Auto Train

The Auto Train runs every day between Lorton, Virginia, south of Washington, D.C., and Sanford, Florida, north of Orlando — 855 miles overnight, in about 17 hours, with no station in between. You board at one end and step off at the other.

What sets it apart rides at the back. Every passenger travels with a vehicle — a car, SUV, van or motorcycle — and it crosses five states in one of the enclosed, double-deck autoracks that make up most of the train. With more than twenty of them behind the passenger cars, the Auto Train runs to about three-quarters of a mile, among the longest passenger trains in the world. Amtrak calls it the only service of its kind in the United States.

The idea came from a private company, Auto-Train, which opened the route on 6 December 1971 and went under in 1981; Amtrak revived it on 30 October 1983, and it has run daily since the following year. Both trains leave at 4 p.m. Dinner is served as the first miles pass, the Carolinas and Georgia go by in the dark, and breakfast comes before arrival the next morning. In 2024 it carried 266,586 riders.

The day starts in a car park. Check-in at Lorton opens at 11:30: each vehicle is given a number, fixed magnetically to the driver's door, and then staged by size and loaded into the autoracks by Amtrak's crews. Owners take an overnight bag with them — there is no access to the vehicle until the other end.

Train 53 leaves Lorton at 16:00 and runs south on the old Richmond, Fredericksburg and Potomac line, which reached Fredericksburg in 1837. It crosses the Rappahannock there and goes on to Richmond, where it joins the CSX main line south. On a long summer evening Virginia passes in daylight; in winter it is dark by dinner.

Through the night

The train's one stop comes at Florence, South Carolina, around midnight. It is a service stop, not a station call: a new engineer and conductors take over, the train takes on fuel and water, and passengers may step down to the platform for a few minutes. Nobody boards and nobody leaves. In the small hours the train crosses the Savannah River into Georgia and the St. Marys River into Florida.

Florida by morning

South of Jacksonville the line follows the St. Johns River through Palatka and crosses it a few miles beyond, then runs through farm and forest country by Seville and DeLand. The last 16 miles into Sanford belong to SunRail, Central Florida's commuter railway. The train is due at 08:59.

Arrival takes a while. The autoracks are uncoupled, split into sections and lined up with the unloading ramps, and vehicles come off in no particular order, called out by number in the claim area; a full train takes about an hour to empty. Northbound, the pattern runs in reverse: Florida in the afternoon, Virginia after breakfast.

The train itself

The passenger end is Amtrak's double-deck Superliner fleet: sleeping cars, a Sightseer Lounge and a dining car for First Class, coaches and a café-lounge for Coach. Behind them come the autoracks, which carry up to 340 vehicles, and in front two or three diesel locomotives — GE P42DC "Genesis" units on the day of the photograph above, and older GE Dash 8s such as No. 515 at Lorton.

The Auto Train runs once a day in each direction, all year, and both trains leave at the same time. Southbound, train 53 leaves Lorton at 16:00 and is due in Sanford at 08:59 the next morning. Northbound, train 52 leaves Sanford at 16:00 and is due in Lorton at 08:59. Either way the booked time is 16 hours 59 minutes, and there is no station in between.

Your vehicle has to be checked in before you board.

Good to know:

• Motorcycles, oversize vehicles and trailers close earlier, at 14:00 — as does check-in for anyone who has booked Priority Offloading. Amtrak makes no exceptions.

• You cannot ride without a vehicle. The Auto Train carries passengers only with a car, van, SUV or motorcycle, and there must be a seat belt in the vehicle for every passenger booked with it (motorcycles aside).

• The whole route is on Eastern time, so the clock never changes on the way.

• The arrival time is a target. The train runs on CSX freight lines that give their own trains priority, and it is often late — in May 2021 only 31 percent of Auto Trains arrived on time. Leave the morning after free.

• Then allow an hour for the car. Vehicles come off the train in no set order; a full train takes about an hour to unload. Priority Offloading puts yours among the first 30.

• Check your own date. Amtrak's timetable is generated for a single day. The times above are from the one for 29 September 2026; a booking for 6 January 2027 showed the same 16:00 departure and 08:59 arrival.

Times as of September 2026, from Amtrak's published timetable for 29 September 2026; check-in times from Amtrak's vehicle requirements. Confirm before travelling on amtrak.com (opens in a new tab).

Every seat and room is reserved, and an Auto Train fare comes in two parts: the people and the vehicle. Sampling Amtrak's booking engine in September 2026 for one adult, Lorton to Sanford on Wednesday 6 January 2027, gave Coach from $244, a Roomette at $782, a Family Room at $1,216 and a Bedroom at $1,451 — room prices for the room. The vehicle is added on top, priced by type: standard, extended (up to 18 ft) or motorcycle. Amtrak's own advertising puts it as fares "as low as $95 + the cost of your vehicle".

Coach includes the café and a continental breakfast before arrival. A room adds an attendant, the First Class lounge, and dinner and a hot breakfast in the dining car. Fares checked September 2026 at amtrak.com (opens in a new tab); US dollars, one way.

Interrail and Eurail do not apply anywhere in the United States, and Amtrak's own USA Rail Pass does not cover the Auto Train. The pass — $499 for 10 segments over 30 days, in Coach — is valid on every Amtrak service except the Acela, the Auto Train, the Canadian stations of the Maple Leaf and Amtrak's Thruway buses numbered 7000 to 7999.

So there is nothing to weigh up: the Auto Train is always a separate ticket, bought with its vehicle fare. If the Auto Train is one leg of a longer trip, the pass can still cover the others — Amtrak's Silver Meteor and Floridian also run from Washington to Florida, on much of the same track, but without your car.

Checked September 2026 against amtrak.com/usa-rail-pass (opens in a new tab).

The Auto Train has no stops to break the journey at, so the places below are at the two ends — and the point of the train is that you arrive with your own car to reach them. Two are within reach of Lorton, and four of Sanford.

Three historic hotels for a night either side of the train: the Willard in Washington, a short drive from Lorton, and two of Florida's grand hotels of the 1880s — the Lakeside Inn on Lake Dora, in the Orlando area, and the Casa Monica in St. Augustine, on the Atlantic coast.

Planning this trip and stuck on something, or spotted a time, fare or detail that has changed? Send us a message about Auto Train. We read every one, and we update this page when something has changed.