I think the title tells all about my adventure today to stop at the Frank R. Lautenberg Secaucus Junction Station to pay my respects to a great public transportation leader as he was transferred from motorcade to train at his namesake station for a very short ceremony with the New Jersey Transit Police Honor Guard, and only his Rabbi speaking in a brief ceremony in the rotunda. From there he was put aboard a baggage car to Washington aboard a special Amtrak Train of 4 cars, the lead car a baggage car, the last car Beach Grove. I saw Joseph Boardman the president of Amtrak as well. Amtrak does transport human remains in their baggage cars all the time so this was simply a much higher profile coffin. I was also the only photographer to get photos of the train leaving Secaucus from the western open end of the station (on the opposite platform). The news media all just have the casket of Sen. Lautenberg getting the honor guard escort into the baggage car (this I didn’t photograph, I couldn’t pull of being a member of the news media at this higher profile event compared to last weeks more happier special train).
The details of my trip:
This was a very spur of the moment trip, I was at home, writing yesterday’s blog post about my bike ride, planning to take another just recreational bike ride today, when I noticed this post on Amtrak Unlimited, the only message board I normally follow about Senator Frank R. Lautenberg’s Amtrak Funeral train from Secaucus Junction down to Washington. It is about 12:25, I do a quick glance at the Pascack Valley Line and Route 171 Bus Schedule, eat some lunch and walk down the hill to the bus station.
At the bus station I stop at the TVM to buy my overpriced $4.25 bus ticket to Hackensack. If I had time to walk over the bridge the fare would have been only $2.35.
A bus for route Route 171 has pulled up early although it doesn’t leave until 10 minutes after us. At 1:08 the 175 pulls up to stop. There is a problem with a passenger who lacks change and the driver doesn’t have any dollar bills. NJT is the last public bus company that use transit buses I know of that still has drivers make change on many routes. Another passenger gives him change. We go over the bridge passing a large traffic jam going the other direction.
This time I don’t panic and get off early but ride the bus on its long ridiculous loop via Route 4 to serve no passengers instead of going directly over the Hackensack before I get to Anderson Street –(23 Photos added) at 1:39, their building something, signs on the platform announce a new shelter is under construction effective March 18th. I guess New Jersey Transit for once is improving on just having bus shelters.
At 2:07 the train comes in I get on and the conductor, seeing my SLR that’s out (I didn’t bother to photograph the cab car entering) says “Please don’t take pictures sir”. I board the first Comet V (all NJT) and head to the front. He comes back to collect my ticket and I ask him if no photos a new policy. The response is its post 9/11 and that he’s seen the cops yell at people at Hoboken but there is nothing the crew can do from a moving train.
We make the quick stops at Essex Street and Teterboro where the fence is still intact.
South of Teterboro we meet a northbound train on the siding while we’re still rolling but still come to a stop briefly for the switch to reset itself.
2:18 – Woodbridge, I notice the station house I’ve never been inside closes at 1:00pm. I’ll need to get back there.
2:20 – Plank interlocking and then the wye formed by the Meadowlands spur I need to ride. Fittingly it’s south interlocking is named Sport. The agent comes back again and is super friedly telling me to have a good day as he collects my seat check.
We go through the Meadowlands and join the Bergen County line before making my second crossing of the Passaic in as many days. We arrive in Secaucus Junction at 2:27. I don’t get any photos of the lower-level getting off and walk into the station. I walk up to the lower overpass and find tons of mainly New Jersey police officers in what are dress uniforms standing guard in the station, not their usual all in one place location. I head up to the central rotunda and find a bunch of chairs set up in one corner and a simple microphone (no lectern). There also a bunch of regular NJ Transit employees waring customer assistance vests.
Then I head outside (Secaucus only has one exit from the main station plus a second elevator bank) and do a quick loop of the station. I don’t end up taking any pictures. The huge police presence makes me a bit too nervous and my main goal is to photograph the train, not the security prescience outside the station There quite a lot of cops waiting for the motorcade with the north driveway (used for taxis and passenger pick-up/drop off) completely closed off by cones. There are a couple of large RVs that are New Jersey Transit’s mobile units and also a Flexible bus that is their mobile command center. I also notice all the news trucks in the normally, small employee parking lot. I check my iPhone and find out the motorcade has left late, so I will be here longer than I think.
I head inside the station and stop at Ducken Donuts for a snack. I then find a spot on a bench near some other commuters between trains to eat my donut and watch as the concourse gets more and more crowded. Soon I notice a man with a distinctive mustach (and an Amtrak lanyard), I assume its Joesph Boardman, the President and CEO of Amtrak.
Eventually at about 3:25 I see people walking in with what look like service programs with Sen. Lautenberg’s photo on the front.
