ACES Train Service.

Many, many years ago a train came from New York City, down the coast line to the then sleepy down of Atlantic City New Jersey. Well recently a new era, that is taking it's cues from the olden days, finds a rail line from New York City to Atlantic City once again. 

The light rail line is called ACES, and travels from New York's Penn station to Atlantic City's Rail Terminal.  Service started yesterday, February 6th, for the inaugural train trip. 

The rail line is newly remodeled and is a multi-level rail line that is supposedly very comfortable for passengers to enjoy. There is a 300 person capacity in the 4 cars that make up the rail line, but there is so much more. The seating is comfortable leather chairs, there are several food and beverage kiosks available and there is also a private lounge. 

There are a few catches though. There is a short stop in Newark New Jersey, and pricing can be a bit much where the low end one way tickets are $25 and the high end tickets where you have access to the lounge can be as much as $300. A bit more than the simple AMTRAK rail from Atlantic City to Philadelphia and points west.  Also the rail line only runs on Friday, Saturday and Sunday twice daily. 

In a time where Atlantic City, and the Casinos that make up a substantial part of the market place, are really falling on hard economic times, something novel and unique like this should fire up some excitement. The thing is will New Yorkers "buy into" this concept and get on the train is the big test. Again, the rail line only offers two trips a day out of NYC for the three days and, at most, can only hold up to 300 people. So at most you're getting an additional 1800 people a week to Atlantic City to NYC. Only time will tell.