Amtrak Locomotives

[donjgatlin]

I've been wondering a while about how Amtrak is able to do what they have in the Midwest. How is it possible that Amtrak is running trains now with two P42DC's instead of the usual one on their services East of Chicago to Michigan and South through Illinois (Not the long-distance trains)? Has Amtrak always been able to do this or have they had to remove other locomotives from services around the country to accomplish this? I know that the reason they're adding two loco's now is because of the new 110mph running and the ease of returning to the other end of the line once they've reached the end. I'm just wondering if they've always had locomotives sitting around to be able to do this and they're now just being used more or if Amtrak is going to need to purchase new locomotives soon? I believe I read somewhere that they might be doing that for the Illinois corridors. I've also read that Amtrak has sent a few more of their remaining P40DC's back to Beech Grove to be refurbished for us on some of Amtrak California's trains as well as other places that need them. I'm just wondering where they're getting all of these seemingly stored locomotives or if they've been hiding them all this time(joke). This is just a burning question that I'd like answered.