Today, after months of delays, Amtrak will reveal when the Acela Express will start service.
A lot is riding on the new bullet train, including the future of Amtrak itself and other high-speed rail projects being pondered by Congress as part of a $10 billion bond package.
When it finally starts service, the Acela Express will hit speeds of 150 mph along the Northeast Corridor - 25 miles an hour faster than the Metroliner, Amtrak's current premier service.
Acela - a name coined by Amtrak by combining the words acceleration and excellence - has cost $2.8 billion so far.
That includes 20 sets of eight-car trains and upgrades to track and overhead power lines. Each train includes front and back locomotives, a first-class car, cafe car and four business-class cars.
Canada's Bombardier makes the passenger cars in Plattsburgh, N.Y., and France's Alstom makes the locomotives in Barre, Vt.
The Acela Regional, on the other hand, is no bullet train.
Instead, it is simply an old Metroliner, stripped down inside and redecorated with new Acela-style seats and carpeting. The train still goes the same old speed and makes the same old stops.
Boyle and her fellow commuters seem too sleepy to care as they board the Acela Regional, but they do wonder when they'll be able to board the real deal, a train based on European high-speed rail technology that has been in use for decades.
Amtrak is counting on the Express.
Congress has ordered Amtrak to wean itself from federal subsidies by September 2002.
Failure of the project could mean big trouble, even a break-up of the rail passenger service formed by the federal government in 1971 out of the ashes of the Penn Central and other failing passenger railroads.
Boyle, who lives in Exton, said her morning commute takes about three and a half hours. The trip home takes her two and a half hours. If the Acela Express speeds the trip, she'll take it.
