Travel Restrictions

The most paranoid among us see surface modes of transportation in the same light as air transport when it comes to security. Amtrak has slowly started to roll over for the Homeland Security people, and more and more "exercises" in security are being held on commuter routes - particularly in the East. It seems that we will eventually have to undergo airline-like security checks, at least on Amtrak, if our current terrorism paranoia continues. But is it paranoia? Or is it a necessary response to where our western civilization stands in the world?

Is it logical to need airline-like security measures on Amtrak? The need for air security is grounded, at least in part, on the enormous potential for destruction of property and taking of human life that an airliner in the skies over just about any populated area presents. The airliners themselves are destructive enough, but add chemical, biological, or radiological elements, and the potential is even higher. Good, we've established that this is probably not paranoia, but a real possiblity.

Now let's look at Amtrak. If you could take over a train, you couldn't drive it into any old building. You certainly could do a lot of damage with the train and kill a lot of people, but you probably won't find a building you can bring down. Locomotives don't carry the enormous amounts of combustible fuels that airliners do. In addition, the places where Amtrak routes enter the interior structural elements of massive buildings are few and far between. But they do exist. If you crashed an Amtrak train in there, would you bring down the building? From an engineering standpoint, probably not. As heavy as it is, the total momentum (product of mass times velocity) of an Amtrak train going the fastest it could go without derailing and still get into these places is far lower than the momentum of a flying airliner. (Perhaps a serendipitous side effect of foot-dragging on high speed rail.)

But what if we add biological, chemical, radiologic and/or explosive elements? Again, the potential for spread is greater, but in all cases more confined. The same argument about momentum applies to spread of these elements, and the only other factor for the "large building" scenario is that enough explosives could probably not be physically carried onto Amtrak to do this. Spread of heat and flame would be more retarded in the subterranean confines where most trains enter large buildings. Again, too, there would be destruction and loss of life on board the train.

Some would say that risk is too high to take, so the answer is an unqualified yes. We need airline-style security on Amtrak.

I disagree. Risk must be handled proportionately. For instance, the worse your credit rating, the more interest you pay proportionately for a loan. (Although the current administration may put a stop to this.) If you can stop a ten-pound cannonball with three inches of steel, you don't need three inches of steel to stop a one-pound shell. As Amtrak is proportionately more safe for the public at large, we should be able to be proportionately more free of the restrictions imposed by airline-style security.

That's my opinion.

©2009 C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Where's The Cash?

Too many advocates of new Passenger Rail projects appear to be hanging their hats on stimulus money alone. And, lo and behold, we are 6 months post stimulus and there are reports that over 80% of the cash remains unspent. At the same time, there is some indication that the economy could be - God Bless Us - in a turnaround.

So what happens to all those dependent on stimulus if we also get a turnaround in government attitude? Not so likely with Progressives at the helm you say? What happens to all those new rail projects that expect to get the money? It's possible that the economy will turn around by itself and the government won't need to print all that money.

Well, old bills work just as well as the one's hot off the presses. We can work a little harder to get the money in place, but the plans should still be made. Passenger Rail is a great public work and should never have been given the short shrift while highway and air got all the bucks.

Just don't hang you hat on getting any stimulus money.

©2009 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Railroads and The Economy

It's been awhile. I just noticed that my last post was on July 5, and here it is August 9. With the crappy economy, I have less time to write anything, and that includes blog posts. Having to work harder and take less time off to make ends meet (or to keep a job) has kept me away from the keyboard too long.

It got me thinking first about Passenger Rail and the economy. How does it change things?

Economic stimulus has been unleashed for Amtrak, for HSR, and for urban Passenger Rail in general. Is this good? I think so. Capitalizing rail transport in any form is a good idea. It's a job creator that won't go away, because the new rails and routes created won't go away. It's good for economic growth. People able to move from one place to another, economically and without damaging the enviroment, for business or pleasure, can only be good for the economy.

In the short term, with the economy slow, sluggish, or just in the crapper, Amtrak revenue and ridership in most lanes will be down. It's a good time to plan for the future. But people are saving money by using public transportation, and this includes light rail, commuter rail, and rail transit. That should be good in the short term, as heavily subsidized rail in the long term will be needing tax dollars, and more riders will make for more voters willing to open their wallets and purses.

Amtrak is in disarray and needs good leadership right now. I see signs that this is occurring with the Amtrak board, but don't hold your breath. With lots of money to spend, it is going to have to be spent right. The long lead time for new equipment is a bummer, but we have to resist spending it where it won't make a permanent good impression on the rail traveler. And Amtrak has a history of finding more ways to trip over its own rails than the average quasi-government agency. (The Postal Service is next in line.) Finally unfettered by Congress and administrations that had it chained to a post and flogged it every afternoon, Amtrak may just dance around for awhile like the Tin Woodman looking for oil before it finds its balance.

Those of you who have read this blog since the start know that I am a political conservative, but one who believes that there are certain things that government should subsidize. Passenger Rail is one of those things. Let's hope Passenger Rail can come out of this recession looking stronger and better than ever. With the right leadership at all levels, and cooperation from private enterprises that should recognize its importance to a vital economy, it will.

©2009 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

What Did He Say?

I forget sometimes that words mean different things to different people. Take the last blog on the subject of automation. Note the comment and my return comment.

In my book, and I guess I'm getting too old, automation is anything where a mechanical or electronic system (or a combination of both) intervenes in a process that could be (or once was) done by human hand. We forget that there weren't always signals that detected an occupied block. Those signals that do were invented a century ago and were automation. Now a lot of people think that something is not automated unless it is run by a computer chip.

In the case of the DC Metro wreck, it may be interesting if the final determination is a failure in automation that had nothing to do with computers. But it just makes my point. As automation gets older, it needs maintenance to avoid failure. In most cases, automatic block signals or occupied block detection systems, were designed to fail safe. They did this in a way that assumed that a live engineer (motorman) was operating the train. The operator had certain options (not necessarily only two), in the event of a dark signal. Even those options were supposed to err on the side of safety.

Which brings the question: In the DC wreck, how was the software written to respond to an occupied block (I'm guessing binary zero) or an unoccupied block (binary one), or to the equivalent of a dark signal (maybe neither but probably should also be a zero)? Or did the computer itself have to take the equivalent of a visual position and translate it to digital? Or what?

I'm speculating, because I know nothing about the design of this system - absolutely nothing, binary zero. I do know this: In designing any system of automation, it is better to design the overall system from scratch than to try to wed it to something older, slower, or just not in step with current trends. My point again?

If we are going to spend money to design automated train control systems, especially in the case of dedicated HSR, but also for light rail and transit, we need to go whole hog, or future designers and engineers will be trying to do patches and upgrades that just won't be as safe.

©2009 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Automated Railroading

The terrible wreck on the DC Metro last week got me thinking about automated railroading in general.

Let me first say that I have ridden the Metro and I have always been very impressed by it. I have never felt any fear at all that the automated systems were unreliable or would result in such a wreck.

Nonetheless, as we move toward further reliance on automatic train stop and other systems for Passenger Rail, I wonder what will happen when the money runs out. Granted, there is more focus on the lack of reinforced car ends and anticlimber engineering for the cars than there is on the automated system that would have had to fail in order for the DC wreck to happen. These cars didn't have the engineering due to lack of cash. And it remains to be seen whether the system failure was also because of deferred spending.

