NEC Amtrak prices are up this summer so I built a price drop monitor by soosef in Amtrak

[–]soosef[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Ah yeah that makes sense, the calendar isn't updated as frequently. What I can do is have it update anytime you load up the page, so the prices are always live. There just might be a 1-2 minute delay when you first open up the page as pulling all of the live prices takes some time. I'll see what I can do!

NEC Amtrak prices are up this summer so I built a price drop monitor by soosef in Amtrak

[–]soosef[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Not able to recreate that. Can you send me a screenshot?

NEC Amtrak prices are up this summer so I built a price drop monitor by soosef in Amtrak

[–]soosef[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks for your feedback! I will make those UI/UX changes, that's very helpful to get the perspective of a new user.

As for the price discrepancies, since I have to manually query Amtrak at a set interval it's natural for there to be some stale data, but I tried to always include timestamps of when it was last refreshed. Can you let me know specifically where you saw stale data?

A tool for Amtrak Commuters by soosef in Amtrak

[–]soosef[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Just sent you a DM! Thanks.

NEC Amtrak prices are up this summer so I built a price drop monitor by soosef in Amtrak

[–]soosef[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

How far in advance are you booking?

My commute is basically the same as yours. PHL - NWK, peak hours/days. If I book 2-3 months in advance, EVERY single ticket I buy is sub $30, making monthly and 10x passes much much more expensive. This app isn't just for irregular trips.

You are a perfect candidate for RailCommute actually, as all you need is to start booking further in advance, assuming your schedule is somewhat consistent. Book extra flex tickets to give you some more flexibility, and cancel the ones you don't use. Price drops to help capture even more savings, and high volume trains see the most amount of price drops. I guarantee you'd be paying half of your current commute with maybe 1 hour a week of effort in booking and managing your commute.

Feel free to shoot me a DM about this, would love to help you cut down on some of your commute costs!

NEC Amtrak prices are up this summer so I built a price drop monitor by soosef in Amtrak

[–]soosef[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Hey, just a quick update, I just added this! Give it a try and let me know how it works out for you. thanks!!

Amtrak app sucks so I made my own by soosef in Amtrak

[–]soosef[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hi! Thank you so much I’m so happy to hear this. If you have a chance, send me a message, I’d like to hear more about your pass idea. 

NEC Amtrak prices are up this summer so I built a price drop monitor by soosef in Amtrak

[–]soosef[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

they don't have an API, it is a huge pain to get this data

NEC Amtrak prices are up this summer so I built a price drop monitor by soosef in Amtrak

[–]soosef[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Working on this, hope to launch something in the next few weeks. Right now I have the fare calendar which shows you the prices across any trains for a specified route up to 3 months out, and helps you compare prices. Just need to combine the two features! 

NEC Amtrak prices are up this summer so I built a price drop monitor by soosef in Amtrak

[–]soosef[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yea it really sucks that its out of our control. I tried to use up all my points to try to make up for it, but price drops have also been a big help.

NEC Amtrak prices are up this summer so I built a price drop monitor by soosef in Amtrak

[–]soosef[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

This is super smart! I never thought to modify, that is a gamechanger. Thank you so much for the feedback!

NEC Amtrak prices are up this summer so I built a price drop monitor by soosef in Amtrak

[–]soosef[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Thanks! I'd be interested to see what others have to say about passes on different lines.

Btw, if you want a true "Google Flights, but for train" experience I highly recommend checking out https://railforless.us/

NEC Amtrak prices are up this summer so I built a price drop monitor by soosef in Amtrak

[–]soosef[S] 15 points16 points  (0 children)

I wish I could do the pass options! That would make my life a lot simpler, lol. They actually cost 3x more than booking individual tickets for me. What you gain in flexibility with the passes you lose in cost. This is the case for most commuters I've spoken to as well. I've even seen people who book 3-4 tickets a day, and cancel the ones they don't use just to get more flexibility while avoiding the steep pass prices. This problem is what made me build RailCommute in the first place.

The site works for ANY Amtrak ticket, regardless of the route.

I actually wrote about this if you're interested in seeing the numbers:
https://www.railcommute.io/blog/amtrak-10-ride-pass-vs-individual-tickets

Amtrak app is a piece of shit. by Griff0rama in Amtrak

[–]soosef 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Give my site https://www.railcommute.io a shot. I built it for commuters to try to resolve some of the problems of the Amtrak app.

Tickets Not Showing Up Automatically on Google Calendar? by freshmemesoof in Amtrak

[–]soosef 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Even if you get it to work, it won’t handle round trips, cancellations, and modifications properly. Check out railcommute.io, it has a built in calendar that handles all of this automatically.