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Amtra~ A Newsleller for Amtrak Employees VOLUME 2-ISSUE 13 SEPTEMBER 15, 1973 amtrak revolutionizes ticketing, reservations Railroad p ass enger ticketing the modern way. Here at Amtrak's computerized reservation and ticketing center at Bensalem, Pa ., ticketing and reservations have tak en on space-age speed for rail passengers in the Northeast. A new breed of reservation agent-modern, effici ent, Today, ARTS covers the Northeast from Canada to courteous and equipped with the most advanced com­ Virginia, with the ARTS Center located at Bensalem, puter tools-has gone to work for the nation's rail pas­ Pa . The Southeast and West Coast Centers will go into sengers to make buying a train ticket as simple and operation in November of this year and the Middle quick as dialing a telephone. West Center follows in February of next year. Five cen­ Working in carpeted, air-conditioned buildings with ters-Bensalem, Los Angeles, Chicago, New York City soft music piped in, these new agents are bringing ex­ and Jacksonville-will make up the nation-wide reserva­ peditious order to an archaic railroad information and tion system . ticketing system which was, perhaps, Amtrak's most ARTS is a unique system designed by Amtrak solely serious problem in modernizing the nation's rail pas­ to serve the railroad passenger. While other transporta­ senger system. These agents are the vital part of Am­ tion companies have developed modern reservation trak's ARTS program-ARTS meaning Amtrak Reserva­ techniques, no system existed that could serve Amtrak's tion and Ticketing System . With their computer readout more complicated requirements. Amtrak's multiplicity consoles and their speed-of-light communications sys­ of stops, fares, and accommodations required a totally tem, ARTS agents can tell a traveler what space is avail­ new system if Amtrak passengers were to be served able on any Amtrak train and have his bedroom or efficiently and quickly. roomette or reserved seat booked in his name almost " And in ARTS, Amtrak has just such a system," says in the time it would take him to dial the weather fore­ Robert J. Dooley, Director of Data Processing. " With cast. ARTS, one call does it all for our passengers." (Continued on Pa ge 2) (Continued from Page 1) to be switched from a heavy workload area to another Bensalem-which Amtrak calls the Northeast Cen­ center which is less busy. tralized Reservations Center-went into operation on ARTS represents an initial $7-million investment for April 15, right on schedule. Almost immediately, salu­ Amtrak and is revolutionizing reservations procedures. brious effects were noted. The first day of operations But it isn't the hardware making up the system that the agents at the new center handled 3,000 telephone Mr. Dooley finds most impressive. calls and lost not a single caller. Each phone call was " Certainly it is good equipment," Mr. Dooley said. answered within an average of six seconds-a far cry "It's the best that the state of the art can provide. But from the old days when a determined caller might have it doesn't operate itself. It's the people that make it to hang on to a ringing phone for five minutes or more work that Mr. Lewis (Roger Lewis, President of Amtrak) before someone picked it up. and I are proud of. They are bright, dedicated, properly With its 275 employees, Bensalem today is handling trained and equipped with the best tools we could buy 14,000 calls a day. The Center's percentage of calls for them. They know the importance of talking courte­ handled never falls below 95 per cent and frequently ously, pleasa ntly and knowledgeably about our services." hovers at the 99 to 100 per cent mark. And Mr. Dooley sums it all up: "If you don' t have ARTS is the result of work on the part of hundreds people like this working for you, the most sophisticated of people, but the four key Amtrak employees who equipment in the world isn't going to help you." designed the system are Mr. Dooley; Robert Bell, Man­ ager-Computer Technology; Thomas W. Kennedy, Man­ ager of the Bensalem Center, and Donald E. Ulrich, Project Manager for the Northeast Region. And consider­ ing the outmoded systems they had to work with, they did it in remarkably short time. " What we replaced," Mr. Dooley said, " were 13 individual antiquated sys­ tems which had been designed ba ck in the 1930s . The only modern system we could build on was the Tic­ ketron system which the Department of Transportation put in for the Metroliners. I don' t think it is unreason­ able to say that we had to start from scratch." Th e "heart" of ARTS is two giant computers located in the basement of Amtrak headquarters. When a pas­ senger makes a toll-free telephone call to