What happens to our automated systems when the money runs out? It will run out, you know. Someday, the pendulum will swing back in the other direction and nobody will want government to subsidize rail again. The question becomes: Do we spend enough now to design fail-safe systems that will be able to age gracefully? And do we spend enough time to retain the necessary skills among our railroaders so that, when and if the systems fail, we can still run trains the old way?

It's interesting to think of what Passenger Rail in the United States will be like in 20 or 30 years. Hope I'm around to see it, whatever it is like.

©2009 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Chicago to Iowa City - I'd Ride It

If I still lived in the Chicago area.

Getting out to Iowa City used to be one of my favorites. It's a beautiful city with a thriving university campus and sites of historical interest. I used to do it for an overnight or two. Out - overnight - and back.

That's probably how Amtrak service would go. But with a five-hour schedule (one way) it would be possible to spend a 15-hour day and five of those could be for business or shopping in one city or the other.

I'm speaking from the big-city perspective, however. The train would be of even more benefit for Iowans, as they would pick up the brunt of the subsidy, but could look forward to visiting downtown Chicago more often with less headache than driving. If the train is scheduled correctly.

I fear that with a lot of these new proposed startup Amtrak routes, the freight railroads will prevail and the schedules will be adjusted (or crimped by bad or felonious dispatching) into what the host rail wants or needs to get its freight over the road. There will be less incentive as freight traffic (unsubsidized as of today, but bailouts happen) takes it in the shorts from the lousy economy. But if both the economy and the new Amtrak routes come on line at the same time, you know absolutely which will bite the bullet. And it won't be the new route.

But making an overnight isn't so bad in Iowa City or in Chicago - though more expensive in the latter. I'd ride it anyway.

©2009 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Good Ideas and Bad Ones

The Good:  Amtrak is considering the restoration of the Pioneer from Denver to the pacific northwest (see article), and the idea of adding more of the Front Range cities that have some population density is a Good Idea.  Amtrak routes need population centers at the ends of routes in order to assure proper utilization of resources throughout the entire route.  But it would be damn silly not to add smaller population centers where possible.  It’s the no-density towns and marginal cities that need not be served by terminal routes.

The Bad:  Congressman Harry of NM wants the Rail Runner, already suffering from marginal density in its Belen terminal, to go to El Paso.  (See article.)  The reasoning is, and get this, the rest of New Mexico wants commuter options, too.  This shows that Mr. Teague has no concept of how to use rail resources and recover revenue.  Yes, like my example under “The Good,” El Paso would be a high-density city population, also with potential Mexican passengers (and concomitant border crossing problems like Amtrak’s international trains), but running a train because the other 2/3 of New Mexico has one isn’t a good reason.  And the northern end of the route is a marginal terminal (Santa Fe), that even the old namesake railroad didn’t go to. 

The Ugly:  Not today.

©2009 – C. A. Turek – mistertrains@gmail.com

Green Passenger Rail

With Earth Day/Week just past, I've been thinking about how we might make Passenger Rail more radically green than freight rail already is. Yes, Veronica, the energy saving by moving a ton of freight over rail as opposed to over the road is much, much greater than that saved by moving a ton of passengers by rail as opposed to over the road, even in buses. That's because the amenities associated with long distance passenger rail (and to some extent even commuter rail) often weigh more than the passengers transported. So I've been thinking, what can we do about that?

The energy/fuel advantages of the concept of gensets appears to be widely accepted. Perhaps something similar to that can be incorporated into the next generation of passenger equipment. Was a time when some commuter trains in the Chicago Area carried their own generator cars on some railroads. They didn't have or need the head end power. And the head end power concept in which the prime mover is always running hard enough to light/heat/cool the passengers may be passe.

Would a genset aboard each car be the answer. Perhaps a hybrid technology involving batteries (like heavyweight and early lightweight passenger cars of old) and maybe even solar technologies (there's a lot of roof area on the passenger cars) would be ideal. Has anyone looked into this?

I would think that the fuel saving for a power-on-demand genset over a 220-volt system for the whole train (a little like a small town power coop) would be great. And we could look into powering all of the gensets with biodiesel or with other green fuels like used cooking oil. Maybe we could build something that would pipe the used oil from a dining car right into the gensets.

Also, I still like the idea of making all future new passenger routes, especially HSR and new dedicated rights-of-way, electrified. This again is power on demand. You never have a diesel idling in a station burning up fuel and money.

With all the dollars that will now flow to Passenger Rail, I sure hope we get it right and get it green.

© 2009 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Too Little, Too Late - Hope Not

A frightening theme runs through much of the current rail-oriented media. (That would be rail mags, news articles, and editorial comment.) It's frightening if you are looking forward to the rebirth of Passenger Rail. Summed up in six words: We may have waited too long.

Even with the public and even the private sector interested in funding new and expanding rail projects, here are the problems from bottom to top.

1. The rebirth of rail hasn't discouraged the NIMBYs and the environmentalists. This will mean that acquisition of land (right of way) for any rail project will be more costly and take longer than ever before in United States history. In fact, I recently read an editorial reply where the environmentalist writer, in arguing against a new line, suggested that light rail is no more fuel efficient than the private auto. As the global warming people like to say: The facts are in and the science is settled. Both arguments are wrong, but that won't stop this guy. I would rather live next to a busy railroad than to a freeway or airport, but perhaps that's just me.
2. For reasons of safety regulations, general risk, materials, labor, and advancing technology, the tracks that go on those rights of way are more costly than ever before. Many miles of old track will have to be replaced, many miles have already been torn out, and freight rail is scrambling in some parts just to get a second main back where there once were three or four main line tracks. Demand will drive up cost, or cause shortages in materials.
3. Speaking of materials, the domestic steel industry is in shambles. Yes it still exists, but nowhere is there the capacity to turn out the steel needed for a major expansion. Not just rails are needed, but steel for bridges, retaining walls, scaffolding, cranes, earthmovers, re-bar, and etc. on and on. We are already buying enough from our overseas suppliers.
4. We have two North American locomotive builders but no passenger car builders. Some, like Siemens and Bombardier (both not domestic companies) can and have come on line in short order to assemble cars. With freight car orders down, now would be the time to shift some of those manufacturers to the passenger cars of our future.
5. Signal systems, which even in their basic state increase line capacity and reduce risk and thereby cost, are also in a shambles. Amtrak alone operates on whatever signal and communications systems the host railroad has in place. Once relatively cheap electro- pneumatic or mechanical devices have become high-tech GPS-based systems with increasing incremental costs as well. Letting the old systems go to pot in many areas has not given us a step up in getting to the high-tech.
6. Reservations systems are operating on decades old software that has been modified and updated but is still based on concepts that came to us with the birth of the personal computer. They will continue to get integrated into the newer technology of cell phones and hand-held devices, but they will still be the old systems. New would be better, but is it too late to revamp the whole thing?
7. With the degradation of our Passenger Rail system has come the degradation of society in general. The acceptable has become the unacceptable and some people just won't know how to ride the modern equivalent of a Pullman sleeper and respect the peace and privacy of other passengers. And the threat of litigation and stepping on somebody's civil rights keeps rail employees from putting a stop to some of the worst abuses. With our airline-driven are-we-there-yet mentality, we just might not be ready, as a society, for the rebirth of Passenger Rail.

Does anyone disagree?

Good News - Can Amtrak Take It?

AMTRAK to spend $47.5 million in stimulus funds on Chicago projects and CSX willing to help spur high-speed rail on Empire Corridor, Schumer says are just two of the articles of "good news" about Passenger Rail. The questions I have is this: Can Amtrak take all this good news?

