Running during daylight hours, scenery included the Delaware Water Gap, Pocono Mountains and the Susquehanna and Genesee River valleys.

[1] On August 30, 1943, the Lackawanna Limited wrecked in Wayland, New York, when it sideswiped a local freight that had not cleared into a siding, killing 29 and injuring more than 100.

Reportedly, the cars had been placed into storage in the unused Erie shop facilities at Susquehanna, Pennsylvania because they were deemed a nuisance, as they had to be turned on a turntable or a wye at the end of each trip.

An alternative explanation for the discontinuation of the cars was that the Erie management resented the symbol of the DL&W playing such a prominent a role in the EL passenger train operation and sought to dispose of it wherever they could.

White was looking for a way to boost both EL employee morale and to gain some positive publicity for the foundering railroad; the move accomplished both.

However, since a Hoboken-Chicago routing was chosen, which bypassed Buffalo, the train was put into direct competition with the New York Central Railroad's passenger operation.

In an earlier time, the new train might have flourished, but with the steadily declining image of passenger rail travel in the U.S. in general, and competition from airlines in particular, it was doomed from the start.

The trademark tavern-lounge cars were placed in storage again after the final run, although they appeared occasionally at the rear of special trains until sold-off.

Dubbed the Pocono Day Express, it was the last passenger train to run over the route of Phoebe Snow in the twentieth century.

The 469 is owned by the Dining Car Society, a nonprofit historical group based in Port Jervis, New York, and is planned to be[when?]

[11] The 470 is owned by the owners of Genesee Valley Transportation and is stored on their Delaware-Lackawanna Railroad in Scranton, Pennsylvania awaiting a full restoration.