train, passenger railroad company of the United States. It operates inter-city rail service in 46 of the 48 contiguous United Stat ...

between

Washington Washington commonly refers to: * Washington (state), United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A metonym for the federal government of the United States ** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered o ...

and

Cincinnati Cincinnati ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located at the northern side of the confluence of the Licking and Ohio rivers, the latter of which marks the state line wit ...

from 1976 until 1981.

History

The ''Shenandoah'' began operating on October 31, 1976.Corridor Takeover, New Equipment, Highlight Amtrak's 1976 ''

Amtrak News The National Railroad Passenger Corporation, doing business as Amtrak () , is the national passenger railroad company of the United States. It operates inter-city rail service in 46 of the 48 contiguous U.S. States and nine cities in Canada. ...

'' January 15, 1977 page 1 The name came from the '' Shenandoah'', a

Akron Akron () is the fifth-largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and is the county seat of Summit County. It is located on the western edge of the Glaciated Allegheny Plateau, about south of downtown Cleveland. As of the 2020 Census, the city prop ...

train operated by the

Baltimore & Ohio Railroad The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad was the first common carrier railroad and the oldest railroad in the United States, with its first section opening in 1830. Merchants from Baltimore, which had benefited to some extent from the construction of ...

until

took over the nation's passenger trains in 1971. Parkersburg Amtrak station

Connecting service at Cincinnati to

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

was provided by the ''

Mountaineer Mountaineering or alpinism, is a set of outdoor activities that involves ascending tall mountains. Mountaineering-related activities include traditional outdoor climbing, skiing, and traversing via ferratas. Indoor climbing, sport climbing, an ...

''/''

James Whitcomb Riley James Whitcomb Riley (October 7, 1849 – July 22, 1916) was an American writer, poet, and best-selling author. During his lifetime he was known as the "Hoosier Poet" and "Children's Poet" for his dialect works and his children's poetry. His ...

'' until 1977, after which it was provided by the ''

Cardinal Cardinal or The Cardinal may refer to: Animals * Cardinal (bird) or Cardinalidae, a family of North and South American birds **''Cardinalis'', genus of cardinal in the family Cardinalidae **''Cardinalis cardinalis'', or northern cardinal, the ...

''. Amtrak discontinued the ''Shenandoah'' on September 30, 1981, citing low ridership. Amtrak considered the ''Shenandoah'' one of its "weakest lines"; the Department of Transportation had recommended its discontinuance in 1979. Service on the Washington–Cumberland segment of the ''Shenandoah'' was replaced by the new Washington–Pittsburgh–Chicago ''

Capitol Limited The ''Capitol Limited'' is a daily Amtrak train between Washington, D.C., and Chicago, running via Pittsburgh and Cleveland. Service began in 1981 and was named after the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad's ''Capitol Limited'' which ended in 1971 u ...

''. The Cincinnati–Cumberland portion remains without rail service, and

CSX CSX Transportation , known colloquially as simply CSX, is a Class I freight railroad operating in the Eastern United States and the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec. The railroad operates approximately 21,000 route miles () of track. ...

subsequently abandoned much of the line.

Equipment

The ''Shenandoah'' originally operated with

Amfleet Amfleet is a fleet of single-level intercity railroad passenger cars built by the Budd Company for American company Amtrak in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Budd based the Amfleet design on its earlier Metroliner electric multiple unit. An in ...

coaches and a cafe car; one or two coaches were used west of Martinsburg, with two additional coaches on the more-heavily-used segment between Martinsburg and Washington, D.C. The original

GE P30CH The GE P30CH (nicknamed "Pooch" because of the similarity of the designation) was one of the first brand-new diesel-electric locomotives built for Amtrak by General Electric during Amtrak's early years. The design was based on the GE U30C, but ha ...

locomotives were replaced by new

EMD F40PH The EMD F40PH is a four-axle B-B diesel-electric locomotive built by General Motors Electro-Motive Division in several variants from 1975 to 1992. Intended for use on Amtrak's short-haul passenger routes, it became the backbone of Amtrak's d ...

locomotives in 1977. Consists varied based on demand; many trains were just two to three cars long. The 1978 switch to overnight service required the train to have sleeping facilities per

Interstate Commerce Commission The Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) was a regulatory agency in the United States created by the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887. The agency's original purpose was to regulate railroads (and later trucking) to ensure fair rates, to eliminat ...

rules. Amtrak added two sleeping compartments each to a pair of Amfleet coaches (dubbed "Ampad"), which began service on May 3, 1978.A Congressional mandate resulted in a conventional 10-6 sleeper (10 roomettes and 6 double bedrooms) being added on October 28, 1979. The sleeper was removed on April 26, 1981.

References

External links

1981 timetable
{{Former Amtrak routes Former Amtrak routes Passenger rail transportation in Maryland Passenger rail transportation in Ohio Passenger rail transportation in Washington, D.C. Passenger rail transportation in West Virginia Railway services introduced in 1976 Railway services discontinued in 1981