The Shuttle

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Others have moved to alternate airlines and airports. From the moment that Eastern created the concept of hourly, no-reservations-needed flights in 1961, the Northeast Corridor shuttles have been limited to three airports: New York's LaGuardia, Boston's Logan, and Washington's Reagan National. But Continental Airlines has won over New Jersey business travelers who prefer using Newark Airport. American Airlines and JetBlue Airways fly from John F. Kennedy Airport. And many Washington-area flyers find Dulles International more convenient than Reagan National Airport.

You'll also find a lot of former Shuttle flyers on the Acela, Amtrak's eight-year-old high-speed rail service that connects Boston, New York, and Washington, with intermediate stops in Philadelphia and Baltimore. Acela now carries more than three million passengers a year. Its traffic climbed 7.7 percent during the first 10 months of Amtrak's current fiscal year, and the service accounts for more than 25 percent of the railroad's total nationwide revenue.

I'm not nostalgic about planes or airlines, but I miss the Shuttle's glory days. Like most of its riders, I have used the Shuttle for profit (I was a New York-based writer for the defunct Washington Star) and pleasure (a two-year affair with a woman in Washington). I've flown the shuttles when they were run by Trump (he equipped aircraft with faux-marble lavs and gilt paint) and Pan Am, which moved its flights into La Guardia's Depression-era Marine Air Terminal. I loved New York Air, which ran a predecessor of the Delta Shuttle, and handed us bright-red nosh bags filled with bagels and miniature cheesecakes.

I even miss being rained on in the tumbledown hangar that Eastern used as its passenger "terminal" and weaving my way through the rabbit warren of corridors in the old National Airport. In the halcyon days of 2,000 frequent-flyer miles for each Shuttle flight, I earned enough for many free first-class tickets to Hawaii. And I miss Charlie Rangel. I always seemed to end up sitting next to the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee on flights back to New York. (He had the best scarves and cashmere coats!)

But I also should tell you: I'm writing this on a train hurtling toward Washington. I haven't flown the Shuttle in years.

The Fine Print…

More than a dozen bus lines—some with familiar names like Greyhound and Trailways, others with a 21st-century pedigree like Megabus and Boltbus—now compete with the shuttles too. The most notable is LimoLiner. It runs lavishly appointed motor coaches configured with just 28 reclining leather seats. It has WiFi, worktables, flowers in the lavatory, and an onboard attendant. It travels between the Hilton hotel in New York's Rockefeller Center and the Hilton Back Bay in Boston. The one-way fare is about $90.

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