Ridin' The Rails To Cyberspace

In a test planned next month, riders in a cafe car on Amtrak's line that runs between Harrisburg, Philadelphia and New York will be able to watch movies and television shows, check e-mail or shop online using interactive touch screens.

Pennsylvania transportation officials and the state's technology development network are providing financial backing for the trial run, in hopes that passengers will look for the car with the seat-back screens on Amtrak's Keystone line. The screens allow passengers to connect to the Internet via a new high-speed wireless network.

"Passengers can tune in for work or play, and advertisers gain access to a highly affluent, captive audience," said Carlos Garcia, chief executive of NRoute Communications, the network's provider.

Garcia hopes revenue from the advertiser-supported service will give Amtrak enough incentive to expand it to other trains and get NRoute Communications off to a sound financial start. He said the company is also talking to bus companies about launching similar systems.

Merry Hein, a Harmelin Media vice president who has discussed the system with clients, said the NRoute network has unique capabilities that already have some advertisers interested.

The network incorporates Global Positioning System technology that lets advertising be targeted based on location.

"So as a train or bus approaches New York City, for instance, local restaurants, hotels, theaters and other local businesses can promote themselves to the precise audience likely to use their services," said Darryl Trent, NRoute's executive vice president of sales and marketing.

Amtrak riders who intentionally log onto the system will be in a comparatively "uncluttered" environment, Hein said. By comparison, she said, "In a car, I'm listening to the radio, I'm driving, there could be a billboard, there could be a blimp going by. It's cluttered."

Garcia says NRoute is "really like a cable system for the transportation industry."

Passengers will be able to choose from a selection of movies and from programs from sources such as Food Network, Do It Yourself Network and Fine Living.

NRoute will install and maintain the equipment at no cost to the railroad, and Amtrak will get a small share of ad revenues.

That was decisive for the government-subsidized, loss-plagued railroad, which is asking Congress for $1.2 billion just to continue operating for another year, spokesman Bill Epstein said.

Amtrak is too cash-strapped to install its own communications amenities, such as Wi-Fi wireless networking hubs that would otherwise let people connect to the Internet via wireless-equipped laptops or other devices. "Every dollar we have goes to run a safe and reliable railroad. We look to outside sources for that kind of potential," Epstein said.

For example, a six-month test earlier this year of handheld devices offering Internet access via Yahoo on selected trains between Washington, D.C., and Boston on the East Coast, between Sacramento and San Jose in California, and between Chicago and Milwaukee in the Midwest, proved popular. But Epstein said Amtrak would need outside proposals to offer the service permanently.

So a $155,000 contribution from Pennsylvania's Department of Transportation was vital for the NRoute test. "The state grant will pay for the wiring of the car," Epstein said.

Rick Peltz, deputy PennDOT secretary, said the agency wants to learn whether it can coax commuters to leave their cars behind. "Will this type of service be another incentive to take public transportation — get out of their car and take the train?"