For one thing, is Amtrak going to spend every bit of that stimulus money while looking over its shoulder and wondering when it will be taken away? I hope not.

In my humble opinion, the best way to spend the stimulus money, whatever it can get either through direct subsidy or through partnership with the states, is to not listen to Congress or to politicians in general. Argument: It is widely known that the Amtrak Board and much of Amtrak financial management is burned out with trying to keep the whole shebang running on a showstring. It is also widely known that Amtrak employees, from operating personnel on down, are generally more enthusiastic about what Amtrak can and should do. So ask the employees.

There have to be thousands of cheap problem fixes out there; fixes that when all done at the same time will make drastic improvements in service and on-time performance. Some of the corridor fixes highlighted in this month's Trains Magazine are a good example of this. Other things would be station repairs, security upgrades, quick fix amenities like new bedding and pillows in sleepers, and appearance upgrades (paint, soap and water). And I bet you wouldn't even spend half of the money on these.

Dear Amtrak: While you are thinking about making the big plans, solve all the small problems that you can solve right NOW. Thank you.

©2009 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Worthy Effort

Please consider this link as direction to a worthy effort to save an historic piece of passenger railroading.

R U Stimulated Yet?

Don't get me wrong. I love the fact that Amtrak and other Passenger Rail projects are getting stimulus money. I also love the fact that the prospect of following that money has gotten state and local governments and their politicians to pay attention. (I doubt they would pay so much attention if it didn't involve gobs of cash.)

Here in the great state of confusion we call New Mexico, our Passenger Rail project is completed for the time being. (See Rail Runner Express.) Any stimulus money that goes to transportation here is likely only to assist in the perpetuation of that franchise rather than starting anything new. Follow my link (in the header) to Passenger Rail news, however, and you will find news on any of a hundred new projects.

But stimulus money, by law, must be spent on - I hate this term - "shovel ready" projects. I'll leave it to you to decide whether that means ready to start a foundation or ready to bury the dead. But few rail projects are going to be shovel ready. Nor will few meet the test of job creation that is attached to the transportation funds. The money being thrown at Amtrak appears to be an exception, and I hope the masters of make-do at Amtrak catch all of it and use it wisely.

I also hope that Amtrak can find a domestic rail car builder before they are all bankrupt, but that's another story.

My point is that much more of the stimulus money is going to wind up in building or repairing more and better roads, some airport runways or terminals, airway infrastructure, and - gasp - bailing out the auto industry, than will ever be put into Passenger Rail. As we sell out more of our grandkids' future, perhaps the trend towards thoughtful, intermodally integrated and environmentally sound transportation policy will change that. Who's going to pay for it? I don't know.

So just sit back and get ready to watch those passengers shovel.

© 2009 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Three Weeks is Too Much Without a Post

My apologies to those of you who navigate to this blog regularly. The number is growing and I appreciate the traffic. But I haven't been in the mood to blog lately.

There are a number of reasons, but the biggest one is just spending too much time on other things. Among these things, the one that looms largest is working to make a living and keep the job that has become just as precarious as others in these hard times. Maybe a little mental depression goes along with that. Another thing I've been up to is spending a little more time working the Internet to market a completed manuscript.

If you think it's about Passenger Rail, you would be wrong. It is a historical novel about another form of rail tranportation. Although I've kept links to my other interests out of this blog so far, I'm breaking with that policy. You can read a little about my novel at tunneltoofar.blogspot.com, where you will find that its period is the start of the Great Depression and much of it is set in the tunnel system under the streets of Chicago and in and around the railroad infrastructure of that period.

A third reason for not blogging Passenger Rail is the speed at which things are moving. Passenger Rail as a transportation mode has caught on, and even the collective heads of our federal politicians have come out of their butts long enough to realize this. I will write more on what's real and what's not in the speed of this transition as soon as possible. But bottom line: I see so much good planning and prospective new rail projects out there that it's hard to decide on which one to focus my attention.

Write me at my regular email address (mistertrains@gmail.com ) if you check out A Tunnel Too Far and like what you see. I would prefer this to a comment on this blog, but I think I have opened the door to that, haven't I?

©2009 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

How Permanent Is Permanent?

As a nation of freedom-loving fools currently hellbent on swinging towards the socialist side of the pendulum, we need to be very careful not to squander the stimulus money coming to Passenger Rail. We all have ideas and pet projects, but how many of them will result in permanent jobs? And how permanent is permanent?

How many jobs are still around that were created by FDR's depression-era programs? I can safely tell you that most of the railroad jobs created or kept by those programs have long ago gone away and will not come back. Why? We don't want them to. Therefore, we want to put Passenger Rail's stimulus money into things that will create future jobs.

Bad example: Refurbishing damaged or aging Amtrak cars will create short-term jobs. Putting more Amtrak cars on the rails on current routes will create jobs that have to be funded from year to year. There will have to be a committed source of future funding to make these jobs even semi-permanent.

Good example: Building new HSR routes will create completely new kinds of railroads that will carry on into the future and may yield future jobs we cannot dream of today! Yes, this will probably also need some stable source of future funding, but we won't be funding old ideas.

Is it the only way to go then: To fund only new ideas? Not by a long shot. We simply need to avoid that law of unintended consequences that political types are so fond of falling into. We have to think things through, thoroughly, and with precision.

Hope we do; because this kind of money on the loose might be Passenger Rail's best opportunity long into the future.

© 2009 C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

More Wishes and Dreams

City Triplets. No, I am not advocating multiple births by urban dwellers. I am talking about groups of cities that would be an excellent starting point for new Passenger Rail routing. Just about every state has a set of city triplets, and I am sure my readers will know of more. Some triplets don't fit into just one state, they are bi-state or tri-state triplets. Let me give two examples and then a list.

My home state of New Mexico now has the beginnings of a triplet routing. We have a true intercity commuter between Albuquerque and Santa Fe. The south end of the line doesn't count. Belen isn't big enough to fit my idea. But Santa Fe - Albuquerque - Las Cruces does. And there is already talk.

Another example, from my former state, would be Chicago - Springfield - St. Louis, which does exist to some extent. Chicago - Peoria - Moline would be another. My point in getting together these triplet is: If we start here, it is a good place to then connect the dots by connecting the triplets. And it gives each state a chance to decide what routes they want and then go for the gold in getting their triplet into the new national network.

Others (mostly where there is no or limited Passenger Rail now):
Boise - Pocatello - Idaho Falls
Tucson - Phoenix - Flagstaff
Pueblo - Colorado Springs - Denver
Grand Island - Lincoln - Omaha
Topeka - Wichita - Oklahoma City
Amarillo - Lubbock - San Angelo
New Orleans - Baton Rouge - Shreveport
Memphis - Nashville - Knoxville
Evansville - Indianapolis - South Bend

I could go on. There's no trick other than finding a triplet that has some population in between towns that would ride the train and stir up some economic activity by doing so. With few exceptions in the one's I've named, this would also take passenger cars off the Interstates.