At 3:30 the bagpipes start and the casket (draped in the American flag) is escorted into the station by police officers (I was desecrate with my photos). The Honor Guard do the ceremonies (I don’t have a great view). There is one sound I will never forget from the ceremony; The silence when the bagpipes stopped playing interrupted by one noise, the flip-flip-flip of the Solari boards that line the concourse, changing track locations.
This is followed by the one speaker, Rabbi Daniel Cohen. I start listing to my remarks and realize its time to descretely go down to the middle platform at 3:46. I go up to the fare gates and try twice but get error messages. A friendly agent comes up to me to examine my ticket and says there’s a star on it. (It’s printed in the upper left corner). She tells me that means the ticket doesn’t work (the magnetic strip must be defective) she writes a small X in a ballpoint pen beneath the * and lets me through the fare gates
I go down to the island platform for tracks A and B. The special Amtrak funeral train is on track 1 with this consist:
- AEM7 #928
- Heritage Baggage Car #1762
- Amfleet Cafe/Club #48140
- Amfleet I Bussiness Class #81512
- Amfleet Office Car “Beach Groove” #10001
It’s parked deep within the building of the main concourse above so I don’t get too many decent photos of it:
At 3:54 I hear the bagpipes on the platform and see the casket getting rolled down it by the NJT honor guard soon it goes past the locomotive and out of view.
I head to the open air front of the platform where a MidTOWN Direct Montclair Train stops in the station and a bunch of transferring commuters get off. A couple express trains that skip the station roll through as well. A Southbound Keystone and Acela also pass. Much to my surprise there is no police presence on the island platform but a number on the side platform for track 1. The most noticeable is a police dog standing at the exposed front of the platform.
I notice the front lights go on on the AEM7 and at 4:14pm with barely a toot of the horn the casket of Senator Frank R. Lautenberg riding in a car that he never road in at any point during his life (I assume), a windowless Amtrak Heritage Baggage Car that is nearly 60 years old, originally built as a 44 seat coach for the Southern Pacific in 1954. The unusual train leaves and I notice the bright track inspection lights of Beach Grove bringing up the markers.
At 4:16 another Amtrak train comes to a stop on Track 1. It is a normal Northeast Regional Consist of 7 Amfleets with a Buissiness Class Car just behind the lcomotive. I wonder if its for the press. While its in the station a HHP-8 pulling another typical Regional consist zooms by on Track B. The Amtrak Train on 1 leaves as this train has finished passing it, giving me the photo of two Amfleet I rear red lights bringing up the rears of these trains.
I notice three Amtrak baggage handlers with a hand cart and hard hats waiting on my platform. They get on the 4:17 NJ transit train to Jersey Avenue (it skips Elizabeth). I assume they were the ones brought out from Newark Penn to load the coffin onto the baggage car after the Amtrak Honor Guard relieved the New Jersey Transit Honor Guard at the door to the baggage car. I see them standing in the vestible as the train departs (its mostly Comet II and IIIs, no middle doors).
I’m waiting on the next train to Elizabeth (the scheduled 4:26 heading to Aberdeen-Matawan) although I’ll be getting off in Newark. At 4:30 it arrives. They then announce the portal bridge is open and were waiting, We leave at 4:40. Going slowly with tons of train traffic piled up from the bridge opening. I think the Funeral Train got through before the opening but have no way of knowing. I’m sitting in an aisle seat so no sightseeing.
At 4:51 I finally get to Newark. I go down to the Amtrak ticket window to resolve a question I have about a complex reseravtion I’ve made (using AGR points) for my trip to California. Everything is exactly how I was told over the phone, the issue is Amtrak can’t send out to eTickets to the same reservation number and me and my friend that I’m traveling with are going different portions of the sleeper I’ve booked.
I then head up to PATH for an uneventful ride empty to World Trade Center. I’m in the front car and can barely get out the doors of the train and up the stairs to the mezzanine since their so jammed with commuters on their ways home, going the opposite way.
I decide to walk over to Fulton Street and at 5:35 I get there. I hear the ominous “After an earlier incident Uptown trains are running with delays, the next uptown A train is at Hoyt-Schmerhorn street.”
5:45 – the platform keeps getting more crowded and I decide to do the High Street trick and take a C train out there to double-back. Get to High Street at 5:49 to an uptown A train arriving with plenty of seats Clearly the second to arrive. I get on and choose my preferred seat back at Fulton at 5:52. It’s a slow ride entering stations since we’re clearly trailing another train.
6:36 – I get to 181 street, to a huge crowd at the elevators (and only two working) I get on one as yet another train arrives since all the trains are backed up after whatever this ‘earlier incident was.’
Finally, may Senator Frank Lautenberg, a great statesman and supporter of public transportion Rest In Peace. I will never forget the flipping noise of the Solari boards between the bagpipers.