Imagine on Friday afternoon you are sitting in your boiling hot New York City office. You’re sweating through your shirt and listening to your boss tell you how busy next week will be. Your boss is robbing your weekend before you can even wrap up your day. By 3:30, you are sitting comfortably on a train headed for The Berkshires for dinner. This is the fantasy Amtrak brings by scheduling weekend trips from the city to the countryside of Western Massachusetts.
Amtrak Launching the Berkshire Flyer
Amtrak, along with the Massachusetts and New York Departments of Transportation, is announcing a pilot seasonal passenger rail service to operate the next two summers known as the Berkshire Flyer, running between New York City and Pittsfield, MA. The service will begin on July 8 and carry passengers on weekends through the summer months. The Berkshire Flyer will include a Friday afternoon departure from New York’s Penn Station at 3:16 pm. It will run through Albany-Rensselaer, NY, arriving 4 hours later in the Berkshires. Amtrak will provide a return trip on Sunday afternoons.
“We are pleased to work together with our partner agencies to run passenger train service between Pittsfield and New York City on weekends during the busiest tourist times this summer,” said Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker. “Western Massachusetts and the Berkshire Region offer a whole host of cultural and recreational opportunities during the summer, and we hope this pilot service will encourage even more visitors to this part of our state.”
“I would like to thank officials in the Connecticut Valley Region for working with our Administration to launch this pilot passenger rail service,” said Lt. Governor Karyn Polito. “The Berkshire Flyer will make it easy for residents to travel to take advantage of opportunities to visit museums, attend concerts, shop, enjoy hiking and bicycling, and enjoy all that Massachusetts has to offer.”
Amtrak continues to attempt to revive the travel industry as the country rebounds from the pandemic. There is no reason to boil in the city for the next two summers. Nature and arts wait just down the road to give you a break from the hustle and bustle.