©2009 C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Wish List 2

Please, Mr. Obama, while you are printing more money, please fund the following:

1. All-rail passenger service from Chicago to Green Bay.
2. More than one train each day out of Chicago to each and every route end, including the long ones.
3. Buy up enough nearby real estate to increase the capacity of Chicago stations for Amtrak. As fantasies go, this is a big one. It would require one or all of a) increasing the number of available tracks in Union Station; b) spreading out Amtrak among the several stations (only Union Pacific has northbound tracks), which would also require; c) improved light rail (non-CTA) between Randolph, LaSalle, Union Pacific (all Metra) and Union (maybe a light rail circulator on dedicated elevated right of way?).
4. While we're fantasizing feeders, new ones from O'Hare and Midway right to Amtrak! Now there's a transportation concept. As it is right now, you can't do this via rail alone.

More next time

© 2009 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Wish List 1

Don't get me wrong. I am dead against the way our politicians are hustling every pet project they can think of in order to get them in front of Mr. Obama for a piece of the "economic stimulus" pie.

But I am attracted by the fantasy of having some favorate Passenger Rail-related projects funded, so I am going to start on my wish list.

Dear Mr. Obama:
Please print money for the following projects to stimulate the economy.
1. Passenger Rail service along the front-range corridor from Cheyenne, Wyoming, to El Paso, Texas.
2. At least two daily trains each way on this corridor.
3. Passenger Rail service that would get me from Albuquerque to Phoenix in under 24 hours, without going part way by bus.
4. A short intra-state local running Las Cruces to Las Vegas, NM.
5. Passenger Rail from Albuquerque to Las Vegas, Nevada.

Next time: Wish lists for other areas.

©2009 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Winter and Amtrak

Now that the early-winter holidays are past, it is worth noting that Winter has been upon much of the country with a vengeance since well before the holidays came and went. And what has Amtrak been able to do about it? Not much.

I have opined on this blog in past winters that Amtrak should focus more on keeping its equipment winter-operable and on getting new equipment that is more weatherproof. Nonetheless, the norm seems to be to shrug when weather sidelines equipment or makes it inoperable enroute, and to make the poor passenger endure the hell that results.

Several winters ago, I experienced what happens to Superliner sleepers when snow and ice get up between the cars and into the high-voltage house power connections. The resulting explosion and showers of sparks are certainly memorable, but sitting for hours on the track while crews use every imaginable spit-and-baling-wire fix to try to get things working again, all the while freezing in a train with no heat or light, is not the makings of a pleasant trip. There should have been spare parts on board. And it wouldn't hurt to have at least one crewmember who is also trained as a car mechanic, at least on paper.

But that winter has been repeated many times this year, according to reports, in lower Michigan and the Northeast. There are horror stories of a four-hour trip taking 16 hours with no available toilet facilities and no adequate communication from Amtrak. The intertia that this represents in Amtrak's approach to such things is staggering.

We, the sheep . . . er, taxpayer . . . shouldn't stand for this kind of management in Our Passenger Rail System! I'm imagining that all Amtrak trains that have a longer than 2-hour run should have a passenger representative appointed by random draw of ticket stubs to be empowered to summarily fire any employee of Amtrak that lets this kind of thing happen. Nice fantasy, but it won't happen. Too many bureaucrats (with really heavy ass inertia) standing in the way.

Amtrak needs to get it's crap together or be modified out of existence into some new form, with a new charter and a new commitment to passenger service. It could happen. Change should be forthcoming. Let's hope it's real.

©2009 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Passenger Rail Is Not Always The Answer

Much as I would like it to be, Passenger Rail isn't the answer to every transportation question. As I often push for more Passenger Rail in this blog using an argument that it is sound policy from both a conservation and an environmental standpoint, I would like to be careful not to push too much.

As Mr. Obama's presidency nears and we are every day promised dollars for public infrastructure projects, some local politicians are taking their heads out of their arses only long enough to see the dollar signs. Yes, they have heard that trains are sound policy, so if there's anywhere they can put one, they are going to ask for money for it.

So a little education while you guys aren't busy watching your own colons:

1. Light rail only is a good idea only for large cities. I am talking cities the size of Milwaukee or better, not those on the borderline of "medium to small." The economies will just never catch up with the initial cost and the burden of subsidy. Mayors who want this and get it will be ruining their economies unless they have a dedicated line in mind, say from one airport to another.
2. Commuter rail is usually a little less costly for right-of-way and more costly for equipment. It, too, makes no sense for a small city with small ridership. New Mexico Rail Runner Express is not really commuter rail any longer, it is state sponsored intercity (Santa Fe - Albuquerque - Belen) with no help from Amtrak. It will leave a burden of subsidy too large for a low pop state like New Mexico to bear. If it has to go belly up, it will be money down a rathole.
3. Long distance Passenger Rail only makes sense on a more frequent basis than Amtrak can provide at this time. Amtrak has gone into the commuter business to find money, and it does a good job in the northeast, midwest, and California. But there's no local government seeking stimulus money for an Amtrak route, so Amtrak won't benefit from this unless local government seeks infrastructure improvements that will facilitate Amtrak.

Is anybody listening?

© 2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

No Cure From Amtrak

Something that Amtrak has not been able to cure in all of its three decades plus of existence is the public perception that the days are numbered for the train. I'm talking about any train.

Throughout the decade preceding Amtrak, those of us old enough to remember will recall that news of one or another passenger train's demise came out almost weekly. Unless you were a train nut trying to get mileage that would become unavailable onto your log book, you weren't very enthusiastic about riding a train that you knew wouldn't be there in the very near future. It was a protective reaction, really, because you knew that if you liked it you would be sad not to do it again, and if you didn't like it, it was probably because you waited too long to try it.

The same thing has been going on throughout the Amtrak era. There is always a rumor of a certain train in danger of discontinuance, and the press makes no bones about putting it out there when it's just a rumor. Some of this has got to stop if Passenger Rail is going to grow and if public confidence is going to grow with it. Amtrak should spend some new money on public relations initiatives that will tell the public, not just the train nuts that watch for the info, like me, what is in store for them if things go right. What new trains can we expect? How will this help my life and how will this help the country and the environment?

Today, even the reporting and the editorial slant for potential new trains is in the negative. It's about what might go wrong, how horrendously large is the needed money, or how it's just a "study" that will cost lots and no train is likely to result.

As a society, we are now conditioned to breath a sigh of relief when things don't go too wrong. So we don't expect to hear about what could go right. We rejoice over $2 gas, we turn handsprings when the train schedule doesn't get cut back, we thank God and Southwest Airlines that somebody still gives us peanuts during a long flight. It's ridiculous, and we should all expect more.

Wouldn't it be a lot more fun to rejoice over Amtrak doubling its route structure and its on-board amenities? And somebody at Amtrak needs to get their head out of whatever dark hole its up and start to let the public know how good things could be, not just how bad they could get.

I look forward to it.

©2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Political Momentum

Big Ideas aren't going to get done with the kind of thinking that exists in our legislative branch today. And they won't get done with the kind of thinking that is scheduled to exist tomorrow.

Political momentum says that Congress will continue to think along the lines of "no new Passenger Rail lines unless states or local governments put in the money." That's not going to work, and that is no longer a Big Idea. It was a good way to keep Amtrak moving when states were flush with cash, but that's not going to happen for the foreseeable future. Call it momentum or call it a head in the sand. Call it what you will, our newest congressmen and senators, as well as the re-elected ones, are going to have to stop thinking like we are going back to a Clintonian White House. The economy is already dictating that the rest of this decade is going to be very different from the 1990s.

As much as Radical Environmentalism - as a movement - is against the free market, neither will it want to see us slide back into a transportation policy where the only way to get somewhere is by passsenger auto or jet-fuel guzzling airlines. And the auto fleet will be aging - therefore less environmentally friendly - if none of us can afford to buy a new one.

