Why Amtrak Can't Expand Routes

Conflicts between the nation's freight railroads and Amtrak contributed to failures by the passenger service to expand its business to help boost its sagging finances, a congressional study found Tuesday.

The General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress, said Amtrak and freight rail services were unable to work out deals in recent years to fund capital improvements, like track and signal upgrades, and track access.

After several years of cutting service to save money, Amtrak proposed 15 new routes in 2000 as part of a growth strategy to add much needed revenue.

But the railroad canceled nine of the routes before they could be put into service. Another failed and three have been delayed. Only two were launched and remain in place.

Some of the routes were canceled because Amtrak overestimated how much money could be made on them hauling mail and cargo. But others fell victim to conflicts between passenger and freight rail interests.

For instance, the two businesses could not agree on Amtrak's expanded use of tracks owned by freight companies, which said some of the lines were already congested. The freight companies also felt Amtrak's plans to carry mail and cargo on their tracks might hurt their business.

The expanded service was part of Amtrak's plans to stem its staggering losses and operate without federal subsidies by the end of this year. That goal has been abandoned as Congress considers a $1.2 billion aid request from Amtrak to maintain current services.

 

Russ, it sounds like you're blaming the freight railroads for this. The government had the railroads over a barrel in 1970. They would agree to just about anything to unload their passenger trains. And the U.S. Government took advantage of it. Here is an excerpt from the President of AAR's testimony given before the House Transportation Committee's Railroad Subcommittee last week (the transcript of the entire testimony can be read here):

Perhaps this is just spin from the freight railroads, but that looks unconstitutional to me (property rights, and all that). Anyway, I thought it was a very interesting read.

Also, one of the bills in the Senate authorizes "$4.6 billion a year for the next five years on Amtrak operations, renovations to Amtrak-owned tracks in the Northeast and development of new high-speed corridors around the country. It also would provide a one-time infusion of $1.3 billion for safety and security improvements, mostly in the Northeast." For more info, check out the Friends of Amtrak website.

Dwight

[ 18 April 2002, 12:33: Message edited by: Dwightman ]

 

Oh contraire! I am presenting both sides of the story so everyone can make up their own minds on this. This is actually a follow up post to my April 16th post titled "Amtrak Needs to Expand Routes" which was based on a study done by the government.
I am of the few that understands that had the government not dictated what the private railroads could do with their own passenger routes in the first place, Amtrak would never have come about. There were many court battles fought by Railroads against the government to try and cut their unprofitable routes. The government's stance was that even though a route would lose money, everyone deserved train travel - yet they didn't fund this! (Kind of like Amtrak today) In fact, if people do not want to ride the train, then it should not be forced on them. As a result, the private roads bailed out of the passenger business altogether.
I think that if government is going to tell a private business what they can and can not do, they should at least provide the funding for them to do it. Of course, I believe that the government should be involved in running the country instead of someone's business but ,thanks to the dummying down of America, citizen's expect their government to be involved with every aspect of their lives, contrary to what this country was founded for!
Well, sorry if I got a bit off topic! Happy Railroading!

Russ