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Amtrak

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 three Canadian provinces. Amtrak is a portmanteau of the words America and trak, the latter itself a sensational spelling of track.

Founded in 1971 as a quasi-public corporation to operate many U.S. passenger rail routes, Amtrak receives a combination of state and federal subsidies but is managed as a for-profit organization. The company's headquarters is located one block west of Union Station in Washington, D.C. Amtrak is headed by a Board of Directors, two of whom are the Secretary of Transportation and CEO of Amtrak, while the other eight members are nominated to serve a term of five years.

Amtrak's network includes over 500 stations along 21,400 mi of track. It directly owns approximately 623 mi of this track and operates an additional 132 miles of track; the remaining mileage is over rail lines owned by other railroad companies. While most track speeds are limited to 79 mph or less, several lines have been upgraded to support top speeds of 110 mph, and parts of the Northeast Corridor support top speeds of 160 mph.

In fiscal year 2022, Amtrak served 22.9 million passengers and had $2.1 billion in revenue, with more than 17,100 employees as of fiscal year 2021. Nearly 87,000 passengers ride more than 300 Amtrak trains daily. Nearly two-thirds of passengers come from the 10 largest metropolitan areas and 83% of passengers travel on routes shorter than 400 miles.

Private passenger service
In 1916, 98% of all commercial intercity travelers in the United States moved by rail, and the remaining 2% moved by inland waterways. Nearly 42 million passengers used railways as primary transportation. Passenger trains were owned and operated by the same privately owned companies that operated freight trains. As the 20th century progressed, patronage declined in the face of competition from buses, air travel, and the car. New streamlined diesel-powered trains such as the Pioneer Zephyr were popular with the traveling public but could not reverse the trend. By 1940, railroads held 67 percent of commercial passenger-miles in the United States. In real terms, passenger-miles had fallen by 40% since 1916, from 42 billion to 25 billion.

Traffic surged during World War II, which was aided by troop movement and gasoline rationing. The railroad's market share surged to 74% in 1945, with a massive 94 billion passenger-miles. After the war, railroads rejuvenated their overworked and neglected passenger fleets with fast and luxurious streamliners. These new trains brought only temporary relief to the overall decline. Even as postwar travel exploded, passenger travel percentages of the overall market share fell to 46% by 1950, and then 32% by 1957. The railroads had lost money on passenger service since the Great Depression, but deficits reached $723 million in 1957. For many railroads, these losses threatened financial viability.

The causes of this decline were heavily debated. The National Highway System and airports, both funded by the government, competed directly with the railroads, which, unlike the airline, bus, and trucking companies, paid for their own infrastructure. American car culture was also on the rise in the post-World War II years. Progressive Era rate regulation limited the railroad's ability to turn a profit. Railroads also faced antiquated work rules and inflexible relationships with trade unions. To take one example, workers continued to receive a day's pay for 100 to 150 mile workdays. Streamliners covered that in two hours.

Matters approached a crisis in the 1960s. Passenger service route-miles fell from 107000 mi in 1958 to 49000 mi in 1970, the last full year of private operation. The diversion of most United States Post Office Department mail from passenger trains to trucks, airplanes, and freight trains in late 1967 deprived those trains of badly needed revenue. In direct response, the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway filed to discontinue 33 of its remaining 39 trains, ending almost all passenger service on one of the largest railroads in the country. The equipment the railroads had ordered after World War II was now 20 years old, worn out, and in need of replacement.

Formation
As passenger service declined, various proposals were brought forward to rescue it. The 1961 Doyle Report proposed that the private railroads pool their services into a single body. Similar proposals were made in 1965 and 1968 but failed to attract support. The federal government passed the High Speed Ground Transportation Act of 1965 to fund pilot programs in the Northeast Corridor, but this did nothing to address passenger deficits. In late 1969, multiple proposals emerged in the United States Congress, including equipment subsidies, route subsidies, and, lastly, a "quasi-public corporation" to take over the operation of intercity passenger trains. Matters were brought to a head on June 21, 1970, when the Penn Central, the largest railroad in the Northeastern United States and teetering on bankruptcy, filed to discontinue 34 of its passenger trains.

In October 1970, Congress passed, and President Richard Nixon signed into law (against the objections of most of his advisors), the Rail Passenger Service Act. Proponents of the bill, led by the National Association of Railroad Passengers (NARP), sought government funding to ensure the continuation of passenger trains. They conceived the National Railroad Passenger Corporation (NRPC), a quasi-public corporation that would be managed as a for-profit organization, but which would receive taxpayer funding and assume operation of intercity passenger trains - while many involved in drafting the bill did not believe the NRPC would actually be profitable, this was necessary in order for the White House and more conservative members of Congress to support the bill.

There were several key provisions:
 * Any railroad operating intercity passenger service could contract with the NRPC, thereby joining the national system.
 * The United States federal government, through the Secretary of Transportation, would own all of the NRPC's issued and outstanding preferred stock.
 * Participating railroads bought into the NRPC using a formula based on their recent intercity passenger losses. The purchase price could be satisfied either by cash or rolling stock; in exchange, the railroads received NRPC common stock.
 * Any participating railroad was freed of the obligation to operate intercity passenger service after May 1, 1971, except for those services chosen by the Department of Transportation (DOT) as part of a "basic system" of service and paid for by NRPC using its federal funds.
 * Railroads that chose not to join the NRPC system were required to continue operating their existing passenger service until 1975, at which time they could pursue the customary ICC approval process for any discontinuance or alteration to the service.

Of the 26 railroads still offering intercity passenger service in 1970, only six declined to join the NRPC.

Nearly everyone involved expected the experiment to be short-lived. The Nixon administration and many Washington insiders viewed the NRPC as a politically expedient way for the President and Congress to give passenger trains a "last hurrah" as demanded by the public. They expected the NRPC to quietly disappear as public interest waned. After Fortune magazine exposed the manufactured mismanagement in 1974, Louis W. Menk, chairman of the Burlington Northern Railroad, remarked that the story was undermining the scheme to dismantle Amtrak. Proponents also hoped that government intervention would be brief and that Amtrak would soon be able to support itself. Neither view had proved to be correct; popular support allowed Amtrak to continue in operation longer than critics imagined, while financial results made passenger train service returning to private railroad operations infeasible.

Selection of initial routes
The Rail Passenger Service Act gave the Secretary of Transportation, at that time John A. Volpe, thirty days to produce an initial draft of the endpoints of the routes the NRPC would be required by law to serve for four years. On November 24th Volpe presented his initial draft consisting of 27 routes to Nixon, which he believed would make a $24 million profit by 1975. The Office of Management and Budget, however, believed Volpe and the DOT's analysis was far too optimistic, with director George Shultz arguing to cut the number of routes by around half. Nixon agreed with Shultz, and the public draft presented by Volpe on November 30th consisted of only 16 routes.

The initial reaction to this heavily-cut-back proposed system from the public, the press, and congressmen was strongly negative. It made front-page headlines across the country and it was quickly leaked that the DOT had wanted a far larger system than the White House would approve of. The Interstate Commerce Commission produced its own report on December 29th, criticising the proposed draft and arguing for the inclusion of fifteen additional routes, giving further ammunition to the congressmen who wanted an expanded system. Further wrangling between the DOT and the White House produced the final list of routes on January 28th, 1971, adding five additional routes to the November 30th draft.

These required routes only had their endpoints specified; the selection of the actual routes to be taken between the endpoints was left to the NRPC, which had just three months to decide them before it was due to start service. Consultants from McKinsey & Company were hired to perform this task, and their results were publicly announced on March 22nd.

At the same time, the NRPC had hired Lippincott & Margulies to create a brand for it and replace its original working brand name of Railpax. On March 30th, L&M's work was presented to the NRPC's board of incorporators, who unanimously agreed on the "headless arrow" logo and on the new brand name "Amtrak", a portmanteau of the words America and trak, the latter itself a sensational spelling of track. The name change was publicly announced less than two weeks before operations began.

1970s: The Rainbow Era
Amtrak began operations on May 1, 1971. Amtrak received no rail tracks or rights-of-way at its inception. All Amtrak's routes were continuations of prior service, although Amtrak pruned about half the passenger rail network. Of the 366 train routes that operated previously, Amtrak continued only 184. Several major corridors became freight-only, including the ex-New York Central Railroad's Water Level Route from New York to Ohio and Grand Trunk Western Railroad's Chicago to Detroit route. The reduced passenger train schedules created confusion amongst staff. At some stations, Amtrak service was available only late at night or early in the morning, prompting complaints from passengers. Disputes with freight railroads over track usage caused some services to be rerouted, temporarily cancelled, or replaced with buses. On the other hand, the creation of the Los Angeles–Seattle Coast Starlight from three formerly separate train routes was an immediate success, resulting in an increase to daily service by 1973.

Needing to operate only half the train routes that had operated previously, Amtrak would lease around 1,200 of the best passenger cars from the 3,000 that the private railroads owned. All were air-conditioned, and 90% were easy-to-maintain stainless steel. When Amtrak took over, passenger cars and locomotives initially retained the paint schemes and logos of their former owners which resulted in Amtrak running trains with mismatched colors – the "Rainbow Era". In mid-1971, Amtrak began purchasing some of the equipment it had leased, including 286 EMD E and F unit diesel locomotives, 30 GG1 electric locomotives and 1,290 passenger cars. By 1975, the official Amtrak color scheme was painted on most Amtrak equipment and newly purchased locomotives and the rolling stock began appearing.