As I have said before on this blog, our transportation policies must be coordinated and include a higher proportion of funding for Passenger Rail. This must also occur with any economic stimulus plans. Mr. Obama, please listen: If we are going to put people to work ala 1930s style WPA, it must be on building and repairing rail infrastructure as well as other kinds, and maybe even on building railcars, streetcars, and locomotives, too. (GM should not have sold Electro Motive is a topic for another day.)

+++++

Thank you all for your very astute comments and emails on my Big Ideas title. Now please write to your politicians - all of them - from the local know-nothings on up.

© 2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Something Big

Since the inception of Amtrak, the model for Passenger Rail in this country has been - with few exceptions - one of subsidize and recover. This means subsidize as much of the train operations budget as is politically possible, and recover as much as possible of the costs of train operations from the farebox. The few exceptions are excursion trains, since even commuter rail is handled in the "subsidize and recover" model.

Perhaps we are ready for a new model. A big idea.

Looking at some photographs of New York Central varnish from the 1930s and 1940s got me thinking: We could look at this the same way banks are required to look at deposit insurance. Banks take a percentage of every dollar and put it into the FDIC.

Think about this: Instead of taking money out of transportation taxes and out of other general taxes to fund Passenger Rail, why don't we just require every railroad to pay a percentage of their profits towards passenger service.

You may say that was how railroads got in trouble with passengers to begin with. And I would say you are right. But railroad of the time were trying to serve every community on most routes and were doing it with lots and lots of equipment and heavy schedules. I think that if the current Amtrak route structure were imposed on the host railroads, a percentage of freight revenues would be enough, in our day, to operate most, if not all of Amtrak, maybe even double the routes currently available. I believe that it would not cramp the style of the profitable railroads.

You may also say this is a bad time to start imposing an effective tax on profitable businesses, as the times are telling us that profitable businesses are going to be few. But what better time than when railroads are flush with cash? Should we wait until the whole economy is in shambles?

If it worked, this would be a way to ease railroads back into the habit of operating and funding passenger service, not just grudgingly allowing passenger trains to operate on tracks built in the public interest.

Yes, there are consequences. Shippers would effectively be paying for passenger rail in rates that might be higher. Congress would have to resist the temptation to allow (or worse, mandate) that all costs thus incurred be passed on to the shippers. And initally, reduced service would result on already crowded lines. Benefits would be forthcoming with patience. Business would benefit from increased availability of travel and lower cost. Removing automobiles from roadways would relieve environmental pressures on all businesses. Fuel savings would be great, and all businesses would benefit from a reduced dependence on foreign oil.

I'm sure I haven't thought of all the positives and negatives here. Anyone want to jump in and enlighten me if you think this is a bad idea? Otherwise, maybe we can write some letters to the new Congress and the new president. Maybe there are other new and better ideas out there. But the old model isn't working, hasn't for a long time. Let's start something big.

© 2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Turning Point

Passenger Rail, like a train poised at the switch ready to take one track or the other, will be rolling onto a different track as a result of the events of this month.

First, the pundits say that the administration of President-Elect Obama is likely to be much more pro-Passenger Rail than several of its predecessors. This is based in part on Joe Biden, who is seen as pro-passenger in part based on his voting record, but mostly because he likes to ride the trains himself. It is also based on the undisputable fact that Mr. Obama came up during the campaign as more knowledgeable as to the potential of Passenger Rail in general and HSR in particular.

Today, it appears that Rep. James Oberstar is the likely choice for Secretary of Transportation. Whether this is 'change' or a step forward is arguable. Mr. Oberstar's voting record in the House is to support Amtrak reauthorization, to vote against reductions in funding, but never, as far as my research can find, to take a positive forward move in sponsoring any legislation that would get Amtrak and Passenger Rail over the hump to where it should be in this century.

The next development is the resignation of Alex Kummant as CEO of Amtrak. This writer was thoroughly skeptical about Mr. Kummant when he came on board. I have been pleasantly proven wrong. But he also had the luck of the draw, with Amtrak ridership increasing as a result of high fuel prices, giving him extra revenue to work with. Now that gas prices are falling, will ridership stay at this level?

My guess is that Mr. Kummant has trained his executive team well, and the interim CEO William Crosbie will carry on some of the same policies. Also my guess: President-Elect Obama will likely appoint a new CEO from outside Amtrak.

That's not a bad thing. In the spirit of change that the recent election is supposed to have fostered, I am hoping that whoever it is will agree with Secretary-in-waiting Oberstar and with the new Congress on the direction Amtrak should take. I think we would all have to agree that the only 'change' that would be good for Amtrak and good for the country is increased funding for train frequency, equipment, on-time performance, service, and new routes - without the redundancy of Congress repeating over and over, year after long year, that it thinks Amtrak should make money.

Mr. Oberstar - if you are appointed as expected - and Mr. Obama . . . the train is running on your track now. Please don't derail it at the switch.

©2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

It's Too Bad

It's too bad that in the current political climate our passenger railroads are not still run by private corporations. Do you see where we're going with this.

If Amtrak were a private corporation, all it would have to do - other than pay its executives scads of money to run it into the ground - would be to whine about how it is too big and important to the United States economy to fail. Bingo. The government would be buying up equity with taxpayer dollars and there would no longer be a question of getting appropriations in Congress.

With Congress ready to pour money into 1. banks; 2. insurance companies; and 3. anything else that moves and has assets to control, the freight railroads are already lining up at the door to the treasury. (We once had an uncle who used to do what Congress does to number 3, but we called it something different.)

It may bode well for rail infrastructure, but again we fall back on the questions: How far can government money go? How is all this going to happen without huge tax increases? If we are all out of a job, how are we going to pay taxes?

Neither candidate for president seems to have these answers.

We spend a lot of time worrying these days.

©2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Two Questions Redux

With the events of the past two weeks smoldering in our collective brains - or whats left of our brains after the political ads slam them against the wall with every television or radio break - we now know that we should not have asked, "Will there be any money left for Passenger Rail?" What we should have asked was, "Will there be any money left? Period."

Fact One: The current economic crisis and the resulting bailouts are spending taxpayer dollars that have to come from somewhere and that would otherwise have gone elsewhere.

Fact Two: The economic situation will tend to elect Democrats in four weeks.

Fact Three: Democrats have run on the promise of extensive spending programs to right the supposed wrongs of previous administrations.

Fact Four: Democrats have also established the balanced budget idea that says basically that no new spending will occur without taking money away from old projects.

Fact Five: Amtrak and Passenger Rail are not as politically sexy as road, bridges and airport facilities.

There will be huge temptation to take money away from Passenger Rail sooner than from other infrastructure projects. We hope it doesn't put a revived intercity rail system on the back burner just when it was starting to cook.

©2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Waking Up

It's a good thing that some in this country are waking up. This opinion piece from the Baltimore Sun does a pretty good job of repeating some of the things that we have been saying for years. It is good to see ordinary journalists waking up to the transportation crisis.

First, there is new technology, and many new ideas for new technology, for Passenger Rail and for freight rail. For our political establishment to suddenly mandate any one of the technologies that is still in the testing stage, and do that as a knee-jerk reaction to current events, is idiocy. But that is what Congress specializes in.