inquire about reservations, his call is answered by one of the agents at one of the five centers. While the caller waits, the agent types the request into a visual displaywhich looks considerably like a television screen. This information is transmitted via high-speed telephone lines to the computers. With almost unbelievable speed, the com­ puters scan their millions of memory cells, find the right one, and send the information back to the agen t where it appears on the agent's screen-all in the time With her co mputerized information system, reservations agent Lydia it takes the caller to draw a few breaths. The computer Hunter can quickly tell a passenger what space is available on any can make the reservation if that is what the passenger train in the Amtrak system and complete the passenger's ticketing. wishes, or if he requires information only, the computer feeds back information on all trains for a particular destination on a particular date including the necessary r ______ HAVEYOU MOVED????? _____ _ fare information. If a reservation is made, the computer can automatically send an advisory report to the sta­ I Please let us know so that you can continue to re­ tion where the ticket will be picked up. I ceive UPDATE. The Bensalem Center is equipped with a sophisticated I Name ___________________________________ monitoring system. A flashing digital box reads out Old Add ress _____________________________ exactly what is going on at the center at all times. It I shows how many agents are on duty, how many in­ I City ________ State _____ Zip ___ coming calls are waiting, how long the oldest call has I New Address ____________ _____ been waiting, how many agents are in conversation I City ______ State ____ Zip ___ with customers, how many customers are on hold while the agents seek additional information from another I Amtrak Employee? ___________ source by phone, and how many agents are making I Railroad Employee? __________ call backs or working on follow up duties. I Similar equipment is to be placed at all five reserva­ I Railroad? __________ tion bureaus with a centralized monitor at Amtrak I Mail to: Amtrak Public Relations headquarters in Washington, D.C. This will enable calls I 955 L' Enfan t Plaza North, S. W. I Washington, D.C. 200024 Amtrak passengers in the Northeas t now are making reservations through A mtrak's com­ p uterized reserva tio ns and ticketing center at Bensalem, Pa . Shown above is a group of reserva tion agent trainees receiving indoctrination in the center's comp uterized com­ munica tio ns sys tem . At righ t are three Amtrak employees who pla yed major roles in the d esig n of th e sys tem. Shown left to right are: Robert Bell, Manager-Computer Technology; Robert}. Dooley, Director of Data Processing, and Thomas W. Kennedy, Manager of th e Bensalem Center. A t b o ttom, Amtrak reservation agents book passengers on A mtrak trains. Th eir light-weight h ea dse ts are th e lates t word in telephones. / amtrak dedicates new station at springfield, mass. Amtrak dedicated its newest passenger railroad sta­ Company, Inc., of Springfield was the general con­ tion renovation project at Springfield, Mass., early this tractor. month and demonstrated a solution to a too-common Amtrak operates 10 daily passenger trains through urban problem. Springfield including the popular Washington/ Mont­ The new station replaces an old building which was real service initiated last fall. Amtrak considers the city considered among the most modern of its time when an important link in the corporation's New England it was built in the 1920s but which had, over the years, operation. deteriorated to the point that passengers were some­ Amtrak employs four persons at theSpringfieldstation times hesitant to enter. At the same time, the costs to including lead ticket agent, James McNulty, who is in Amtrak of replacing existing platforms and train service charge of the Springfield operation. facilities elsewhere would have been prohibitive. The station is staffed 24-hours-a-day, seven days a week with tickets available for the entire Amtrak sys­ The solution was a station-within-a-station. Located in tem. the northwest corner of the old station complex, the Springfield area residents may use Amtrak's new com­ new facility provides passengers with a modern, well­ puterized reservation system by calling the toll-free lighted ticketing, baggage and waiting area and easy number (800) 523-5720 . access to the passenger tracks without ever requiring The station is located in downtown Springfield at 66 them to enter the old station. Lyman Street and metered parking is available near the Renovated at a cost of over $320,000, the facility station.

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