March 31, 2025
JetTrain Reaches Twenty Years in Service
Update 7:00 AM EDT, Wed April 2, 2025
The Bombardier JetTrain being in commercial service for twenty years as the Albany-Richmond 'Acela-Jet' is sadly just an Aprils Fools joke.
CNN Travel | "JetTrain: The high-speed dream that never took off" BY Ben Jones, June 8, 2021
Twenty Years of Service for the JetTrain
BY John B. Jervis for The Upstate Knickerbocker
April 1st 2025
This Tuesday marks a full two decades since the Bombardier JetTrain entered commercial service, and to mark the occasion a large group of railfans—joined by a few former railroad, corporate, and public officials—are taking the early morning Acela Express ride down from the Rensselaer Rail Station to New York City, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, and Richmond.
Among the celebrants will be 81-year-old George Featherstonhaugh, former NYS DOT Deputy Commissioner for Rail and Public Transportation during the Pataki Administration, 1995-to-2006. Your correspondent interviewed Mr. Featherstonhaugh—Georgie to his friends—and two of his travel companions on Monday evening before the big trip.
According to William Buchanan, former vice-president of high-speed rail for Bombardier Transportation and now senior director of alterative technology at Alstom, it was Mr. Featherstonhaugh who was both godfather and midwife for getting the JetTrain into service.
“Without Georgie, I don’t think this magnificent train would ever have entered commercial service anywhere,” said Mr. Buchanan.
“We had bright prospects in Florida, Alberta, and with VIA on the Toronto-Montreal corridor, but they all fell through, but New York State came through, because of his dogged persistence and powers of persuasion.”
“Georgie was so cute,” stated Matoaka Rebecca Rolfe, currently the Executive Director of the North American High-Speed Rail Association, a former aide to then Governor Mark Warner of Virginia.
“Governor Warner had just come into office in 2002, I was just out of college at my first job, when he just showed up at our office door at the capitol, holding a model train in his hand. With that white beard, red plaid jacket, and that silly striped hat, I thought he was Santa Claus. Little did I know he was bringing me the gift of a lifetime career.”
That model train was the JetTrain locomotive or “power car”, the gas-turbine version of the electric Acela trainset developed by the former Canadian rail and aerospace manufacturer Bombardier Transportation (purchase in 2020 by Alstom) in partnership with the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA).
The JetTrain originated in 1997 from the FRA's Next Generation High Speed Rail Program to develop high speed train technologies for services on routes outside the Northeast Corridor—where use of freight tracks and lower passenger volumes might make expensive electrification a non-option. Bombardier agreed to a 50/50 investment and a final agreement was signed in October 1998, with the FRA and Bombardier each investing $13 million in the first prototype locomotive, which was built at the new Bombardier Mass Transit Corporation plant in Plattsburgh, New York. The prototype locomotive was completed in June 2000.
“It was a very pragmatic project,” states Mr. Buchanan. “We took the power car of the all-electric Acela Express and installed a lightweight yet high-power gas-turbine to power the traction motors, in lieu of taking electricity from the overhead wire through a pantograph.
“In high-speed passenger service, the JetTrain is highly efficient and practically silent even at full power. Due to its lighter weight and modern engine, the JetTrain has greenhouse gas emissions that are 30% lower than a diesel unit operating at the same speeds, and now that is using renewable biodiesel, its carbon emissions are very low.
“A key feature is that running at 150 MPH, it exerts lower dynamic track forces than a conventional Amtrak train at 90 MPH, keeping track maintenance costs down. It’s just a beautiful machine.”
Mr. Featherstonhaugh agrees. “Hello Baby”, the spry old man murmured as he patted the blue and silver nose of Power Car 2050 on a cold March evening during a tour and get together at the Rensselaer Rail Station. 2050 along with 2051, powered the first of the “Acela-Jets” on the Albany-Richmond Acela Express run in April 2005.
Change of Trains
After the public tour of the JetTrain at the platform, I sat down for an interview with Mr. Featherstonhaugh, Mr. Buchanan, and Rolfe in the station’s café.
“It started in 1995,” reminisce Mr. Featherstonhaugh, “Amtrak and the State of New York collaborating on rebuilding one of the old Rohr Turbotrains, which performed well as we tested it up to 125 MPH on the NEC and the Hudson Line.”
“The plan was then, lets rebuild all seven of the then over twenty-year-old RTL trainsets and paint them in the colors of what we now call the Acela, while doing some track upgrades. I however, then came to the realization it was a far better idea to buy new than rebuild the old, and after selling it to the commissioner, I was sent up to the second floor to sell it to the governor, who sent me over to sell it to [NYS Senate Majority Leader] Joe Bruno.”
In 1998, NYS DOT signed an agreement to buy seven JetTrain trainsets from Bombardier for service between Albany, New York City, and Washington DC under the ‘Acela Express’ brand of Amtrak’s Boston-Washington high-speed rail service.