We don't think mandating PTC for all Passenger Rail for all lines with a target date somewhere in the future and no specifications for a particular system attached to the mandate is particularly idiotic. PTC in one form or another is certainly a probability. There are no particular hurdles to the engineering of PTC, other than making sure it works as needed and making sure that various systems are compatable. The latter is like getting a DVD player to read all the various types of disks that have been developed. Not a sure thing unless you buy the right player, but certainly not impossible.

What scares the hell out of us is that Congress would mandate a particular system built by a particular bidder and then squeeze the cash out of the deal so that the final system on line would be nothing like what could be developed if Congress would just leave the specs to the open market.

Second, with respect to suddenly upping the ante on train protection when a particularly deadly accident occurs, let's get real. All modes of transportation carry some risk, and the way to minimize that risk is "safety first," not after the accident occurs. There are technologies other than PTC that are either on line or being tested, such as electronic braking, that will make Passenger Rail safer. It will be by a combination of available tech, not by one system of signalling, that Passenger Rail and rail in general will be made safer. Congress probably will never wake up.

That's why Mister Trains urges all voters: Do not vote for the incumbent. Pick the independent, the green, the Naders or the Ron Pauls, but don't pick the incumbents.

But we always welcome it when somebody wakes up and smells the coffee with regards to our failing transportation policy and the value of Passenger Rail in particular.

© 2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Two Questions

Question One: Will there be any money left for Passenger Rail?

There is a need for a comprehensive United States transportation plan. We think this statement is unarguable. We also think that the only way such a plan can be implemented is through focused government subsidy for expanded Passenger Rail. This should move into the realm of public-private partnerships and finally, if successful, one day into the realm of pure private enterprise.

Right now, we are not moving in the direction of private enterprise. It wouldn't surprise us if there were a need - in a very short time - to nationalize the transportation system to keep it from melting down in the same way that AIG and the credit markets almost have, or almost did.

If we do that, the question comes as to how much money will be put into Passenger Rail. Or will the government just support new highways and airways and revamp air transport? In our opinion, we cannot do the latter without leaving our transportation systems vulnerable to attack. Only a balanced Passenger Rail component secures the system against such attack.

Question Two: Is Joe Biden pro rail just because he commutes on a train?

We think not. Biden has been critical of Amtrak, just as have many legislators, without offering a solution that demonstrates a comprehensive knowledge of the problem. We know lots of folks who bitch about the service but have no idea what it really takes to run a passenger train, let alone a railroad.

We do not see a presidential or vice-presidential candidate that can truly be called pro rail. Transportation won't become glamorous enough to catch the eye of the media, and hence of the voter, unless it is interrupted in the same way that failure of Fannie and Freddy would have interrupted the financial markets. (And please do not think we are advocating this. We are just saying.) It is a pity, but keep it in mind when you vote.

©2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Precursor

It is too soon after the disasterous wreck of this past Friday to lay blame.

This is why we disagree with Metralink blaming the engineer. Again, it is too soon, and all sorts of things might have gone wrong. If experience is any teacher, it usually takes more than one thing to go wrong to cause such a disaster or contribute to it.

However, please pray for the injured and for the newly departed. These include the poor engineer of the Metralink train.

We would just like to ask our readers if, after prayer please, you would think about the future of Passenger Rail in this country. On its present course, most, if not all, passenger trains will be sharing the rails with the already overburdened freight transportation industry. And all will be running across barges and trucks during their journeys. Will both sides - passenger and freight - be safe? What do we - as a nation - need to do to keep this from being the precursor of even more such disasters as almost every one in the past has been?

©2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Breather

Now that we have vented about what - historically - has been done wrong. Let's take a breather and think about what might be done right.

Let's think about doubling. What part of Passenger Rail and Amtrak in particular should we fund to double the current status and how efficient would that be?

It is reported that Amtrak ridership is growing in spite of stagnent numbers of routes (with the exception of new, state funded routes) and stagnent amounts of passenger cars available to the fleet.

Doubling Route Miles

This would probably result in a better than doubling of passenger miles, but would require doubling or better the amount of equipment and the service facilities that go with more equipment. It would probably require more than doubling the payroll. Would it result in double the revenue? We doubt it.

Doubling Train Frequency

This would probably result in more passenger miles. It would not require twice the equipment and probably could be done without doubling employment in on-board crews. However, it would result in higher maintenance costs.

Doubling Track Speed
A necessity if train frequency is to be doubled. Better signalling would help with this, so this would probably require double the expenditures of host railroads on track and signals.

Doubling The Amount of Equipment
This would be a first step in doubling the availability of all passenger rail and must be done no matter what the cost.

Doubling The Size of Management
A real danger if we start pouring money into the system.

We start to see how interconnected is the network that we dismantled by nationalizing the Passenger Rail system. If Congress can come up with not double the money but enough money to double the system, it's really hard to say where it should go. It should not go into administration and/or management.

©2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

No. 4 - Manufacturing and Industrial Design

What is it about North American freight railroading that makes it unique? It has a look and esthetic that is unlike railroading anywhere else in the world.

Passenger Rail in North America used to be the same way.

Actually, with most of Amtrak, it still is. But with commuter rail not so much any more. And we have probably long given up the possibility that the coming revival of intercity Passenger Rail will look anything more that Global, or worse, European.

The extraordinary hiatus in development of purely American intercity passenger trains has given the rest of the world a leg up. Worse, we will never know what the evolution of the passenger train would have been had we just continued to run them in a quantity and at a speed that kept them in the public eye and mind. For instance, the trend toward bi-levels started with the Santa Fe equipment might have been more incentive for eastern routes with increased clearances. Fifteen years ago, Amtrak still had to devise Superliner-like interiors to fit into single-level cars still having to squeeze through tunnels that couldn't clear Superliners.

With the increase in sizes, would we now have a third or fourth generation of Super-Superliners that make Passenger Rail even more fuel efficient than it already is with broken-down antiques? With a continuity in design and volume of use, would green locomotive builders be targeting passenger use instead of just freight? We will never know.

Had we been building North American passenger cars right along, the cost of including integrated, state-of-the-art amenities (the full range of electronic media, the best of human creature comforts) might not be as great as it is now for single, disgustingly small (by car count) orders that come only once every two decades.

We The People have done ourselves a great disservice in settling for Amtrak.

©2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

No. 3 - Marginalization and Demonization

Third on Mister Trains' list of what the United States should have done to ensure that Passenger Rail was viable in the twenty-first century is a two-parter. Because they are two sides of the same coin, we have put them together; but they just as easily could have been No. 3 and No. 4.

Marginalization: The act of diminishing the importance of something by shoving it off to the margins of public consciousness. In our society today, the homeless, the harmless insane, the elderly poor, and Passenger Rail are all marginalized. When public policy evolved (or devolved) to support air and highway transport at the expense of rail, the policy makers found themselves with a nightmare of complaints from those who still viewed rail as the way to get from here to there. Train-offs were always made after loud public outcry from those who did not want to lose the passenger train.

So we dealt with it by convincing ourselves that those loudmouths were not riders but complainers and that they probably would not use the trains if they were left on the timetable. We then marginalized the communities that suffered and sometimes died because of the train-offs. We told ourselves that they were little hayseed towns that didn't have an economic future anyway.

During the process of marginalization, the media always presented the railroads as an archaic form of transportation. Likewise, successful European or Asian passenger trains were characterized as quaint and touristy. Not until our trains were long gone and the rest of the world's weren't did the media start showing us the "modern and space age" trains of France, Japan, and etc. Now the only experienced passenger car builders come from places other than the United States.