Amtrak inherited problems with train stations (most notably deferred maintenance) and redundant facilities from the competing railroads that once served the same communities. Chicago is a prime example; on the day prior to Amtrak's inception, intercity passenger trains used four different Chicago terminals: LaSalle, Dearborn, North Western Station, Central, and Union. The trains at LaSalle remained there, as their operator Rock Island could not afford to opt into Amtrak. Of all the trains serving Dearborn Station, Amtrak retained only a pair of Santa Fe trains, which relocated to Union Station beginning with the first Amtrak departures on May 1, 1971. Dearborn Station closed after the last pre-Amtrak trains on the Santa Fe arrived in Chicago on May 2. None of the intercity trains that had served North Western Station became part of the Amtrak system, and that terminal became commuter-only after May 1. The trains serving Central Station continued to use that station until an alternate routing was adopted in March 1972. In New York City, Amtrak had to maintain two stations (Penn and Grand Central) due to the lack of track connections to bring trains from upstate New York into Penn Station; a problem that was rectified once the Empire Connection was built in 1991. The Amtrak Standard Stations Program was launched in 1978 and proposed to build a standardized station design across the system with an aim to reduce costs, speed construction, and improve its corporate image. However, the cash-strapped railroad would ultimately build relatively few of these standard stations.

Amtrak soon had the opportunity to acquire rights-of-way. Following the bankruptcy of several northeastern railroads in the early 1970s, including Penn Central, which owned and operated the Northeast Corridor (NEC), Congress passed the Railroad Revitalization and Regulatory Reform Act of 1976. A large part of the legislation was directed to the creation of Conrail, but the law also enabled the transfer of the portions of the NEC not already owned by state authorities to Amtrak. Amtrak acquired the majority of the NEC on April 1, 1976. (The portion in Massachusetts is owned by the Commonwealth and managed by Amtrak. The route from New Haven to New Rochelle is owned by New York's Metropolitan Transportation Authority and the Connecticut Department of Transportation as the New Haven Line.) This mainline became Amtrak's "jewel" asset, and helped the railroad generate revenue. While the NEC ridership and revenues were higher than any other segment of the system, the cost of operating and maintaining the corridor proved to be overwhelming. As a result, Amtrak's federal subsidy was increased dramatically. In subsequent years, other short route segments not needed for freight operations were transferred to Amtrak.

In its first decade, Amtrak fell far short of financial independence, which continues today, but it did find modest success rebuilding trade. Outside factors discouraged competing transport, such as fuel shortages which increased costs of automobile and airline travel, and strikes which disrupted airline operations. Investments in Amtrak's track, equipment and information also made Amtrak more relevant to America's transportation needs. Amtrak's ridership increased from 16.6 million in 1972 to 21 million in 1981.

In February 1978, Amtrak moved its headquarters to 400 N Capitol Street W, Washington D.C.

1980s and 1990s: The Building Era
In 1982, former Secretary of the Navy and retired Southern Railway head William Graham Claytor Jr. came out of retirement to lead Amtrak. During his time at Southern, Claytor was a vocal critic of Amtrak's prior managers, who all came from non-railroading backgrounds. Transportation Secretary Drew Lewis cited this criticism as a reason why the Democrat Claytor was acceptable to the Reagan White House. Despite frequent clashes with the Reagan administration over funding, Claytor enjoyed a good relationship with Lewis, John H. Riley, the head of the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), and with members of Congress. Limited funding led Claytor to use short-term debt to fund operations.

Building on mechanical developments in the 1970s, high-speed Washington–New York Metroliner Service was improved with new equipment and faster schedules. Travel time between New York and Washington, D.C. was reduced to under 3 hours due to system improvements and limited stop service. This improvement was cited as a reason why Amtrak grew its share of intercity trips between the cities along the corridor. Elsewhere in the country, demand for passenger rail service resulted in the creation of five new state-supported routes in California, Illinois, Missouri, Oregon and Pennsylvania, for a total of 15 state-supported routes.

Amtrak added two trains in 1983, the California Zephyr between Oakland and Chicago via Denver and revived the Auto Train, a unique service that carries both passengers and their vehicles. Amtrak advertised it as a great way to avoid traffic along the I-95 running between Lorton, Virginia (near Washington, D.C.) and Sanford, Florida (near Orlando) on the Silver Star alignment.

In 1980s and 1990s, stations in Baltimore, Chicago, and Washington, D.C. received major rehabilitation and the Empire Connection tunnel opened in 1991, allowing Amtrak to consolidate all New York services at Penn Station. Despite the improvements, Amtrak's ridership stagnated at roughly 20 million passengers per year, amid uncertain government aid from 1981 to about 2000.

In the early 1990s, Amtrak tested several different high-speed trains from Europe on the Northeast Corridor. An X 2000 train was leased from Sweden for test runs from October 1992 to January 1993, followed by revenue service between Washington, D.C. and New York City from February to May and August to September 1993. Siemens showed the ICE 1 train from Germany, organizing the ICE Train North America Tour which started to operate on the Northeast Corridor on July 3, 1993.

In 1993, Thomas Downs succeeded Claytor as Amtrak's fifth president. The stated goal remained "operational self-sufficiency". By this time, however, Amtrak had a large overhang of debt from years of underfunding. In the mid-1990s, Amtrak suffered through a serious cash crunch. Under Downs, Congress included a provision in the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997 that resulted in Amtrak receiving a $2.3 billion tax refund that resolved their cash crisis. However, Congress also instituted a "glide path" to financial self-sufficiency, excluding railroad retirement tax act payments.

George Warrington became the sixth president in 1998, with a mandate to make Amtrak financially self-sufficient. Under Warrington, the company tried to expand into express freight shipping, placing Amtrak in competition with the "host" freight railroads and the trucking industry.

On March 9, 1999, Amtrak unveiled its plan for the Acela Express, a high-speed train on the Northeast Corridor between Washington, D.C. and Boston. Several changes were made to the corridor to make it suitable for higher-speed electric trains. The Northend Electrification Project extended existing electrification from New Haven, Connecticut, to Boston to complete the overhead power supply along the 454 mi route, and several grade crossings were improved or removed.

2000s: Growth in the 21st century
Ridership increased during the first decade of the 21st century after the implementation of capital improvements in the NEC and rises in automobile fuel costs. The inauguration of the high-speed Acela in late 2000 generated considerable publicity and led to major ridership gains. However, through the late 1990s and very early 21st century, Amtrak could not add sufficient express freight revenue or cut sufficient other expenditures to break even. By 2002, it was clear that Amtrak could not achieve self-sufficiency, but Congress continued to authorize funding and released Amtrak from the requirement. In early 2002, David L. Gunn replaced Warrington as seventh president. In a departure from his predecessors' promises to make Amtrak self-sufficient in the short term, Gunn argued that no form of passenger transportation in the United States is self-sufficient as the economy is currently structured. Highways, airports, and air traffic control all require large government expenditures to build and operate, coming from the Highway Trust Fund and Aviation Trust Fund paid for by user fees, highway fuel and road taxes, and, in the case of the General Fund, from general taxation. Gunn dropped most freight express business and worked to eliminate deferred maintenance. A plan by the Bush administration "to privatize parts of the national passenger rail system and spin off other parts to partial state ownership" provoked disagreement within Amtrak's board of directors. Late in 2005, Gunn was fired. Gunn's replacement, Alexander Kummant (2006–08), was committed to operating a national rail network, and like Gunn, opposed the notion of putting the Northeast Corridor under separate ownership. He said that shedding the system's long-distance routes would amount to selling national assets that are on par with national parks, and that Amtrak's abandonment of these routes would be irreversible. In late 2006, Amtrak unsuccessfully sought annual congressional funding of $1 billion for ten years. In early 2007, Amtrak employed 20,000 people in 46 states and served 25 million passengers a year, its highest amount since its founding in 1970. Politico noted a key problem: "the rail system chronically operates in the red. A pattern has emerged: Congress overrides cutbacks demanded by the White House and appropriates enough funds to keep Amtrak from plunging into insolvency. But, Amtrak advocates say, that is not enough to fix the system's woes."

Joseph H. Boardman replaced Kummant as president and CEO in late 2008. In 2011, Amtrak announced its intention to improve and expand the high-speed rail corridor from Penn Station in NYC, under the Hudson River in new tunnels, and double-tracking the line to Newark, NJ, called the Gateway Program, initially estimated to cost $13.5 billion (equal to $ billion in ).

From May 2011 to May 2012, Amtrak celebrated its 40th anniversary with festivities across the country that started on National Train Day (May 7, 2011). A commemorative book entitled Amtrak: An American Story was published, a documentary was created, six locomotives were painted in Amtrak's four prior paint schemes, and an Exhibit Train toured the country visiting 45 communities and welcoming more than 85,000 visitors.

After years of almost revolving-door CEOs at Amtrak, in December 2013, Boardman was named "Railroader of the Year" by Railway Age magazine, which noted that with over five years in the job, he is the second-longest serving head of Amtrak since it was formed more than 40 years ago. On December 9, 2015, Boardman announced in a letter to employees that he would be leaving Amtrak in September 2016. He had advised the Amtrak Board of Directors of his decision the previous week. On August 19, 2016, the Amtrak Board of Directors named former Norfolk Southern Railway President & CEO Charles "Wick" Moorman as Boardman's successor with an effective date of September 1, 2016. During his term, Moorman took no salary and said that he saw his role as one of a "transitional CEO" who would reorganize Amtrak before turning it over to new leadership.

On November 17, 2016, the Gateway Program Development Corporation (GDC) was formed for the purpose of overseeing and effectuating the rail infrastructure improvements known as the Gateway Program. GDC is a partnership of the States of New York and New Jersey and Amtrak. The Gateway Program includes the Hudson Tunnel Project, to build a new tunnel under the Hudson River and rehabilitate the existing century-old tunnel, and the Portal North Bridge, to replace a century-old moveable bridge with a modern structure that is less prone to failure. Later projects of the Gateway Program, including the expansion of track and platforms at Penn Station New York, construction of the Bergen Loop and other improvements will roughly double capacity for Amtrak and NJ Transit trains in the busiest, most complex section of the Northeast Corridor.

In June 2017, it was announced that former Delta and Northwest Airlines CEO Richard Anderson would become Amtrak's next President & CEO. Anderson began the job on July 12, assuming the title of President immediately and serving alongside Moorman as "co-CEOs" until the end of the year. On April 15, 2020, Atlas Air Chairman, President and CEO William Flynn was named Amtrak President and CEO. In addition to Atlas Air, Flynn has held senior roles at CSX Transportation, SeaLand Services and GeoLogistics Corp. Anderson would remain with Amtrak as a senior advisor until December 2020.

