Rail Passenger USA uses many resources to research the passenger rail routes and station stops that comprise our Route Guides. One of the most valuable and entertaining of these is Google Earth.

The "Fly Me First" feature of Rail Passenger USA allows Google Earth users to "fly" each route from station-stop to station-stop in either route direction.  If you haven't downloaded Google Earth yet, go to http://earth.google.com/ to download the application. The application must be down loaded and installed prior to running the Fly Me First tours.

To fly a route go to Slide 3 of any Route Guide and  click on a picture of one of the frequent flyers. For example click on the eagle on Slide 3 of the Capitol Limited Route Guide to fly the westbound Capitol Limited (Train 29) route from Washington DC to Chicago Illinois. If you click on the two birds, you'll fly the route in the opposite direction (Train 30); Chicago to DC.
 

 

When one of these icons is clicked you will see a window asking whether you want to "open or save this file". Click "Open" or "Open using Google Earth". If you click "Open" you will download a Google Earth ".kmz" file. Double clicking on the .kmz file icon will download the station locations from railpassengerusa.com and open them in Google Earth. If you don't have any other locations check marked in your Google Earth sidebar, you will zoom to an overview of the entire Capitol Limited route.  

To fly the route simply click on the "Play Tour" button under "Temporary Places" in the Google Earth side bar on the left. What you see and how long you stay at a station will depend on your settings. An "almost infinite" number of settings are available. Ray prefers the following simple settings.

Ray's Settings

Places Checkmarks - Set from "Places" area of the sidebar Temporary Places/Selected Route (e.g. Capitol Limited_29.kmz) Checked (On) All Other Places Unchecked (Off)

Layer Checkmarks – Set from "Layers" area of the sidebar Terrain Checked (On) Geographic Web Checked (On) Roads Checked (On) Borders and Labels Checked (On) Places of Interest/Transportation/Rail Checked (On) Places of Interest/All Others Unchecked (Off) All Others Unchecked (Off)

Other Settings Tools/Options All Set to Default These are all subject to personal preference. Hint: the faster you fly the more bumpy the ride Note

Saving "Fly Me First" Files On the "File" pull down menu select "Save" then "Save to My Places"

Have an Enjoyable Flight!