The Cascades are equipped with train sets known as TALGOs. TALGO -- the Spanish acronym for Tren Articulado Ligero Goicoechea y Oriol -- is a lightweight articulated train developed by Spanish industrial engineer Alejandro Goicoechea in the 1940s. American Car and Foundry of Berwick, Pa. built the first TALGO trains in the late 1940s for service both in Spain and in the U.S. American railroads never took to them, but they turned out quite popular in Spain and provided that country's premier passenger services until the introduction of high-speed trains, based on the French TGV, in the 1990s.

Amtrak and the Washington State Department of Transportation reintroduced TALGO to American passenger railroading in 1994 when they leased a 12-car trainset from Spanish National Railways. The set entered service that year on the Mt. Adams train between Seattle and Portland. This time around, the train became quite popular.

Amtrak and WSDOT leased a second, 15-car TALGO in 1996. This set entered service in May 1996 as the Mt. Baker International between Seattle and Vancouver, B.C. Amtrak subsequently re-arranged the sets to provide two 13-car trains (the remaining car from the second set was a five-compartment sleeper provided for demonstration purposes only).

Amtrak restructured its Pacific Northwest corridor in May 1998, moving both leased TALGO sets into Seattle-Portland-Eugene service and assigning a bi-level Superliner train to the Vancouver route. It also added a third corridor train south of Seattle, with each TALGO set making 1-1/2 round trips daily.

Meanwhile, five new TALGO trains were undergoing final assembly at Pacifica Marine in Seattle. Amtrak and WSDOT had contracted with the Spanish TALGO manufacturer, Patentes Talgo S.A., to assemble the trains in the U.S.

Pacifica built all five sets to U.S. operating standards (the leased trains were simply off-the-shelf Spanish TALGOs modified for U.S. service). WSDOT and Amtrak each purchased two sets. The fifth set was planned as a demonstrator and for future service in California. Pacifica also assembled several spare cars for the fleet (Washington State eventually purchased the fifth set in 2003).

Amtrak and WSDOT dedicated the first set, named the Mt. Rainier, Nov. 9, 1998 and subsequently sent it to the U.S. DOT test facility in Colorado, where it successfully operated at speeds up to 124 mph. Meanwhile, two of the the other sets -- the Mt. Baker and the Mt. Hood -- operated on inaugural runs Nov. 30, 1998 between Vancouver and Seattle and Seattle and Eugene, respectively.

Amtrak had planned to begin regular Cascades service with the new trains Dec. 1, 1998, but delays in receiving some interior components and final break-in testing postponed the start of regular service until Jan. 11, 1999. At that time, two of the new consists replaced the two leased sets in service on the three trains south of Seattle. The third set entered service between Seattle and Vancouver, B.C. Feb. 24, 1999.

The fourth set, named Mt. Olympus, entered revenue service Sept. 2, 1999 between Seattle and Bellingham, Wash. A second run between Portland and Eugene began Oct. 6, 2000. Both leased sets eventually returned to Spain and were subsequently sold to the country of Kazakhstan in central Asia for new service there.

As built, each Cascades train set consisted of twelve cars: six standard coaches, two business-class coaches, a diner-lounge, a Bistro (cafe) car, a baggage car and a power car. Amtrak and WSDOT susequently reconfigured four of the sets with a seventh standard coach, taken from the set of spares and from the demonstration set, which had been built with two extra coaches.

The interior layout complies with the Americans with Disabilities Act and includes wheelchair access on one standard coach and one business-class coach in each set. The cafe car includes an illuminated map of the Pacific Northwest in the ceiling, with lights showing towns in the region.

The coaches include reclining seats that are equipped with stereo headphone connections and power outlets for electronic devices such as portable computers. They are also equipped with television monitors for showing movies en route. The TV monitors also show a map of the train's progress, which is tracked by a Global Positioning System receiver on board.

The baggage car is also equipped with hanging racks to carry bicycles. The power car provides the heating, lighting and electrical power to the cars, freeing the locomotive to propel the train. All five trains wear a unique color scheme of green, cream and copper brown (known colloquially as the "Latte and Cream", referring to Pacific Northwest residents' love of specialty coffee).

The Seattle-Vancouver, B.C. train runs north from Seattle in the morning and returns in the early evening, taking approximately four hours for its run. The Seattle-Portland section of the corridor has southbound departures in the early morning, late morning, mid-afternoon and late afternoon. Northbound from Portland, there are departures in the early morning, early afternoon, late afternoon and early evening. These trains operate on a three hour, 30 minute schedule.

Amtrak added a new Seattle-Portland round trip in July 2006 and combined it with the rescheduled Seattle-Bellingham train to provide Cascades service through Seattle. The Seattle-Bellingham leg takes about two hours, 25 minutes in each direction, currently running early evening northbound and early morning southbound.

Amtrak, BNSF and the State of Washington recently concluded an agreement with the B.C. provincial government to extend this train through to Vancouver. As part of the agreement, BNSF is constructing a passing siding near Colebrook, north of White Rock, B.C. This will help increase the line's capacity and enable the agencies to extend the train.

This is expected to occur in mid- to late 2008, and will provide same-day, single-seat Portland-Seattle-Vancouver service for the first time. Infrastructure improvements along this route, on both sides of the border, also promise to significantly reduce travel time. The aqdditional service will also help carry an expected increase in travelers to the Vancouver area for the 2010 Winter Olympics.

Between Eugene and Portland, Cascades trains serve intermediate stops at Albany, Salem and Oregon City, Ore. Between Portland and Seattle, stations include Vancouver, Kelso-Longview, Centralia, Olympia-Lacey, Tacoma and Tukwila. Trains from Seattle to Bellingham and Vancouver, B.C. also stop at Edmonds, Everett and Mt. Vernon. A new station is planned for Stanwood, Wash., which would open in 2009.

The Seattle-Los Angeles Coast Starlight also serves the stations between Seattle and Eugene, except for Tukwila and Oregon City; the Seattle section of the Empire Builder also serves Edmonds and Everett; and the Portland section of the Builder also serves Vancouver, Wash. The Vancouver, B.C. train shares VIA Rail Canada's Pacific Central Station with VIA's Vancouver-Toronto Canadian and the privately-operated Rocky Mountaineer cruise trains to Jasper and Calgary, Alta.

Cascades services also share the Seattle and Tukwila stations with six daily Sound Transit Sounder regional round trips between Seattle and Tacoma, and the Edmonds and Everett stations with three Seattle-Everett Sounder round trips. Sound Transit is currently constructing a new multimodal station in Mukilteo, west of Everett, and Amtrak may also use this when it is complete.

The end cars on each set (baggage car at one end, power car at the other) also have distinctive aerodynamic tail fins similar to those found on American automobiles in the 1950s (and which, when viewed on end, look like the ears on a "Batman" mask, prompting many to call the trains "Batmobiles").

The tail fins provide a streamlined match to the height of the trains' locomotives, which are significantly taller than the cars. The locomotives in this service are painted to match the trains, as are the cab cars that allow them to operate in "push-pull" service, eliminating the need to turn the trains at their end points.The locomotive or cab car and the baggage or power car on each end also provide critical impact protection for the passenger-carrying cars in the event of a collision.