As Amtrak approached profitability in 2020, the company undertook planning to expand and create new intermediate-distance corridors across the country. Included were several new services in Ohio, Tennessee, Colorado, and Minnesota, among other states.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Amtrak continued operating as an essential service. It started requiring face coverings the week of May 17, and limited sales to 50% of capacity. Most long-distance routes were reduced to three weekly round trips in October 2020.

In March 2021, following President Joe Biden's American Jobs Plan announcement, Amtrak CEO Bill Flynn outlined a proposal called Amtrak Connects US that would expand state-supported intercity corridors with an infusion of upfront capital assistance. This would expand service to cities including Las Vegas, Phoenix, Baton Rouge, Nashville, Chattanooga, Louisville, Columbus (Ohio), Wilmington (North Carolina), Cheyenne, Montgomery, Concord, and Scranton. Also in March 2021, Amtrak announced plans to return 12 of its long-distance routes to daily schedules later in the spring. Most of these routes were restored to daily service in late-May 2021. However, a resurgence of the virus caused by the Omicron variant caused Amtrak to modify and/or suspend many of these routes again from January to March 2022.

Routes
Amtrak is required by law to operate a national route system. Amtrak has presence in 46 of the 48 contiguous states, as well as the District of Columbia (with only thruway connecting services in Wyoming and no services in South Dakota). Amtrak services fall into three groups: short-haul service on the Northeast Corridor, state-supported short-haul service outside the Northeast Corridor, and medium- and long-haul service known within Amtrak as the National Network. Amtrak receives federal funding for the vast majority of its operations including the central spine of the Northeast Corridor as well as for its National Network routes. In addition to the federally funded routes, Amtrak partners with transportation agencies in 18 states to operate other short and medium-haul routes outside of the Northeast Corridor, some of which connect to it or are extensions from it. In addition to its inter-city services, Amtrak also operates commuter services under contract for three public agencies: the MARC Penn Line in Maryland, Shore Line East in Connecticut, and Metrolink in Southern California.

Service on the Northeast Corridor (NEC), between Boston, and Washington, D.C., as well as between Philadelphia and Harrisburg, is powered by overhead lines; for the rest of the system, diesel-fueled locomotives are used. Routes vary widely in the frequency of service, from three-days-a-week trains on the Sunset Limited to several times per hour on the Northeast Corridor. For areas not served by trains, Amtrak Thruway routes provide guaranteed connections to trains via buses, vans, ferries and other modes.

The most popular and heavily used services are those running on the NEC, including the Acela and Northeast Regional. The NEC runs between Boston and Washington, D.C. via New York City and Philadelphia. Some services continue into Virginia. The NEC services accounted for 4.4 million of Amtrak's 12.2 million passengers in fiscal year 2021. Outside the NEC the most popular services are the short-haul corridors in California, the Pacific Surfliner, Capitol Corridor, and San Joaquins, which are supplemented by an extensive network of connecting buses. Together the California corridor trains accounted for a combined 2.35 million passengers in fiscal year 2021. Other popular routes include the Empire Service between New York City and Niagara Falls, via Albany and Buffalo, which carried 613.2 thousand passengers in fiscal year 2021, and the Keystone Service between New York City and Harrisburg via Philadelphia that carried 394.3 thousand passengers that same year.

Four of the six busiest stations by boardings are on the NEC: New York Penn Station (first), Washington Union Station (second), Philadelphia 30th Street Station (third), and Boston South Station (fifth). The other two are Chicago Union Station (fourth) and Los Angeles Union Station (sixth).

On-time performance
On-time performance is calculated differently for airlines than for Amtrak. A plane is considered on-time if it arrives within 15 minutes of the schedule. Amtrak uses a sliding scale, with trips under 250 mi considered late if they are more than 10 minutes behind schedule, up to 30 minutes for trips over 551 mi in length.

Outside the Northeast Corridor and stretches of track in Southern California and Michigan, most Amtrak trains run on tracks owned and operated by privately owned freight railroads. BNSF is the largest host to Amtrak routes, with 6.3 million train-miles. Freight rail operators are required under federal law to give dispatching preference to Amtrak trains. However, Amtrak has accused freight railroads of violating or skirting these regulations, resulting in passenger trains waiting for freight traffic to clear the track.

The railroads' dispatching practices were investigated in 2008, resulting in stricter laws about train priority. Subsequently, Amtrak's overall on-time performance went up from 74.7% in fiscal 2008 to 84.7% in 2009, with long-distance trains and others outside the NEC seeing the greatest benefit. The Missouri River Runner jumped from 11% to 95%, becoming one of Amtrak's best performers. The Texas Eagle went from 22.4% to 96.7%, and the California Zephyr, with a 5% on-time record in 2008, went up to 78.3%. However, this improved performance coincided with a general economic downturn, resulting in the lowest freight-rail traffic volumes since at least 1988, meaning less freight traffic to impede passenger traffic.

In 2018, Amtrak began issuing report cards, grading each host railroad similar to students, based on the railroad's impact to on-time performance. The first report card, issued in March 2018, includes one A (given to Canadian Pacific) and two Fs (given to Canadian National and Norfolk Southern). Amtrak's 2020 host report card gives Canadian Pacific and Canadian National an A, BNSF and CSX a B, Union Pacific a C+, and Norfolk Southern a D−.

Ridership
Amtrak carried 15.8 million passengers in 1972, its first full year of operation. Ridership has increased steadily ever since, carrying a record 32 million passengers in fiscal year 2019, more than double the total in 1972. For the fiscal year ending on September 30, 2020, Amtrak reported 16.8 million passengers, with the decline resulting from effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Fiscal year 2021 saw ridership decrease more, with 12.2 million passengers reported. Fiscal year 2022 saw an increase to 22.9 million passengers. Fiscal year 2023 saw a further increase to 28.6 million passengers, although this is still below the record-high in Fiscal year 2019.

Guest Rewards
Amtrak's loyalty program, Guest Rewards, is similar to the frequent-flyer programs of many airlines. Guest Rewards members accumulate points by riding Amtrak and through other activities, and can redeem these points for free Amtrak tickets and other rewards.

Rail passes
Amtrak offers the USA rail pass, valid for 10 segments (rides) in 30 days, and the California rail pass which is valid for 7 days of travel in a period of 21 days.

Lines
Along the NEC and in several other areas, Amtrak owns 730 mi including 17 tunnels consisting of 29.7 mi of track, and 1,186 bridges (including the famous Hell Gate Bridge) consisting of 42.5 mi of track. In several places, primarily in New England, Amtrak leases tracks, providing track maintenance and controlling train movements. Most often, these tracks are leased from state, regional, or local governments. The lines are further divided into services. Amtrak owns and operates the following lines:

 * Northeast Corridor: the Northeast Corridor between Washington, D.C., and Boston via Baltimore, Philadelphia, Newark, New York and Providence is largely owned by Amtrak (363 of 457 miles), working cooperatively with several state and regional commuter agencies. Between New Haven, Connecticut, and New Rochelle, New York, Northeast Corridor trains travel on the Metro-North Railroad's New Haven Line, which is owned and operated by the Connecticut Department of Transportation and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.
 * Keystone Corridor: Amtrak owns the 104.2-mile line from Philadelphia to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. As a result of an investment partnership with the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, signal and track improvements were completed in October 2006 that allow all-electric service with a top speed of 110 mph to run along the corridor.
 * Empire Corridor: Amtrak owns the 11 mi between New York Penn Station and Spuyten Duyvil, New York. In 2012, Amtrak leased the 94 mi between Poughkeepsie, New York, and Schenectady, New York, from owner CSX. In addition, Amtrak owns the tracks across the Whirlpool Rapids Bridge and short approach sections near it.
 * Michigan Line: Amtrak acquired the 98 miles of Porter, Indiana to Kalamazoo, Michigan section of the former Michigan Central main line from Conrail in 1976.
 * New Haven–Springfield Line: Amtrak purchased the 62 mi between New Haven and Springfield from Penn Central in 1976.
 * Post Road Branch: 12.42 mi, Castleton-on-Hudson to Rensselaer, New York

In addition to these lines, Amtrak owns station and yard tracks in Chicago, Los Angeles, New Orleans, New York City, Oakland (Kirkham Street Yard), Orlando, Portland, Oregon, Seattle, Philadelphia, and Washington, D.C. Amtrak leases station and yard tracks in Hialeah, near Miami, Florida, from the State of Florida.

Amtrak owns New York Penn Station, Philadelphia 30th Street Station, Baltimore Penn Station and Providence Station. It also owns Chicago Union Station, formerly through a wholly owned subsidiary, the Chicago Union Station Company until absorbed by Amtrak in 2017. Through the Washington Terminal Company, in which it owns a 99.7 percent interest, it owns the rail infrastructure around Washington Union Station. It holds a 99% interest in 30th Street Limited, a partnership responsible for redeveloping the area in and around 30th Street Station. Amtrak also owns Passenger Railroad Insurance.

Service lines
Amtrak organizes its business into six "service lines", which are treated like divisions at most companies.

There are three operating service lines: Northeast Corridor, which operates Amtrak's high-speed Acela and Northeast Regional trains; State Supported, which provides service on corridor routes of less than 750 miles through cost-sharing agreements with state governments; and Long Distance, which operates routes over 750 miles and receives financial support from the federal government.

Additionally there are three service lines involved in activities other than operating Amtrak trains. They are: Ancillary, which includes operating commuter trains under contract, establishing Amtrak Thruway connecting services, operating charter trains, and hauling private railcars; Real Estate & Commercial which manages property owned by Amtrak, including leasing space to other businesses inside stations; and Infrastructure Access/Reimbursable which charges other railroads for access to Amtrak owned tracks and performs work that can be reimbursed by other railroads or state governments. Net revenue generated by these service lines is used to fund Amtrak's other operations.

