The Aerotrain

For U.S. railroads, hauling passengers is an expensive proposition: it runs them into the red by some $700 million yearly. Last week the nation's No. 1 automaker showed off an air-conditioned train that could put the money-losing passenger lines back in the black.

On one exhibition run, General Motors' 400-passenger Aerotrain streaked over the Pennsylvania Railroad from Washington to Philadelphia in two hours--as fast as the crack Congressional Limited. The same day, another Aerotrain rolled out of Chicago over the tracks of the New York Central and highballed 284 miles to Detroit in four hours, an hour better than the fastest passenger express. Even more impressive than its speed is the Aerotrain's low operating cost. For the Chicago-Detroit run, fuel cost only $18, about one-fourth the costs of a conventional^ train. G.M. engineers estimate that the Aerotrain can be operated 80% loaded, at fares of 2-c- a mile (present coach fare: 2.53-c- a mile) and show a profit.

No plush-lined Cadillac of the rails, the Aerotrain was designed more like a stripped-down Chevvy. The 40-passenger coach weighs only 16 tons, v. 65 tons for an 80-passenger conventional coach. Construction costs were kept down by using G.M. components already in production, e.g., coach side panels and air bellows suspension were lifted from the bus G.M. makes for Greyhound. Result: the entire ten-coach train and engine can be mass-produced for an estimated $600,000, v. $1,700,000 for a conventional train.

G.M. even looked ahead to maintenance costs. It believes that railroads should stop spending $70,000 every six years to overhaul a coach. For far less, G.M. could sell the railroad a new coach, install it on the old wheels in 1 1/2 hours.

Whether G.M. will go into the passenger-car business depends on how the train tests out on the New York Central, Pennsylvania and a long list of other railroads waiting to try it out on regular passenger runs. But G.M.'s Vice President (for Electro-Motive Division) Nelson C. Dezendorf is confident that G.M. can sell its newest product. Says he: "If we can build a railroad car to sell at half the price of present cars, and be operated at half the price, and be maintained at less than half the price, that's good for the railroads and good for G.M. too."

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