Demonization is an extreme form. Not only were railroads characterized as archaic and outdated, but they were placed in a blame situation for almost every possible annoyance that a transportation form could have. They were too hot, too cold, unsafe, they contributed to noise, pollution, they dispoiled the land, they were founded by robber barrons who never repaid their debt to society.

Trains retreated, they retrenched, and they kept a low profile. Today they do their jobs without the high advertising budgets of airlines and auto manufacturers. Throughout the world, however, railroads haul more passengers more miles and more comfortably than do today's airlines. But they don't do it here.

Mister Trains still gets comments from people who don't get it. From those who say rail is archaic. We bet that fewer people in the rest of the world feel that way. Where Passenger Rail was never marginalized or demonized, it flourishes.

©2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

No. 2 - Regulation

We shall reach back a little further in time for the second item on our list of things we, the United States, should have done to foster a vital Passenger Rail system over time.

Regulation of the rail transportation system, in general, should have ended after the Robber Baron era. We are sure that the public of the late nineteenth century saw abuses by the railroads. The system of regulation that continued without mercy into the third quarter of the twentieth century abused the so-called private-sector railroads far more.

In today's economy, we are having a healthy discussion about the relative merits of free markets v. regulation. Movements are afoot to re-regulate rail and big oil and big drug and big any other business that is seen as making a buck off the Little Guy. But every dollar made in this country originates with the Little Guy.

By regulating the health out of the railroads, Government deprived the Little Guy of a vital form of transportation. The Little Guy no longer had the choice of taking a passenger train from Point A to Point B. Indirectly, Little Guy and Girl were deprived of truck-free highways good for a Sunday afternoon spin. We were deprived of the clean environment that trains foster and trucks do not. We were deprived of all of the potential advancements in rail service that many other parts of the world have or will have. Because even while regulating rail, and with the exception of national emergency (read World War), Government refused to run the trains. Via ridiculous yearly Congressional debates over funding Amtrak, Government still refuses to run the very corporate entity it set up to be the trains.

Would we have done better without regulation? You bet. First, the railroads that ran the passenger trains would have had a fairer chance to remain solvent. Though solvency in railroad terms is an interesting accounting theory probably served more by a whole book than by this blog, suffice it to say that a fully solvent corporation, one making money for its investors, is less likely to have to cut off marginal parts of the business.

Did we say marginal? Yes, because although Passenger Rail does not make money on a fully allocated cost basis, there was a time when it did make money on an avoidable cost basis. Basically that means that, if freight is solvent and paying all fixed and avoidable costs (trains, track and infrastructure), then Passenger Rail has only to pay avoidable costs to make money. What once was an accounting ploy by the railroads to show regulators how badly they needed to raise the rates became common practice and had everybody convinced that passengers were dragging freight down. (They were - but only because freight rates were regulated too heavily to make a profit from the combination of both freight and passenger service.)

Without regulation, passenger rates would also have risen with the economy. The railroad that wanted to lure pasengers from airlines and automobiles would have been free to hold the bargain-basement sale (at the expense of freight, which would have been paying its way in any case). Without regulation, freight would have been able to maintain its competitive edge with truck and barge, and been able to "do a deal" on rates where needed to snag the business. (As opposed to going to the government hat in hand to ask mother-may-I when a rate change seemed appropriate.)

In its own way, and with the help of the NIMBYs and environmentalists, Government still regulates the rails. Freight has been free to flow at market rates for decades, but building more infrastructure is a daunting task. So you won't see new rail routes blazed out of virgin territory any sooner than you will see new oil refineries in cities that never had them, or new oil rigs off the coast of California.

We are a nation of contortionists, my friends. Because we have been screwing ourselves for years.

©2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

What We Should Have Done - No. 1

The decline of the passenger train in the United States did not come as a shock to anyone.

Just as it should be obvious to anyone today that the passenger airliner is on the ropes, so it was clear in the early 1950s that Passenger Rail would not survive the private passenger auto. The precipitous drop in rail travel numbers after World War II should have engendered a national transportation policy that included saving the trains.

The National Defense Highway system, subsequently the Interstate Highway system, was first and foremost supposed to be a device to enhance national security. Yes, troops and equipment could move fast by rail, and had moved faster by rail during the war than they had ever before. But our Government foresaw that war materiel could move faster on a system of limited-access highways.

Instead, what our Government should have done was establish a national defense transportation policy - a policy whereby private citizens, commerce and industry, and Government and the military could be assured that, no matter what the disaster, all would have access to the transportation necessary to their needs.

While establishing a route system for the highways, the Government should have been identifying essential passenger routes for all modes of transport and weighing the cost benefits against what would happen if one or more of those modes became undesirable or unuseable for reason of some national emergency.

Instead our money went into a distinctly inferior system of highways that ultimately saddled us with spiraling maintenance costs and accelerating depreciation precisely BECAUSE we did not establish balanced and well-considered policy towards other modes of transport. And it did this while using public money to effectively cut many communities off from both motor commerce and passenger rail. (Count the number of communities that any Interstate bypasses by looping around them, and see how many of these still have Amtrak service.)

The unheeded and nonetheless inevitable decline in the railroads' passenger service during the next 15 years certainly was not headed off. And Amtrak, instead of being well-considered policy, was instead a political stopgap. What happened with the creation of Amtrak - saving a few routes for political and popular expediency - was nothing like what should have been done a decade or two before. It was an emergency measure that did ALL modes of passenger transport a disservice. To say nothing of what it did to We The People.

Next time, No. 2.

© 2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Bleak Future

Don Phillips is an internationally recognized authority on transportation. He writes a monthly piece in Trains Magazine, and he has a doozy in the current (August 2008) issue.

Whether or not he is right in blaming President Bush for the transportation policies of the past 8 years - and Congress is at least as responsible - you have to listen to the truths he tells.

Truth No. 1 - U.S. transportation policy is a mess. We would go one step further and say we have none, but we guess that maintaining the status quo with a minimum of funding and no new taxes is policy. Unfortunately, the status quo just won't cut it. Highways are just about at the breaking point, the air traffic system is as archaic as the California Zephyr was when the first jet passenger aircraft were in diapers, and we need all the intercity rail routes we have just to move freight. In fact, there are some parts of the country where starting up Commuter Rail to take cars off the roads will just put trucks on the roads in their places. It is just that bad.

Truth No. 2 - The public is in the dark as to transportation policy and transportation options. We are not talking about deciding whether to fly or drive - we are talking about whether we will have the option of getting there at all. The public sees rail transportation as an anachronism. We can see that in some of the responses we get to our blog. The public is not disturbed by the lack of options until the public is stuck in truck traffic on the way to an important meeting. The public sensitivity is so dulled by the continual squandering of tax money that it doesn't give a fig any more.

Truth No. 3 - Our leaders, the President, Congress, and state governments, would just as soon keep it that way. That's because if the public knew of the options and opportunities for a first-class transportation system that have been passed by - by elected officials more concerned about their re-elections than about the Re-public - then we, the people, would probably throw the whole lot of 'em out and start over.

Truth No. 4 - Nothing will get better if we ignore it. The way Mister Trains sees it: Fuel prices will level out or continue to rise, but they won't fall significantly and will never again drop to as low a percentage of costs for goods and services as they once were. We are beyond the break point, and some transportation companies, particularly those with no hedge on energy costs and with customers who cannot withstand any significant increase in fuel surcharges, will have to merge or quit business. That is true across the board, and we have already seen the bankruptcies in the air transport business. Any failure in one mode will put more pressure on another, and hence more costs through excess loading, wear-and-tear, and penalties on missed deliveries.

