Amtrak offers first look at Airo equipment

WASHINGTON — Amtrak unveiled Airo, its newest fleet addition, on Tuesday with a media tour that featured an in-depth look at the interior of the shiny, feature-filled trainset that’s slated to begin revenue service this summer on the Amtrak Cascades’ service in the Pacific Northwest.

Before offering a tour of coach, café car, and business class equipment, speakers from Amtrak, manufacturer Siemens, and the Department of Transportation extolled the virtues of the program slated to produce 83 trainsets for service on routes less than 750 miles long. The Airo equipment is intended for 14 routes in the East, as well as the Cascades that run between Eugene, Ore., and Vancouver, British Columbia.

Amtrak President Roger Harris called the trainset parked at Union Station — wearing the green, brown, and white paint scheme unique to the Cascades — “the next step in Amtrak’s transformation,” following the introduction of NextGen Acela less than five months ago.

“We can all be proud,” said Tobias Bauer, CEO of Siemens North America. “The train is beautiful.”

Amtrak literature describes Airo as an “elevated experience” with “spacious seating” and improved signage. For a reporter, the tour showed off bright and carefully designed seating, signage, and amenities intended as upgrades from Amtrak’s workhorse Amfleet railcars.

There are three different types of Airo consist: seven-car trainsets with 317-seat and 335-seat configurations, and a nine-car version seating 479. The 317-seat arrangement includes a baggage compartment. Cascades service will continue to offer checked baggage, said Michael Carter, senior director of the Airo program.

In general, the train offers larger windows and seating meant to improve on Amfleet design shortcomings, including one that put too many seats in places where riders had difficulty looking out the windows. The gray, ribbed seats feel much like Amfleet, based on a brief test that doesn’t offer a clue how they would feel on a long trip. Seat pitch is 37 inches in coach and 39 inches in business class.

Half of the coach seats face forward. The others face backward. There are four tables in each coach car.

Among changes from Amfleet: 3 inches of extra space between neighboring coach seats, reflecting customer research that showed more space was a popular feature that Amfleet doesn’t offer. While Amfleet cars have footrests (and Amfleet II features leg rests), coach seats in the new trains seats do not have footrests, although business class seats retain them.

The drop-down seatback tables have space for a 15-inch laptop, as well as a slot to hold phones or tablets. Plugs are located under each seat. Each aisle seat has a grab bar for safety, said Amtrak Principal Electrical Engineer Kevin Choi. Each seat has a reading light as well, plugs for multiple devices, and a USB-C outlet, Choi said.

Features in business class include the familiar two-and-one seating configuration, with 49 seats per car. Choi said there are additional outlets as well as a coat hanger on the seat and 6 inches of space between passengers on the two-seat side of the car.

The café car includes a dining space with 21 seats and a total of four tables — unlike the NextGen Acela design, which has no sit-down café space. The counter where passengers order from the attendant faces the business-class end of the train. While passengers looking to order can line up at either end, there is no real space where those waiting to order can congregate, other than in the aisle.

The counter is in the center of the café car. Several cabinets are near the end of the café on the coach side. One bright café car feature is the ability to change the lights for holidays and special occasions, Choi said.

Interior lighting is adjustable, with further tests planned on intensity of ceiling lights, Choi said. Current settings are 80% for daytime and 25% at night.

Special attention was paid to Americans with Disabilities Act standards, resulting in spaces that include tables and other improvements, Choi said. These include aisles wide enough in the café to accommodate mobility aids such as wheelchairs, allowing passengers to order from the attendant or access items in grab-and-go food cases.

Along with the introductory statement and equipment tour, officials emphasized the made-in-America theme for the trainsets. They are being built at Siemens plants in Sacramento, Calif., and Lexington, N.C. Suppliers in 31 states provide parts.

Details that casual riders might not notice include a small space for conductors featuring screens for diagnostic information and train announcements — avoiding the need to have the crew members occupy tables or seats that passengers could have used. There is a video surveillance system in each car that activates if the conductor reports an event.

The new equipment is part of a $7.3 billion order, including a long-term parts and service agreement and related expense, announced in July 2021 [see “Amtrak, Siemens finalize deal …,” Trains.com, July 7, 2021]. While the initial sets for the Cascades are diesel powered, the order also calls for dual-power and battery hybrid trainsets.

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