Will Meyers' Blog
The NextGen Acela entered service on August 28, 2025. Here we will look at some seventy-two thousand Acela trips as well as fifty-three thousand final-stop arrivals to get a sense of how the NextGen Acela is performing.
An Acela train is late if it reaches Boston, MA or Washington, D.C. more than ten minutes after schedule. 2026 is the worst year in sixteen years with over thirty percent of trains being late.
Late trains per year
While Amtrak added more trains this year,
Trains per weekday
this did not make trips any faster.
Washington to Boston trip time
Scheduled Washington to Boston trips are about 23 minutes longer than in 2017 (6h 45m to 7h 08m). Actual trips are about 30 minutes longer.
Southbound NextGen Acela trains lose over nine minutes when traveling on Metro-North's New Haven Line from New Haven to Stamford. Nearly thirty percent of trains that are on time and then fall more than 10 minutes behind do it on this leg.
Minutes lost per leg
Before NextGen (2024 to Aug 2025)Now (Jul to Oct 2026), lostNow, gained
So, why that particular leg?
Due to an incident back in January 2026 involving a NextGen Acela train damaging overhead wires on Metro-North tracks, Metro-North imposed stricter requirements when passing through this leg. Amtrak is currently suing Metro-North to lift the restrictions.
In addition to new restrictions, continued construction along the New Haven-Stamford leg causes delays and alternative schedules.
But the tracks are not all to blame. The Inspector General reported NextGen trainsets had mechanical problems after launch that caused delays. An incident occurred in May 2026 in which a loose side skirt on a NextGen train touched the third rail outside the East River Tunnels causing a fire.
Did Amtrak make a faster Acela? Maybe on paper. What is clear is the infrastructure that it's supposed to travel on is not up to speed.