Classes of service
Amtrak offers four classes of service: First Class, Sleeper Service, Business Class, and Coach Class:
 * First Class: First Class service is only offered on the Acela. Seats are larger than those of Business Class and come in a variety of seating styles (single, facing singles with table, double, facing doubles with table and wheelchair accessible). First Class is located in a separate car from business class and is located at the end of the train (to reduce the number of passengers walking in the aisles). A car attendant provides passengers with hot towel service, a complimentary meal and alcoholic beverages. First Class passengers have access to lounges located at most larger stations.
 * Sleeper Service: Private room accommodations on long-distance trains, including roomettes, bedrooms, bedroom suites, accessible bedrooms, and, on some trains, family bedrooms. Included in the price of a room are attendant service and on most routes, full hot meals. At night, attendants convert rooms into sleeping areas with fold-down beds and linens. Shower facilities with towels and bar soap are available. Complimentary juice, coffee and bottled water are included as well. Sleeper car passengers have access to all passenger facilities aboard the train. Sleeper Service passengers have access to lounges located at select stations.
 * Business Class: Business Class seating is offered on the Acela, Northeast Regional, many short-haul corridor trains and some long-distance trains. It is the standard class of service on the Acela. On all other trains where it is offered, Business Class is located in a dedicated car or section of the train. While the specific features vary by route, many include extra legroom and complimentary non-alcoholic drinks. Seats in business class recline and feature a fold-down tray table, footrest, individual reading light, and power outlet. Passengers have access to some lounges, but busier locations may exclude Business Class customers.
 * Coach Class: Coach Class is the standard class of service on all Amtrak trains except the Acela. Seats in coach recline and feature a fold-down tray table, footrest, individual reading light, and power outlet. Coach cars on long-distance trains are configured with fewer seats per car so that passengers have additional legroom and seats which are equipped with leg rests. Some corridor and short-distance trains have one coach car designated as a "quiet car" where loud conversation, phone calls, and sound played from electronic devices are not permitted.

Wi-Fi and electronic services
Amtrak first offered free Wi-Fi service to passengers aboard the Downeaster in 2008, the Acela and the Northeast Regional trains on the NEC in 2010, and the Amtrak Cascades in 2011. In February 2014, Amtrak rolled out Wi-Fi on corridor trains out of Chicago. When all the Midwest cars offer the AmtrakConnect service, about 85% of all Amtrak passengers nationwide will have Wi-Fi access. , most Amtrak passengers have access to free Wi-Fi. The service has developed a reputation for being unreliable and slow due to its cellular network connection; on some routes it is usually unusable, either freezing on the login page or, if it manages to log in, failing to provide any internet bandwidth.

Routes with Wi-Fi are typical on routes running east of the Mississippi River and the US Coastlines. West–east routes such as Sunset Limited, Southwest Chief and Texas Eagle notably lacks Wi-Fi whether through Amtrak or using a private hotspot, as cell towers are not common on the rail paths through desert and mountain wilderness.

Amtrak launched an e-ticketing system on the Downeaster in November 2011 and rolled it out nationwide on July 30, 2012. Amtrak officials said the system gives "more accurate knowledge in realtime of who is on the train which greatly improves the safety and security of passengers; en route reporting of onboard equipment problems to mechanical crews which may result in faster resolution of the issue; and more efficient financial reporting".

Baggage and cargo services
Amtrak allows carry-on baggage on all routes; services with baggage cars allow checked baggage at selected stations. With the passage of the Wicker Amendment in 2010 passengers are allowed to put lawfully owned, unloaded firearms in checked Amtrak baggage, reversing a decade-long ban on such carriage.

The Amtrak Express cargo service provides small-package and less-than-truckload shipping between most Amtrak stations that handle checked baggage (over 100 cities). Cargo travels alongside checked luggage in baggage cars. Service and hours vary by station, limited by available equipment and staffing. Nearly all stations with checked baggage service can handle small packages, while large stations with forklifts can handle palletized shipments. Amtrak Express also offers station-to-station shipment of human remains to many cities.

Amtrak is popular among bicycle touring enthusiasts due to the ease of riding with a bike. In contrast to airlines, which require riders to dismantle their bicycles and place them in specialized bags, most Amtrak trains have onboard bike racks in either the coaches or checked baggage car. Bicycle reservations are required on most routes and cost up to $20.

Labor issues
In the modern era, Amtrak faces a number of important labor issues. As of 2023, the average Amtrak employee annual salary was $121,000 per year. In the area of pension funding, because of limitations originally imposed by Congress, most Amtrak workers were traditionally classified as "railroad employees" and contributions to the Railroad Retirement system have been made for those employees. However, because the size of the contributions is determined on an industry-wide basis rather than with reference to the employer for whom the employees work, some critics, such as the National Association of Railroad Passengers, maintain that Amtrak is subsidizing freight railroad pensions by as much as US$150 million/year.

In recent times, efforts at reforming passenger rail have addressed labor issues. In 1997 Congress released Amtrak from a prohibition on contracting for labor outside the corporation (and outside its unions), opening the door to privatization. Since that time, many of Amtrak's employees have been working without a contract. The most recent contract, signed in 1999, was mainly retroactive.

Because of the fragmentation of railroad unions, Amtrak had 14 separate unions to negotiate with, including 24 separate contracts between them as of 2009. This makes it difficult to make substantial changes, in contrast to a situation where one union negotiates with one employer. Former Amtrak president Kummant followed a cooperative posture with Amtrak's trade unions, ruling out plans to privatize large parts of Amtrak's unionized workforce.

Amtrak's environmental impact
Per passenger mile, Amtrak is 30–40 percent more energy-efficient than commercial airlines and automobiles overall, though the exact figures for particular routes depend on load factor along with other variables. The electrified trains in the NEC are considerably more efficient than Amtrak's diesels and can feed energy captured from regenerative braking back to the electrical grid. Passenger rail is also very competitive with other modes in terms of safety per mile.

In 2005, Amtrak's carbon dioxide equivalent emissions per passenger were 0.411 lbs/mi (0.116 kg per km). For comparison, this is similar to a car with two people, about twice as high as the UK rail average (where more of the system is electrified), about four times the average US motorcoach, and about eight times a Finnish electric intercity train or fully loaded fifty-seat coach. It is, however, about two thirds of the raw CO2-equivalent emissions of a long-distance domestic flight.

Amtrak operates diesel, electric, and dual-mode (diesel and electric) locomotives on over thirty passenger train routes throughout the U.S. and Canada. Diesel-powered engines produce more greenhouse gas emissions during operation than electric trains.

As for the locational pollution directly from Amtrak operation, their diesel trains cause more regional air pollution, impacting the ecosystems around the sites of operation. Also, more stops along train routes can lead to higher greenhouse gas emissions. Amtrak rail facilities located in Delaware were cited as the state's largest source of polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) contamination into the Delaware River, which build up in the tissue of animals and are human carcinogens.

Environmental impact on Amtrak
Amtrak railways and surrounding infrastructure are susceptible to degradation by natural causes over time. Railways experience water damage from climate change backed increases in rainfall in wet areas, and rail buckling caused by hotter and dryer seasons in naturally dry areas.

In September 2021, the remnants of Hurricane Ida flooded the Amtrak Northeast Corridor running from Boston to Washington D.C. and caused it to shut down for an entire day. In February 2023, heavy snowfall and debris on tracks caused major disruptions from delays to cancellations.

Rising summertime temperatures are causing an increase in railway buckles. A study conducted on the railways in the southeast United Kingdom found that when temperature changes become extreme in the summertime due to climate change, the tracks buckle due to the outward force of the metal expanding in collaboration with the weight of train car traffic. This causes speed restrictions to be put in place around certain temperature intervals, slowing travel time and lessening the amount of train rides in a day. The study found that in 2004, 30,000 delay minutes were attributed to increased heat causing a total of over 1.7 million U.S. dollars, of total heat related delay cost.

Public funding
Amtrak receives annual appropriations from federal and state governments to supplement operating and capital programs.

1970s to 1990s
Amtrak commenced operations in 1971 with $40 million in direct federal aid, $100 million in federally insured loans, and a somewhat larger private contribution. Officials expected that Amtrak would break even by 1974, but those expectations proved unrealistic and annual direct federal aid reached a 17-year high in 1981 of $1.25 billion. During the Reagan administration, appropriations were halved and by 1986, federal support fell to a decade low of $601 million, almost none of which were capital appropriations. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Congress continued the reductionist trend even while Amtrak expenses held steady or rose. Amtrak was forced to borrow to meet short-term operating needs, and by 1995 Amtrak was on the brink of a cash crisis and was unable to continue to service its debts. In response, in 1997 Congress authorized $5.2 billion for Amtrak over the next five years – largely to complete the Acela capital project – on the condition that Amtrak submit to the ultimatum of self-sufficiency by 2003 or liquidation. While Amtrak made financial improvements during this period, it did not achieve self-sufficiency.

2000s
In 2004, a stalemate in federal support of Amtrak forced cutbacks in services and routes as well as the resumption of deferred maintenance. In fiscal 2004 and 2005, Congress appropriated about $1.2 billion for Amtrak, $300 million more than President George W. Bush had requested. However, the company's board requested $1.8 billion through fiscal 2006, the majority of which (about $1.3 billion) would be used to bring infrastructure, rolling stock, and motive power back to a state of good repair. In Congressional testimony, the DOT Inspector General confirmed that Amtrak would need at least $1.4 billion to $1.5 billion in fiscal 2006 and $2 billion in fiscal 2007 just to maintain the status quo. In 2006, Amtrak received just under $1.4 billion, with the condition that Amtrak would reduce (but not eliminate) food and sleeper service losses. Thus, dining service was simplified and now requires two fewer on-board service workers. Only Auto Train and Empire Builder services continue regular made-on-board meal service. In 2010 the Senate approved a bill to provide $1.96 billion to Amtrak, but cut the approval for high-speed rail to a $1 billion appropriation.

State governments have partially filled the breach left by reductions in federal aid. Several states have entered into operating partnerships with Amtrak, notably California, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Michigan, Oregon, Missouri, Washington, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Texas, Wisconsin, Vermont, Maine, and New York, as well as the Canadian province of British Columbia, which provides some of the resources for the operation of the Cascades route.

