Traveling Outside of Time
Brian Rosenwald made the Coast Starlight into a great train, the best long-distance train in the Amtrak system. The engineers, Jerry Griffo, Willie the cook – they are all True Believers, all followers of the Gospel According to Brian. And they all wan t to preserve what he created. And it should be preserved. If this train is less luxurious than it was in its heyday in the late 1990s, if it has fewer of the amenities Rosenwald imagined for it, it is still an experience worth savoring: a timeless adventure, a short course in conviviality, an important lesson about making connections in a world often experienced by proxy, a Zen tutorial.
I don’t know if Rosenwald will be able to export his vision to Chicago, where he now oversees the California Zephyr and the Texas Eagle. He’s been consumed by budget cutting since taking the job. Much of the focus has been on survival, he says, with a vision for long-distance trains with upgraded service deferred at least for the near future. But Rosenwald has allies – from Congressional supporters to citizen lobbyists, from train-obsessed rail fans to those of us weary of air travel and congested highways who have begun or renewed our romance with the rails.
In the midst of Amtrak’s ongoing struggles, I’m betting on Brian. In fact, I’ve already booked passage on my next land cruise, a 2438-mile journey aboard the California Zephyr.