Oh, the Places You'll Go!
By Alan Mittelstaedt & Alfred Lee & Andy Klein & Anthony Miller & Rebecca Schoenkopf & Ron Garmon
No, Don’t Take the Train!
Pinch your pennies till they scream
~ By Alfred Lee ~
The last time I went to San Francisco, I took the bus. I was waiting for one to pick me up at Union Station when an old man leaned over to me, eyes-a-glitterin’, all but ready to launch into a rendition of “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.” Instead, he asked, toothily: “Did you pay one dollar?”
I hadn’t. He turned to the girl sitting next to me. “Did you pay one dollar?” She had. He nodded conspiratorially, as if they were fellow members of La Résistance.
The Megabus that I boarded with them that day couldn’t have been carrying many more than a dozen people, and so the discount bus service may still seem something of a relative secret, passed on mostly via word-of-mouth: At Union Station, for instance, a couple blink-and-you-miss-them signs discreetly nudge you out and around the back to the pickup point. Hailing from the discount-travelin’ ways of Europe – Scotland, to be exact – Megabus began running intercity routes to and from L.A. last August, with seats as low as, yes, $1, and then going up depending on how late one books or how popular the route may be (which is how I ended up paying a still-low $25 for said seat). Currently, they’ll also take you to Las Vegas, Millbrae, Oakland, and San Jose.
They may have hit onto something, however. In March, Greyhound started a competing service, BoltBus, to go head-on in the $1 seat game with Megabus in northeastern cities such as New York, D.C., Boston, and Philadelphia. “We basically saw a different consumer segment that we thought would really enjoy this service,” says BoltBus spokesperson Dustin Clark. “The majority of
Greyhound’s costs are tied up in terminal maintenance and employee overhead. Fuel costs are only a small percentage of our overall costs, and so by doing all our booking online we’re able to pass on our cost savings to our customers.” He thinks the company could look at expanding out to California after monitoring its success in the northeast first.
According to Clark, BoltBus sees the airline industry as a competitor, and not rail. George Hobica, who runs low-fare listing site Airfarewatchdog.com, agrees that the discount bus model could be a legit alternative to rising airfare costs: “It definitely has an impact in the markets that they offer it – Minneapolis, Chicago, Los Angeles is one – the same way that in Europe the shuttle train had an impact on airline travel from Paris to London.”
Meanwhile, ultra-low-cost airlines similarly derived from European models (think Ryanair) have found mixed results. Skybus, which cut domestic fares to as low as $10, ceased operations on April 5, leaving the likes of Spirit Airlines (currently offering seats from LAX to Detroit at $39) to carry on the ultra-low flame. “I wouldn’t hold my breath,” Hobica says. “It would appear that only Southwest has been able to make this low-fare business model work.
“We’ve definitely seen fares go up, but airlines are still having unadvertised sales,” Hobica explains. “I suggest that people sign up for the widgets that American Airlines and Southwest have to offer. You can get discounts up to 25% on popular routes. We’re finding that airlines are doing a lot more private marketing to people who are loyal customers or who sign up for their programs.”
As for where this leaves the likes of Amtrak, senior marketing officer John Stierwalt points to the popularity of the California Rail Pass plan, which for $159 allows for seven days of travel in California over a 21-day period. But mostly: Take the train if you, um, like the train. “We don’t really go directly head to head with those,” Stierwalt says. “We feel like we have a fairly unique product that offers a different travel experience.”
Published: 05/14/2008
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Comments
Wow, you're so right - and to think that all along everyone's been thinking Hitler was this bad, inconsiderate dude!
The train! The train!
The BEST WAY TO TRAVEL!
Funny (as usual) and to the point (also, as usual.)
I am really, really, really, really glad you are the editor.