With the dramatic rise in gasoline prices during 2007–08, Amtrak saw record ridership. Capping a steady five-year increase in ridership overall, regional lines saw 12% year-over-year growth in May 2008. In October 2007, the Senate passed S-294, Passenger Rail Improvement and Investment Act of 2007 (70–22) sponsored by Senators Frank Lautenberg and Trent Lott. Despite a veto threat by President Bush, a similar bill passed the House on June 11, 2008, with a veto-proof margin (311–104). The final bill, spurred on by the September 12 Metrolink collision in California and retitled Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act of 2008, was signed into law by President Bush on October 16, 2008. The bill appropriates $2.6 billion a year in Amtrak funding through 2013.

2010s
Amtrak points out that in 2010, its farebox recovery (percentage of operating costs covered by revenues generated by passenger fares) was 79%, the highest reported for any U.S. passenger railroad. This increased to 94.9% in 2018.

Amtrak has argued that it needs to increase capital program costs in 2013 in order to replace old train equipment because the multi-year maintenance costs for those trains exceed what it would cost to simply buy new equipment that would not need to be repaired for several years. However, despite an initial request for more than $2.1 billion in funding for the year, the company had to deal with a year-over-year cut in 2013 federal appropriations, dropping to under $1.4 billion for the first time in several years. Amtrak stated in 2010 that the backlog of needed repairs of the track it owns on the Northeast Corridor included over 200 bridges, most dating to the 19th century, tunnels under Baltimore dating to the American Civil War era and functionally obsolete track switches which would cost $5.2 billion to repair (more than triple Amtrak's total annual budget). Amtrak's budget is only allocated on a yearly basis, and it has been argued by Joseph Vranich that this makes multi-year development programs and long-term fiscal planning difficult if not impossible.

In Fiscal Year 2011, the U.S. Congress granted Amtrak $563 million for operating and $922 million for capital programs.

2020s
In 2021, the 117th United States Congress passed and President Joe Biden signed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which directly appropriated $66 billion for rail over a five-year period, of which at least $18 billion is designated for expanding passenger rail service to new corridors, and it authorized an additional $36 billion. Amtrak received $22 billion in advance appropriations and $19 billion in fully authorized funds.

Controversy
Government aid to Amtrak was controversial from the beginning. The formation of Amtrak in 1971 was criticized as a bailout serving corporate rail interests and union railroaders, not the traveling public. Critics have asserted that Amtrak has proven incapable of operating as a business and that it does not provide valuable transportation services meriting public support, a "mobile money-burning machine". Many fiscal conservatives have argued that subsidies should be ended, national rail service terminated, and the NEC turned over to private interests. Critics also question Amtrak's energy efficiency, though the U.S. Department of Energy considers Amtrak among the most energy-efficient forms of transportation.

The Rail Passenger Service Act of 1970, which established Amtrak, specifically states that, "The Corporation will not be an agency or establishment of the United States Government". Then common stock was issued in 1971 to railroads that contributed capital and equipment; these shares convey almost no benefits, but their holders declined a 2002 buy-out offer by Amtrak. There are currently 109.4 million shares of preferred stock, at a par value of $100 per share, all held by the US government. As of February 2015, there were 9.4 million shares of common stock, with a par value of $10 per share, held by American Premier Underwriters (53%), BNSF (35%), Canadian Pacific (7%) and Canadian National (5%).

Leadership
In addition to the United States Secretary of Transportation and its CEO, Amtrak's Board of Directors has eight presidentially-nominated and senate-confirmed seats. Presidentially-appointed members serve nominally five-year terms but are allowed to serve until their successor is confirmed, and no more than five of the eight may belong to one political party. Of the eight presidentially-appointed members, a minimum of two must and maximum of four may reside along or near the Northeast Corridor (defined as Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, and Rhode Island), while the other four to six must reside in a state served by an Amtrak-operated long-distance or state-supported route outside of the Northeast Corridor.

Incidents

The following are major accidents and incidents that involved Amtrak trains: After settling for $17 million in the 2017 Washington state train crash, to prevent further lawsuits, the board adopted a new policy requiring arbitration.

Publication
In April 1974, Amtrak News was launched as Amtrak's bi-monthly in-house journal.

Topics dealing with Amtrak

 * Amtrak Arrow Reservation System
 * Amtrak paint schemes
 * Amtrak Police Department
 * Amtrak Standard Stations Program
 * Beech Grove Shops
 * History of rail transport in the United States
 * List of Amtrak stations
 * Positive train control
 * Visible Intermodal Prevention and Response team (VIPR) – TSA's rail security operations
 * Railway electrification system

Other railway companies

 * Auto-Train Corporation – Pioneer of car-on-train service
 * Brightline – Privately operated higher-speed intercity rail service between Miami and Orlando, Florida that is also constructing a high-speed rail route, dubbed Brightline West that will run between Los Angeles and Las Vegas.
 * Via Rail (Canada) - connects with Amtrak
 * List of railway companies

title: Amtrak


text:
Pope Fabian

Pope Fabian (Fabianus) was the bishop of Rome from 10 January 236 until his death on 20 January 250, succeeding Anterus. A dove is said to have descended on his head to mark him as the Holy Spirit's unexpected choice to become the next pope. He was succeeded by Cornelius.

Most of his papacy was characterized by amicable relations with the imperial government, and the schism between the Roman congregations of Pontian and Hippolytus was ended. He divided Rome into diaconates and appointed secretaries to collect the records of the martyrs. He sent out seven "apostles to the Gauls" as missionaries, but probably did not baptize Emperor Philip the Arab as is alleged. He died a martyr at the beginning of the Decian persecution and is venerated as a saint by the Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church.

Early life and accession
According to the Liber Pontificalis, Fabian was a noble Roman by birth, and his father's name was Fabius. Nothing more is known about his background. The legend concerning the circumstances of his election is preserved by the fourth-century writer Eusebius of Caesarea (Church History, VI. 29). One authority refers to him as "Flavian".

After the short reign of Pope Anterus, Fabian had come to Rome from the countryside when the new papal election began. "Although present", says Eusebius, Fabian "was in the mind of none". While the names of several illustrious and noble churchmen were being considered over the course of thirteen days, a dove suddenly descended upon the head of Fabian. To the assembled electors, this strange sight recalled the gospel scene of the descent of the Holy Spirit on Jesus at the time of his baptism by John the Baptist. The congregation took this as a sign that he was marked out for this dignity, and Fabian was at once proclaimed bishop by acclamation.

Papacy
During Fabian's reign of 14 years, there was a lull in the persecution which had resulted in the exile of both Anterus' predecessor Pontian and the antipope (and later saint) Hippolytus. Fabian had enough influence at court to effect the return of the bodies of both of these martyrs from Sardinia, where they had died at hard labor in the mines. The report that he baptized the emperor Philip the Arab and his son, however, is probably a legend, although he did seem to enjoy some connections at court, since the bodies of Pontian and Hippolytus could not have been exhumed without the emperor's approval.

According to the sixth-century historian Gregory of Tours Fabian sent out the "apostles to the Gauls" to Christianise Gaul in A.D. 245. Fabian sent seven bishops from Rome to Gaul to preach the Gospel: Gatianus of Tours to Tours, Trophimus of Arles to Arles, Paul of Narbonne to Narbonne, Saturnin to Toulouse, Denis to Paris, Austromoine to Clermont, and Martial to Limoges. He also condemned Privatus, the originator of a new heresy in Africa.

The Liber Pontificalis says that Fabian divided the Christian communities of Rome into seven districts, each supervised by a deacon. Eusebius (VI §43) adds that he appointed seven subdeacons to help collect the acta of the martyrs—the reports of the court proceedings on the occasion of their trials. There is also a tradition that he instituted the four minor clerical orders: porter, lector, exorcist, and acolyte. However most scholars believe these offices evolved gradually and were formally instituted at a later date.

His deeds are thus described in the Liber Pontificalis: Hic regiones dividit diaconibus et fecit vii subdiacones, qui vii notariis imminerent, Ut gestas martyrum integro fideliter colligerent, et multas fabricas per cymiteria fieri praecepit.

He divided the regiones into deaconships and made seven sub-deaconships which seven secretaries oversaw, so that they brought together the deeds of the martyrs faithfully made whole, and he brought forth many works in the cemeteries.

The Liberian Catalogue of the popes also reports that Fabian initiated considerable work on the catacombs, where honored Christians were interred, and where he also caused the body of Pontian to be entombed at the catacomb of Callixtus.

Martyrdom and legacy
With the ascension of Emperor Decius, the Roman government's tolerant policy toward Christianity temporarily ended. Decius ordered everyone in the Empire, with the exception of Jews, to demonstrate loyalty to Rome by offering incense to the cult images of deities that represented the Roman state. This was unacceptable to many Christians, who, while no longer obeying most of the laws of the Old Testament, took the commandment against idolatry seriously. Fabian was one of the earliest victims of Decius, dying as a martyr on 20 January 250, at the beginning of the Decian persecution, though probably in prison, rather than by execution.

Fabian was interred in the catacomb of Callixtus in Rome. The Greek inscription on his tomb has survived, and bears the words: "Fabian, Bishop, Martyr". Fabian's remains were later reinterred at San Sebastiano fuori le mura by Pope Clement XI where the Albani Chapel is dedicated in his honour.

Fabian's feast day is commemorated on 20 January in the Catholic Church, the same as Saint Sebastian. Fabian's feast day in the Eastern Orthodox Church is 5 August, and in Coptic Christianity it is 7 and 11 Meshir. The church of Santi Fabiano e Venanzio a Villa Fiorelli (1936) in Rome is named in his honour, and also in that of Saint Venantius of Camerino who died in the same persecutions.

Fabian was highly esteemed by Cyprian. Cyprian's letter to Fabian's successor, Cornelius, calls him "incomparable" and says that the glory of his martyrdom answered the purity and holiness of his life (Cyprian, Epistle 30). Novatian refers to his nobilissima memoriae, and he corresponded with Origen.

