Hope Gets Amtrak Stop

According to an article by Hope Star editor Ken McLemore, Amtrak has announced that passenger rail service on its Amtrak Texas Eagle will begin in Hope on April 4 with the arrival of the westbound Train 21.

The westbound Texas Eagle, Train 21, is scheduled to depart Hope at 5:09 every morning, with arrivals that morning in Dallas, that afternoon in Fort Worth and that evening in Austin and San Antonio. The eastbound Texas Eagle, Train 22, is scheduled to depart Hope at 9:18 every evening, with arrivals in Little Rock that night, St. Louis the following morning and Chicago that afternoon. Connections from that schedule can be made in Fort Worth, San Antonio, St. Louis and Chicago to Oklahoma City, Kansas City, and more than 500 other locations in the Amtrak network.

It’s been about 40 years since Union Pacific and Missouri Pacific have stopped passenger
service in town. In the 1990s, the city renovated that station and converted it to a museum and visitor center. Local folks have been working for about 20 years to get the service restored. Hope, between Arkadelphia and Texarkana, will be the sixth city in the state to have a stop on the line.

A May 18 dedication has been set for the Amtrak passenger platform.  The date is a week after National Train Day on May 11. Anyone interested in traveling in or out of Hope on Amtrak can book a trip at Amtrak’s website: http://amtrak.com.

Photo by Kevin McKinnon via HopePrescott.com.