"Getting Amtrak to agree to that took some arm twisting", chuckled Mr. Featherstonhaugh refering to the extension to Washington as Acela Express trains. "But the Upstate congressional delgation, and Senators Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Al D'Amato really turned up the heat on Amtrak."
The prototype locomotive was completed in June 2000 with safety testing started at the Transportation Technology Center in Pueblo, Colorado in the summer of 2001, where it reached a maximum speed of 156 MPH.
The prototype was then taken on a tour of potential high-speed routes in Canada and Florida, while manufacturing of the full five JetTrain sets was undertaken, with coach body shells at Bombardier's plants in La Pocatière, Québec and Barre, Vermont, while the Plattsburg facility focused on the power cars.
Then the big day came, on April 1st 2005 when the first Acela Express departed Albany-Rensselaer at 6:00 AM for a non-stop run down to Croton-Harmon and New York City, with following station stops at Newark, Trenton, Philadelphia, Wilmington, Baltimore, Washington, and then Richmond.”
“What a ride,” said Ms. Rolfe. “Almost five hours later we pulled into Union Station, but it was before 11am, in time for lunch. We all cheered when after Newark we got up to 131 MPH. We then reached Richmond at 1:30pm, the governor there to welcome us.”
After a two-hour layover the Acela-Jet departed northbound at 3:30pm, arriving back at Rensselaer at 10:50pm. “What a day,” said Mr. Featherstonhaugh as he finished his coffee. “What a day.”
It wasn’t all smooth sailing, that month the electric Acela trainsets were removed from service when cracks were found in the disc brakes of many passenger coaches, requiring the brand new JetTrains to be taken out of service one-by-one later that year for similar remediation. And buyers for more trainsets didn’t emerge either.
"I asked Georgie if I could borrow his home made JetTrain model,” said Mr. Buchanan with a laugh. “He replied to me, don’t have to, Bachmann now makes an HO model. Sadly, those were the only JetTrains sold after the New York order. Promising projects in Florida, Alberta, Ontario and Quebec fell through, and in Florida we came so close. But I'm proud of the good service these seven sets have provided over these last two decades."
The Future
So, what is next for the JetTrain? “Well, we at Alstom now have fierce competition from Siemens Mobility,” stated Mr. Buchanan. “They are pushing forward with their Charger-Venture orders for California, the Midwest, Brightline in Florida, and Amtrak’s Northeast Regional and state-supported corridors.
“The Avelia Liberty is now entering service, replacing the old Acela Express sets which sadly are in their twilight hours. The Acela-Jets are a bit younger, but they too will be phased out by 2030.
“The plan, however, is for the current Albany-Richmond Acela runs to have a small dedicated sub-fleet of Avelia Liberty sets where we will insert a gas-turbine power car that will feed electricity to the traction motors of the two electric power cars for running over unelectrified tracks up to 110 MPH.
“With concern over Climate Change and the desire to get to net-zero,” injected Ms. Rolfe, “the bi-power Avelia Liberty offers the ability for discontinuous electrification, electrifying where you can on dedicated right-of-way and public tracks, while still using portions of freight right-of-way.”
“We are also working with NYS DOT and the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority on the use of hydrogen, green ammonia, and electro-fuels as the fuel for gas-turbines,” added Mr. Buchanan. “It’s a work in progress, but I’m confident we’ll get to a carbon-neutral fuel."
“With the California High Speed Rail Authority moving forward with bids on procuring its first trainsets, we’re pitching the bi-mode Avelia Liberty due its ability to provide a one-seat ride from the to be completed Merced-Bakersfield high-speed segment in the Central Valley, to Sacramento and the Bay Area over unelectrified track. The Canadian Alto High Speed Rail Project also is promising, as a bi-mode allows service beyond the Toronto-Ottawa-Montreal-Quebec electrified corridor to Windsor, London, and Niagara Falls."
“Maybe you should give Calgary-Edmonton another try,” laughed Ms. Rolfe, while Mr. Buchanan gave her back a frown.
“If they want high-speed trains,” replied Mr. Buchanan crossing his arms, “I will be glad to sell them some, electric, gas-turbine, or bi-mode, they can have their pick.”
Mr. Featherstonhaugh was looking out the window, as a southbound Empire Service pulled out of the station, the lights of the night glittering off its stainless-steel side, the red lights from the rear coach rolling pass, down the track, and out of sight into the gloom of the rainy night. I asked if he had any last thoughts.
“Well—I’m just glad to have gotten so much done, there was so much stacked against us in the nineties, state government just doesn’t move with the imagination and vigor that it should, God forbid should you ask for more staff and money!”
With a smile he added, “If the Acela-Jet and the other JetTrains are my legacy, its good enough for me. It’s been a fine ride—a very fine ride, indeed—like it’s been April’s Fools Day every day.”