Fabian is honored on the liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America on 20 January.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Pope Fabian


text:
User:Europrobe

Real name is Daniel Perup. You can send me e-mail to: probe -{at}- spray -{dot}- se

Do visit my WWW homepage! Here are some spamtrap addresses: danie1@perup.net arthropod@perup.net  simmer@perup.net Don't send any e-mail to them, or you will end up in a blacklist!

title: User:Europrobe


text:
Kinetic energy penetrator

A kinetic energy penetrator (KEP), also known as long-rod penetrator (LRP), is a type of ammunition designed to penetrate vehicle armour using a flechette-like, high-sectional density projectile. Like a bullet or kinetic energy weapon, this type of ammunition does not contain explosive payloads and uses purely kinetic energy to penetrate the target. Modern KEP munitions are typically of the armour-piercing fin-stabilized discarding sabot (APFSDS) type.

History
Early cannons fired kinetic energy ammunition, initially consisting of heavy balls of worked stone and later of dense metals. From the beginning, combining high muzzle energy with projectile weight and hardness have been the foremost factors in the design of such weapons. Similarly, the foremost purpose of such weapons has generally been to defeat protective shells of armored vehicles or other defensive structures, whether it is stone walls, sailship timbers, or modern tank armour. Kinetic energy ammunition, in its various forms, has consistently been the choice for those weapons due to the highly focused terminal ballistics.

The development of the modern KE penetrator combines two aspects of artillery design, high muzzle velocity and concentrated force. High muzzle velocity is achieved by using a projectile with a low mass and large base area in the gun barrel. Firing a small-diameter projectile wrapped in a lightweight outer shell, called a sabot, raises the muzzle velocity. Once the shell clears the barrel, the sabot is no longer needed and falls off in pieces. This leaves the projectile traveling at high velocity with a smaller cross-sectional area and reduced aerodynamic drag during the flight to the target (see external ballistics and terminal ballistics). Germany developed modern sabots under the name "treibspiegel" ("thrust mirror") to give extra altitude to its anti-aircraft guns during the Second World War. Before this, primitive wooden sabots had been used for centuries in the form of a wooden plug attached to or breech loaded before cannonballs in the barrel, placed between the propellant charge and the projectile. The name "sabot" (pronounced  in English usage) is the French word for clog (a wooden shoe traditionally worn in some European countries).

Concentration of force into a smaller area was initially attained by replacing the single metal (usually steel) shot with a composite shot using two metals, a heavy core (based on tungsten) inside a lighter metal outer shell. These designs were known as armour-piercing composite rigid (APCR) by the British, high-velocity armor-piercing (HVAP) by the US, and hartkern (hard core) by the Germans. On impact, the core had a much more concentrated effect than plain metal shot of the same weight and size. The air resistance and other effects were the same as for the shell of identical size. High-velocity armor-piercing (HVAP) rounds were primarily used by tank destroyers in the US Army and were relatively uncommon as the tungsten core was expensive and prioritized for other applications.

Between 1941 and 1943, the British combined the two techniques in the armour-piercing discarding sabot (APDS) round. The sabot replaced the outer metal shell of the APCR. While in the gun, the shot had a large base area to get maximum acceleration from the propelling charge but once outside, the sabot fell away to reveal a heavy shot with a small cross-sectional area. APDS rounds served as the primary kinetic energy weapon of most tanks during the early-Cold War period, though they suffered the primary drawback of inaccuracy. This was resolved with the introduction of the armour-piercing fin-stabilized discarding sabot (APFSDS) round during the 1970s, which added stabilising fins to the penetrator, greatly increasing accuracy.

Design
The principle of the kinetic energy penetrator is that it uses its kinetic energy, which is a function of its mass and velocity, to force its way through armor. If the armor is defeated, the heat and spalling (particle spray) generated by the penetrator going through the armor, and the pressure wave that develops, ideally destroys the target.

The modern kinetic energy weapon maximizes the stress (kinetic energy divided by impact area) delivered to the target by:
 * maximizing the mass – that is, using the densest metals practical, which is one of the reasons depleted uranium or tungsten carbide is often used – and muzzle velocity of the projectile, as kinetic energy scales with the mass m and the square of the velocity v of the projectile $$(mv^2/2).$$
 * minimizing the width, since if the projectile does not tumble, it will hit the target face first. As most modern projectiles have circular cross-sectional areas, their impact area will scale with the square of the radius r (the impact area being $$\pi r^2$$)

The penetrator length plays a large role in determining the ultimate depth of penetration. Generally, a penetrator is incapable of penetrating deeper than its own length, as the sheer stress of impact and perforation ablates it. This has led to the current designs which resemble a long metal arrow.

For monobloc penetrators made of a single material, a perforation formula devised by Wili Odermatt and W. Lanz can calculate the penetration depth of an APFSDS round.

In 1982, an analytical investigation drawing from concepts of gas dynamics and experiments on target penetration led to the conclusion on the efficiency of impactors that penetration is deeper using unconventional three-dimensional shapes.

The opposite method of KE-penetrators uses chemical energy penetrators. Two types of such shells are in use: high-explosive anti-tank (HEAT) and high-explosive squash head (HESH). They have been widely used against armour in the past and still have a role but are less effective against modern composite armour, such as Chobham as used on main battle tanks today. Main battle tanks usually use KE-penetrators, while HEAT is mainly found in missile systems that are shoulder-launched or vehicle-mounted, and HESH is usually favored for fortification demolition.

title: Kinetic energy penetrator


text:
Martin Dunwoody

Martin John Dunwoody (born 3 November 1938) is an emeritus professor of Mathematics at the University of Southampton, England.

He earned his PhD in 1964 from the Australian National University. He held positions at the University of Sussex before becoming a professor at the University of Southampton in 1992. He has been emeritus professor since 2003.

Dunwoody works on geometric group theory and low-dimensional topology. He is a leading expert in splittings and accessibility of discrete groups, groups acting on graphs and trees, JSJ-decompositions, the topology of 3-manifolds and the structure of their fundamental groups.

Since 1971 several mathematicians have been working on Wall's conjecture, posed by Wall in a 1971 paper, which said that all finitely generated groups are accessible. Roughly, this means that every finitely generated group can be constructed from finite and one-ended groups via a finite number of amalgamated free products and HNN extensions over finite subgroups. In view of the Stallings theorem about ends of groups, one-ended groups are precisely those finitely generated infinite groups that cannot be decomposed nontrivially as amalgamated products or HNN-extensions over finite subgroups. Dunwoody proved the Wall conjecture for finitely presented groups in 1985. In 1991 he finally disproved Wall's conjecture by finding a finitely generated group that is not accessible.

Dunwoody found a graph-theoretic proof of Stallings' theorem about ends of groups in 1982, by constructing certain tree-like automorphism invariant graph decompositions. This work has been developed to an important theory in the book Groups acting on graphs, Cambridge University Press, 1989, with Warren Dicks. In 2002 Dunwoody put forward a proposed proof of the Poincaré conjecture. The proof generated considerable interest among mathematicians, but a mistake was quickly discovered and the proof was withdrawn. The conjecture was later proven by Grigori Perelman, following the program of Richard S. Hamilton.

title: Martin Dunwoody


text:
Hymenophore

A hymenophore refers to the hymenium-bearing structure of a fungal fruiting body. Hymenophores can be smooth surfaces, lamellae, folds, tubes, or teeth. The term was coined by Robert Hooke in 1665.

title: Hymenophore


text:
Hymenomycete

Hymenomycetes was formerly the largest taxonomic group of fungi within the division Basidiomycota, but the term is no longer taxonomically relevant. Many familiar fungi belong to this class, including bracket fungi and toadstools. This class contained the orders Agaricales, Boletales, and Russulales.

The erstwhile class, now understood to be a polyphyletic assemblage of basidiomycetes, refers to fungi with fruit bodies whose hymenophore develops in an exposed manner, or only with a veil (velum). These forms are termed gymnocarpic or hemiangiocarpic ontogeny, respectively. A contrasting example of hymenophore development is the puffballs, which undergo gasterocarpic development (hymenophore enclosed).

title: Hymenomycete


text:
Waveplate

A waveplate or retarder is an optical device that alters the polarization state of a light wave travelling through it. Two common types of waveplates are the half-wave plate, which rotates the polarization direction of linearly polarized light, and the quarter-wave plate, which converts between different elliptical polarizations (such as the special case of converting from linearly polarized light to circularly polarized light and vice versa.)

Waveplates are constructed out of a birefringent material (such as quartz or mica, or even plastic), for which the index of refraction is different for light linearly polarized along one or the other of two certain perpendicular crystal axes. The behavior of a waveplate (that is, whether it is a half-wave plate, a quarter-wave plate, etc.) depends on the thickness of the crystal, the wavelength of light, and the variation of the index of refraction. By appropriate choice of the relationship between these parameters, it is possible to introduce a controlled phase shift between the two polarization components of a light wave, thereby altering its polarization. With an engineered combination of two birefringent materials, an achromatic waveplate can be manufactured such that the spectral response of its phase retardance can be nearly flat.

A common use of waveplates—particularly the sensitive-tint (full-wave) and quarter-wave plates—is in optical mineralogy. Addition of plates between the polarizers of a petrographic microscope makes the optical identification of minerals in thin sections of rocks easier, in particular by allowing deduction of the shape and orientation of the optical indicatrices within the visible crystal sections. This alignment can allow discrimination between minerals which otherwise appear very similar in plane polarized and cross polarized light.

Principles of operation

A waveplate works by shifting the phase between two perpendicular polarization components of the light wave. A typical waveplate is simply a birefringent crystal with a carefully chosen orientation and thickness. The crystal is cut into a plate, with the orientation of the cut chosen so that the optic axis of the crystal is parallel to the surfaces of the plate. This results in two axes in the plane of the cut: the ordinary axis, with index of refraction no, and the extraordinary axis, with index of refraction ne. The ordinary axis is perpendicular to the optic axis. The extraordinary axis is parallel to the optic axis. For a light wave normally incident upon the plate, the polarization component along the ordinary axis travels through the crystal with a speed vo = c/no, while the polarization component along the extraordinary axis travels with a speed ve = c/ne. This leads to a phase difference between the two components as they exit the crystal. When ne < no, as in calcite, the extraordinary axis is called the fast axis and the ordinary axis is called the slow axis. For ne > no the situation is reversed.

