Prior to the establishment of the Gulf Wind the New Orleans-Florida Express had a counterpart train, the New Orleans-Florida Limited, which left Jacksonville in the morning.[3] For much of the twentieth century, one or two other passenger trains, numbered but unnamed, also plied this route daily; these were much-slower local trains, stopping at each small town along the route, and were labeled simply as "passenger, mail, and express" in timetables. The Express, contrary to its name, made stops at small towns; while the Gulf Wind made fewer stops, mainly in larger towns and cities.[4][5]
With a schedule designed for passengers changing to or from the Seaboard's Silver Meteor at Jacksonville, the Gulf Wind originally departed both endpoints at 5 p.m. daily for the overnight run across the Florida Panhandle and along the Gulf Coast, arriving in the morning at the other end of the line.[2] The name was likely inspired by the success of another train carried partly over L&N rails, the Chicago-Miami South Wind.
Louisville & Nashville 1954 timetable, showing Gulf Wind running in tandem with the Pan-American, as one of five trains traveling daily west from Mobile to New Orleans
Heading westbound, the Gulf Wind joined onto Louisville & Nashville's Pan-American at Flomaton, Alabama. On the eastbound trip, the Gulf Wind ran from New Orleans to Flomaton along with the Southern Railway's Piedmont Limited, and at Flomaton departed as its own train.[6] After the Southern Railway discontinued the Piedmont Limited, the Pan-American carried the Gulf Wind in both directions from New Orleans to Flomaton.[7]
Equipment
The consist of the Gulf Wind included baggage cars, coaches, and Pullman sleepers with a mix of rooms and traditional open sections, as well as an L&N diner between New Orleans and Mobile, and an SAL diner between Chattahoochee and Jacksonville. By 1955 modern roomettes were added to the consist.[8][9][10] A round-ended observation car was also a regular part of the Gulf Wind consist.
In December 1967, the first winter season of the merged Seaboard Coast Line Railroad, the train was the last, along with the company's Silver Star, to have open section sleepers, along with roomettes and other rooms.[11] By the December 1968 schedule, the L&N and the SCL had dropped sleepers from the Gulf Wind altogether.[12]
History
Passenger service existed on this route from its construction in 1882 by the Pensacola and Atlantic Railroad, at times with three or four daily trains in each direction. In 1949, the L&N and the SAL had a local train that arrived at its destinations in the early evening.[13] This local train had no diner or lounge; besides coaches, it carried just baggage and mail cars. (The local train's predecessor, the New Orleans-Florida Express, had a dining car and sleeping cars.)[14] The local was eliminated in 1966.[15][16] In the train's final year, from 1970 to April 1971, the L&N and Seaboard Coast Line made the Gulf Wind a three departures a week train.[17][18]
The last run of the Gulf Wind occurred on April 30, 1971. Amtrak, which took over nearly all passenger train operations in the United States on the following day, elected not to continue running the Gulf Wind, which despite good equipment and service was not a profitable train at that point in time.[2]
The western portion of the Gulf Wind route from Mobile to New Orleans was briefly served by Amtrak's Gulf Coast Limited from 1984 to 1985, and again from 1996 to 1997.
The Gulf Wind route had no scheduled passenger train service between Jacksonville and Flomaton until the revived and extended tri-weekly Sunset Limited was inaugurated by Amtrak in 1993. The service was again suspended in 2005 when Hurricane Katrina did extensive damage to the Gulf Coast. Passenger service had not resumed as of 2016[ref].[19] In 2016 and 2017 Gulf Coast regional officials agitated for restoration of daily train service between New Orleans and Florida.[20]
^"Seaboard Air Line Railroad, Table 6". Seaboard Air Line Railroad timetables, effective December 16, 1966. Seaboard Air Line Railroad. December 16, 1966.