Depending on the thickness of the crystal, light with polarization components along both axes will emerge in a different polarization state. The waveplate is characterized by the amount of relative phase, Γ, that it imparts on the two components, which is related to the birefringence Δn and the thickness L of the crystal by the formula

 * $$\Gamma = \frac{2 \pi\, \Delta n\, L}{\lambda_0},$$

where λ0 is the vacuum wavelength of the light.

Waveplates in general, as well as polarizers, can be described using the Jones matrix formalism, which uses a vector to represent the polarization state of light and a matrix to represent the linear transformation of a waveplate or polarizer.

Although the birefringence Δn may vary slightly due to dispersion, this is negligible compared to the variation in phase difference according to the wavelength of the light due to the fixed path difference (λ0 in the denominator in the above equation). Waveplates are thus manufactured to work for a particular range of wavelengths. The phase variation can be minimized by stacking two waveplates that differ by a tiny amount in thickness back-to-back, with the slow axis of one along the fast axis of the other. With this configuration, the relative phase imparted can be, for the case of a quarter-wave plate, one-fourth a wavelength rather than three-fourths or one-fourth plus an integer. This is called a zero-order waveplate.

For a single waveplate changing the wavelength of the light introduces a linear error in the phase. Tilt of the waveplate enters via a factor of 1/cos θ (where θ is the angle of tilt) into the path length and thus only quadratically into the phase. For the extraordinary polarization the tilt also changes the refractive index to the ordinary via a factor of cos θ, so combined with the path length, the phase shift for the extraordinary light due to tilt is zero.

A polarization-independent phase shift of zero order needs a plate with thickness of one wavelength. For calcite the refractive index changes in the first decimal place, so that a true zero order plate is ten times as thick as one wavelength. For quartz and magnesium fluoride the refractive index changes in the second decimal place and true zero order plates are common for wavelengths above 1 μm.

Half-wave plate
For a half-wave plate, the relationship between L, Δn, and λ0 is chosen so that the phase shift between polarization components is Γ = π. Now suppose a linearly polarized wave with polarization vector $$\mathbf{\hat p}$$ is incident on the crystal. Let θ denote the angle between $$\mathbf{\hat p}$$ and $$\mathbf{\hat f}$$, where $$\mathbf{\hat f}$$ is the vector along the waveplate's fast axis. Let z denote the propagation axis of the wave. The electric field of the incident wave is $$\mathbf{E}\,\mathrm{e}^{i(kz-\omega t)} = E\, \mathbf{\hat p}\,\mathrm{e}^{i(kz-\omega t)} = E (\cos\theta\, \mathbf{\hat f} + \sin\theta\, \mathbf{\hat s}) \mathrm{e}^{i(kz-\omega t)},$$ where $$\mathbf{\hat s}$$ lies along the waveplate's slow axis. The effect of the half-wave plate is to introduce a phase shift term eiΓ = eiπ = −1 between the f and s components of the wave, so that upon exiting the crystal the wave is now given by $$E (\cos\theta\, \mathbf{\hat f} - \sin\theta\, \mathbf{\hat s}) \mathrm{e}^{i(kz-\omega t)} = E [\cos(-\theta) \mathbf{\hat f} + \sin(-\theta) \mathbf{\hat s}] \mathrm{e}^{i(kz-\omega t)}.$$ If $$\mathbf{\hat p}'$$ denotes the polarization vector of the wave exiting the waveplate, then this expression shows that the angle between $$\mathbf{\hat p}'$$ and $$\mathbf{\hat f}$$ is −θ. Evidently, the effect of the half-wave plate is to mirror the wave's polarization vector through the plane formed by the vectors $$\mathbf{\hat f}$$ and $$\mathbf{\hat z}$$. For linearly polarized light, this is equivalent to saying that the effect of the half-wave plate is to rotate the polarization vector through an angle 2θ; however, for elliptically polarized light the half-wave plate also has the effect of inverting the light's handedness.

Quarter-wave plate
For a quarter-wave plate, the relationship between L, Δn, and λ0 is chosen so that the phase shift between polarization components is Γ = π/2. Now suppose a linearly polarized wave is incident on the crystal. This wave can be written as
 * $$(E_f \mathbf{\hat f} + E_s \mathbf{\hat s})\mathrm{e}^{i(kz-\omega t)},$$

where the f and s axes are the quarter-wave plate's fast and slow axes, respectively, the wave propagates along the z axis, and Ef and Es are real. The effect of the quarter-wave plate is to introduce a phase shift term eiΓ =eiπ/2 = i between the f and s components of the wave, so that upon exiting the crystal the wave is now given by
 * $$(E_f \mathbf{\hat f} + i E_s \mathbf{\hat s})\mathrm{e}^{i(kz-\omega t)}.$$

The wave is now elliptically polarized.

If the axis of polarization of the incident wave is chosen so that it makes a 45° with the fast and slow axes of the waveplate, then Ef = Es ≡ E, and the resulting wave upon exiting the waveplate is
 * $$E(\mathbf{\hat f}+i\mathbf{\hat s})\mathrm{e}^{i(kz-\omega t)},$$

and the wave is circularly polarized.

If the axis of polarization of the incident wave is chosen so that it makes a 0° with the fast or slow axes of the waveplate, then the polarization will not change, so remains linear. If the angle is in between 0° and 45° the resulting wave has an elliptical polarization.

A circulating polarization can be visualized as the sum of two linear polarizations with a phase difference of 90°. The output depends on the polarization of the input. Suppose polarization axes x and y parallel with the slow and fast axis of the waveplate:

The polarization of the incoming photon (or beam) can be resolved as two polarizations on the x and y axis. If the input polarization is parallel to the fast or slow axis, then there is no polarization of the other axis, so the output polarization is the same as the input (only the phase more or less delayed). If the input polarization is 45° to the fast and slow axis, the polarization on those axes are equal. But the phase of the output of the slow axis will be delayed 90° with the output of the fast axis. If not the amplitude but both sine values are displayed, then x and y combined will describe a circle. With other angles than 0° or 45° the values in fast and slow axis will differ and their resultant output will describe an ellipse.

Full-wave, or sensitive-tint plate
A full-wave plate introduces a phase difference of exactly one wavelength between the two polarization directions, for one wavelength of light. In optical mineralogy, it is common to use a full-wave plate designed for green light (a wavelength near 540 nm). Linearly polarized white light which passes through the plate becomes elliptically polarized, except for that green light wavelength, which will remain linear. If a linear polarizer oriented perpendicular to the original polarization is added, this green wavelength is fully extinguished but elements of the other colors remain. This means that under these conditions the plate will appear an intense shade of red-violet, sometimes known as "sensitive tint". This gives rise to this plate's alternative names, the sensitive-tint plate or (less commonly) red-tint plate. These plates are widely used in mineralogy to aid in identification of minerals in thin sections of rocks.

Multiple-order vs. zero-order waveplates
A multiple-order waveplate is made from a single birefringent crystal that produces an integer multiple of the rated retardance (for example, a multiple-order half-wave plate may have an absolute retardance of 37λ/2). By contrast, a zero-order waveplate produces exactly the specified retardance. This can be accomplished by combining two multiple-order wave plates such that the difference in their retardances yields the net (true) retardance of the waveplate. Zero-order waveplates are less sensitive to temperature and wavelength shifts, but are more expensive than multiple-order ones.

Stacking a series of different-order waveplates with polarization filters between them yields a Lyot filter. Either the filters can be rotated, or the waveplates can be replaced with liquid crystal layers, to obtain a widely tunable pass band in optical transmission spectrum.

Use in mineralogy and optical petrology
The sensitive-tint (full-wave) and quarter-wave plates are widely used in the field of optical mineralogy. Addition of plates between the polarizers of a petrographic microscope makes easier the optical identification of minerals in thin sections of rocks, in particular by allowing deduction of the shape and orientation of the optical indicatrices within the visible crystal sections.

In practical terms, the plate is inserted between the perpendicular polarizers at an angle of 45 degrees. This allows two different procedures to be carried out to investigate the mineral under the crosshairs of the microscope. Firstly, in ordinary cross polarized light, the plate can be used to distinguish the orientation of the optical indicatrix relative to crystal elongation – that is, whether the mineral is "length slow" or "length fast" – based on whether the visible interference colors increase or decrease by one order when the plate is added. Secondly, a slightly more complex procedure allows for a tint plate to be used in conjunction with interference figure techniques to allow measurement of the optic angle of the mineral. The optic angle (often notated as "2V") can both be diagnostic of mineral type, as well as in some cases revealing information about the variation of chemical composition within a single mineral type.

title: Waveplate


text:
Carlsbad

Carlsbad may refer to:

Geographical locations

 * Carlsbad, California, San Diego County, United States
 * Carlsbad Santa Fe Depot, NRHP ID No. 93001016
 * Carlsbad, New Mexico, United States
 * Carlsbad Caverns National Park
 * Carlsbad Irrigation District, NRHP ID No. 66000476
 * Carlsbad, Texas, Tom Green County, United States
 * Karlovy Vary, Czech Republic; alternatively known as Carlsbad
 * Carlsbad Springs, Ontario, Canada

Astronomy

 * Carlsbad (crater), Asteroid 951 Gaspra

title: Carlsbad


text:
Dichroism

In optics, a dichroic material is either one which causes visible light to be split up into distinct beams of different wavelengths (colours) (not to be confused with dispersion), or one in which light rays having different polarizations are absorbed by different amounts.

In beam splitters
The original meaning of dichroic, from the Greek dikhroos, two-coloured, refers to any optical device which can split a beam of light into two beams with differing wavelengths. Such devices include mirrors and filters, usually treated with optical coatings, which are designed to reflect light over a certain range of wavelengths and transmit light which is outside that range. An example is the dichroic prism, used in some camcorders, which uses several coatings to split light into red, green and blue components for recording on separate CCD arrays, however it is now more common to have a Bayer filter to filter individual pixels on a single CCD array. This kind of dichroic device does not usually depend on the polarization of the light. The term dichromatic is also used in this sense.

With polarized light
The second meaning of dichroic refers to the property of a material, in which light in different polarization states traveling through it experiences a different absorption coefficient; this is also known as diattenuation. When the polarization states in question are right and left-handed circular polarization, it is then known as circular dichroism (CD). Most materials exhibiting CD are chiral, although non-chiral materials showing CD have been recently observed. Since the left- and right-handed circular polarizations represent two spin angular momentum (SAM) states, in this case for a photon, this dichroism can also be thought of as spin angular momentum dichroism and could be modelled using quantum mechanics.

In some crystals,, such as tourmaline, the strength of the dichroic effect varies strongly with the wavelength of the light, making them appear to have different colours when viewed with light having differing polarizations. This is more generally referred to as pleochroism, and the technique can be used in mineralogy to identify minerals. In some materials, such as herapathite (iodoquinine sulfate) or Polaroid sheets, the effect is not strongly dependent on wavelength.

In liquid crystals
Dichroism, in the second meaning above, occurs in liquid crystals due to either the optical anisotropy of the molecular structure or the presence of impurities or the presence of dichroic dyes. The latter is also called a guest–host effect.

title: Dichroism


text:
Alexander Trocchi

Alexander Whitelaw Robertson Trocchi (30 July 1925 – 15 April 1984) was a Scottish novelist.

Early life and career
Trocchi was born in Glasgow to Alfred (formerly Alfredo) Trocchi, a music-hall performer of Italian parentage, and Annie (née Robertson), who ran a boarding house and died of food poisoning when Trocchi was a teenager. He attended Hillhead High School in the city and Cally House School in Gatehouse of Fleet, having been evacuated there during World War II. After working as a seaman on the Murmansk convoys, he studied English Literature and Moral Philosophy at the University of Glasgow, graduating with second-class honours in 1950.

Without graduating, Trocchi obtained a travelling grant that enabled him to relocate to continental Europe. In the early 1950s he lived in Paris and edited the literary magazine Merlin, which published Henry Miller, Samuel Beckett, Christopher Logue, and Pablo Neruda, amongst others. Although not published in Merlin, American writer Terry Southern, who lived in Paris from 1948 to 1952, became a close friend of both Trocchi and his colleague Richard Seaver, and the three later co-edited the anthology Writers In Revolt (1962). Though Merlin had been established somewhat in rivalry with the Paris Review, George Plimpton also had served on the magazine's editorial board. Trocchi claimed that this journal came to an end when the US State Department cancelled its many subscriptions in protest over an article by Jean-Paul Sartre praising the homoeroticism of Jean Genet.

Maurice Girodias published most of Trocchi's novels through Olympia Press, often written under pen names, such as Frances Lengel and Carmencita de las Lunas. Girodias also published My Life and Loves: Fifth Volume, which purported to be the final volume of the autobiography of Irish-American writer Frank Harris. However, though based on autobiographical material by Harris, the book was heavily edited and rewritten by Trocchi. Girodias subsequently commissioned Trocchi to write erotica along with his friends and Merlin associates Logue, Plimpton and John Stevenson. Under the name Frances Lengel, he churned out numerous pornographic books including the now classic Helen and Desire (1954) and a dirty version of his own book Young Adam (1954). Trocchi and his friends also published Samuel Beckett's War and Memory and Jean Genet's Thief's journal in English for the first time.

Drug addiction
Trocchi acquired his lifelong heroin addiction in Paris. He left Paris for the United States and spent time in Taos, New Mexico, before settling in New York City, where he worked on a stone scow on the Hudson River. This time is chronicled in the novel Cain's Book, which at the time became something of a sensation, being an honest study of heroin addiction with descriptions of sex and drug use that got it banned in Britain, where the book was the subject of an obscenity trial. In the United States, however, it received favorable reviews.

Trocchi was then deep in the throes of heroin addiction; he even failed to attend his own launch party for Cain's Book. His wife Lyn prostituted herself on the streets of the Lower East Side. He injected himself on camera during a live television debate on drug abuse, despite being on bail at the time. He had been charged with supplying heroin to a minor, an offence then punishable by death. A jail term seemed certain, but with the help of friends (including Norman Mailer), Trocchi was smuggled over the Canada–US border where he was given refuge in Montreal by poet Irving Layton and met up with Leonard Cohen. His wife Lyn was arrested and son Marc detained, but later joined Trocchi in London.

Later life
In the late 1950s he lived in Venice, California, then the centre of the Southern California Beat scene. In October 1955, he became involved with the Lettrist International and then the Situationist International. His text "Invisible Insurrection of a Million Minds" was published in the Scottish journal New Saltire in 1962 and subsequently as "Technique du Coup du Monde" in Internationale Situationniste, number 8. It proposed an international "spontaneous university" as a cultural force and marked the beginning of his movement towards his sigma project, which played a formative part in the UK Underground.

Trocchi appeared at the 1962 Edinburgh Writers Festival where he claimed "sodomy" as a basis for his writing. During the festival, Hugh MacDiarmid denounced him as "cosmopolitan scum". However, while this incident is well known, it is little remarked upon that the two men subsequently engaged in correspondence, and actually became friends. Trocchi then moved to London, where he remained for the rest of his life.

He began a new novel, The Long Book, which he did not finish. Much of his sporadic work of the 1960s was collected as The Sigma Portfolio. In March 1966 the Internationale Situationniste, issue number 10, announced "Upon the appearance in London of the first publications of the 'Project Sigma' initiated by Alexander Trocchi, it was mutually agreed that the SI could not involve itself in such a loose cultural venture... It is therefore no longer as a member of the SI that our friend Alexander Trocchi has since developed an activity of which we fully approve of several aspects." He continued writing but published little. He opened a small book store near his Kensington home. He was known in Notting Hill as "Scots Alec".

In the 1960s and 70s, Trocchi lived at 4 Observatory Gardens, Kensington, London on the two top floors of a 19th-century terrace block comprising six storeys. He had two sons: Marc Alexander and Nicholas. The elder son, Marc died of cancer at age 19 in 1976, shortly after Alexander's American wife Lyn died of complications from hepatitis.

After undergoing surgery for lung cancer, he died of pneumonia in London on 15 April 1984.

The younger son, Nicholas, returned to the family's home in London less than a year after his father's death and leapt to his death from the top floor of the five-storey building. When the terrace block was extensively refurbished into luxury apartments in the 1980s, the number on Alexander Trocchi's house was removed.

Resurgence
Interest in Trocchi and his role in the avant-garde movements of the mid-20th century began to rise soon after his death. Edinburgh Review published a "Trocchi Number" in 1985 and their parent house published the biography, The Making of the Monster by Andrew Murray Scott, who had known Trocchi for four years in London and who went on to compile the anthology, Invisible Insurrection, in 1991, also for Polygon. These works were influential in bringing Trocchi back to public attention. Scott assisted the Estate in attempting to regain control of Trocchi's material and to license new editions in the UK and US and Far East, also collating and annotating all remaining manuscripts and documents in the Estate's possession.

During the 1990s, various American and Scottish publishers (most notably Rebel Inc.) reissued his originally pseudonymous Olympia Press novels and a retrospective of his articles for Merlin and others, A Life in Pieces (1997), was issued in response to revived interest in his life and work by a younger generation. His early novel Young Adam was adapted into a film starring Ewan McGregor and Tilda Swinton in 2003 after several years of wrangling over finance.

Tainted Love (2005) by Stewart Home contains a lengthy 'factional' meditation on Trocchi's post-literary career period in Notting Hill. In 2009 Oneworld Publications reissued Man at Leisure (1972), complete with the original introduction by William Burroughs, and in 2011 Oneworld Publications also re-released Cain's Book, with a foreword by Tom McCarthy.

Novels

 * Helen and Desire (as Frances Lengel), The Olympia Press, Paris, 1954.
 * The Carnal Days of Helen Seferis (as Frances Lengel), The Olympia Press, Paris, 1954.
 * Young Adam (as Frances Lengel), The Olympia Press, Paris, 1954.
 * My Life and Loves: Fifth Volume, The Olympia Press, Paris, 1954.
 * White Thighs (as Frances Lengel), The Olympia Press, Paris, 1955.
 * School for Sin (as Frances Lengel), The Olympia Press, Paris, 1955.
 * Thongs (as Carmencita de las Lunas), The Olympia Press, Paris, 1956.
 * Sappho of Lesbos, Castle Books, New York, 1960.
 * Cain's Book, John Calder, London, 1960.
 * School For Wives, 1967.

Poetry

 * Man at Leisure, John Calder, London, 1972.

Short fiction

 * The Holy Man and Other Stories, Calder Publications, London, 2019.

Collections

 * Scott, Andrew Murray, editor. Invisible Insurrection of a Million Minds: A Trocchi Reader, (1991)
 * Seaver, Richard, Terry Southern and Alexander Trocchi (eds). Writers in Revolt: An Anthology (1962)

Biographies

 * Scott, Andrew Murray. Alexander Trocchi: The Making of the Monster (1992) 2nd Edition published in 2012 (Kennedy & Boyd)
 * Bowd, Gavin. The Outsiders: Alexander Trocchi and Kenneth White (1998)
 * Campbell, Allan, and Tim Niel (eds.). A Life in Pieces: Reflections on Alexander Trocchi (1997)
 * Slater, Howard. "Alexander Trocchi and Project Sigma" (1989)

About Merlin and Paris

 * Campbell, James. Exiled in Paris: Richard Wright, Lolita, Boris Vian and others on the Left Bank (1994)
 * Scott, Andrew Murray. Trocchi and MacDiarmid, Where Extremists Meet, Chapman magazine'', no. 83, 2003.
 * Hill, Lee. A Grand Guy: The Life and Art of Terry Southern, (Bloomsbury, 2001)

title: Alexander Trocchi