The cascade of chaos is awesome to contemplate. Eventually, we can see a few truck lines carrying on over highways to which we cannot devote any money because use taxes have dropped. We can see trains parked in sidings for days or weeks waiting for capacity. If that happens, you will see empty shelves in all retail establishments, even Walmart. We can see air traffic cut to a half or a third of what it is today. We can see Amtrak unable to get a train from one city to another because of the congestion. And we can see idle commuter trains in idle terminals, because half the work force that needed them won't have jobs. This one could make the Great Depression look like a cakewalk.

Our Enemies - and they are Legion - are licking their chops.

Bleak? Yes! Possible to turn around? Maybe. Don Phillips doesn't think so, and he has a lot more credentials than Mister Trains.

The scariest part of all is this: Not one average Joe or Jill who reads this has a clue what opportunities have been missed - what could or should have prevented this Bleak Future.

Down the road, we will attempt to tell you, if the First Amendment holds out that long.

©2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Or Maybe Nader

Please. Just navigate to this link: http://www.counterpunch.org/nader06252008.html

This pretty much says most of it. And we agree that the candidates for all offices should be debating this with just as much concern as they are debating any other issue.

©2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Minneapolis to Duluth An HSR Experiment Worth Watching

When contrasted with other High Speed Rail corridors in the Upper Midwest, this is a short one. About 150 miles as opposed to over 200 for the next shortest (Chicago - Detroit). It's also one that has to traverse many fewer miles of urban rail wasteland.

Chicago to Detroit has about 100 miles of such wasteland, Chicago to St. Louis considerably less, although the corridor is almost 300 miles. St. Louis to Kansas City is comparable in wasteland but over 270 miles.

Now that municipalities, both suburban and rural, along the Minneapolis to Duluth routing are being heard, it is possible that this corridor will become the first to accomodate both HSR and Commuter Rail on the same right-of-way. Perhaps - with good signalling - on the same tracks.

The high price of motor fuel demands this kind of experiment, as does the general greening of public policy whether one believes in man-made global warming or not. (We don't.)

If any of you have ever watched the scoots on their three-track speedway west of Chicago on what was once the Burlington Route (CB&Q, then Burlington Northern and now BNSF Railway) with commuter trains run by Chicago's Metra, even with CTC from the 1930s, then you can believe that this can be done with the right number of tracks and the right investment in signals.

And certainly we have come a long, long way from the CTC of seven decades ago as well as with the extra control that can be had on diesel-electric locomotives with microprocessors and computers - and the newest potential: electro-pneumatic braking instead of all pneumatics. (A boon for longer freight traffic, but also allowing longer controllable commuter trains.)

And a 150-mile route is just the right percentage of long-distance for economical HSR versus slow-speed routing for conflicting trains. If a viable system could be developed for this routing, it could be expanded to apply to just about any one where either the HSR or the low-speed rail wasteland percentages are higher.

We would hope the government, developers, researchers, and manufacturers recognize this as a golden opportunity to carpe the diem.

We can always hope.

© 2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Amtrak Budget: Is the Glass Half Full, or Just Half Cracked?

If it is the objective of Congress to thumb it's collective snotty nose at the taxpayer in general and at Amtrak in particular, then the pathetic Amtrak appropriation just passed by the House is a measure of success.

$14.9 billion for Amtrak for FIVE fiscal years 2009 thru 2013.

At the very same time, The Associated Press is reporting just about $14 billion in earmarks (called Pork) going to Members' districts in just ONE year. And, if the AP is just half right, that means that about $700 million is going into the pockets of lobbyists for the district and/or organization - read political contributors - that pushed for the earmark. (The AP is guessing about 10%, so conservatively, 5% isn't any stretch at all.)

And supporters of the Amtrak appropriation had to beat back amendments that would have gutted and hamstrung any Amtrak management efforts at improvements.

Let us pray, for remember, with Congress, it's never too late to screw things up.

© 2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

We Can Say It Now

The primaries are over and it is going to be, by God's grace forbidding any disaster, Barack Obama vs. John McCain.

If we were to vote today and base our vote solely on the political history of the two candidates, we are afraid - very afraid - we would have to vote Democrat!

Mister Trains has always had a habit of voting for the best man, so we are not convinced that Mr. Obama is the best man overall, just the best for Passenger Rail.

If you check out this blog: http://trains4america.wordpress.com/2008/05/03/obama-talks-up-high-speed-rail-amtrak/
You will understand that Mr. Obama has at least a rudimentary understanding of HSR and of why trains are more fuel efficient - greener if you will - than other modes of passenger transport.

Mr. McCain has a history of criticizing Amtrak, and has said at least once that a priority for him would be shutting it down. Does anyone doubt on this date, with oil jumping up $10 in one day and gas prices well over $4 in may parts of the country, that shutting down Amtrak would be a catastrophe from which our domestic transport system would not recover?

Yes, Mr. McCain was in a legislative position in which he had to see the worst of Amtrak's failures, but no, Mr. McCain, that is not the solution to this problem. Only if we follow the current trend and gradually move Passenger Rail back into the private sector will anything like this work. McCain's motto: Millions for highways but not a penny for Amtrak.

We are going to listen hard to both candidates for the next five months. We of course won't be able to avoid it and we will be praying for ear plugs by that time. But somewhere in those words is going to be the only hope of Passenger Rail, and by God if it is Obama then so be it.

© 2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Passenger Rail and The Directionally Challenged

A large part of the job of any CSR working for a passenger transportation company - be it airline, rail or bus - is getting people to and from the terminal. People will get on the 800 number and use it like a free GPS to get directions.

It gave us the idea that Amtrak, in addition to publishing system timetables and train-specific timetables, should publish timetables that include every U.S. municipality. Not that Amtrak will probably ever serve every city, even with bus service. But in today's computer-driven age, there is no reason not to be able to publish your time from say Skokie, IL, to Union Station, Chicago, by car. And then at the other end by whatever means to whatever municipality. Sure this would take a huge book if published on paper. But on the Web, it would be child's play to design pages that would give the consumer this timetable.

This way a customer not only gets some idea of how long the total trip will take, but the customer also gets a sort of guide. Coupled with system maps, this should be an attractive draw for customers. We know there are many potential Amtrak riders that shy away from riding the train for the very reason that they do not know how to plan the non-Amtrak ends.

More specifically, in the Skokie example, the timetable could give the time at Skokie, representing the time the Skokie-ite had to leave home. Then perhaps the time at Lawrence Avenue, Chicago, and the Edens Expressway, maybe the time to park the car in some long-term facility. At the other end, a time would be shown for the transfer say from Oakland Jack London to a San Jose bound train, and then add the California train schedule with maybe time for cousin Joe to drive you from San Jose to his home.

Yes, some travel agents do this now, but only with the parts where you buy travel. If you are driving yourself, you are on your own to figure times.

Maybe this is already being done somewhere, and if it is, we would like to see Amtrak pick up on it and figure out how to do it with their own schedules.

© 2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

When Will It Hit Them?

"It" being the train, that is. And by "Them" I refer to the entire United States Government, all branches and all agencies, and all state governments. Them Politicians.

It has already hit the general public and, to some extent, private enterprise. Consistently, the railroad press and the general media carry more stories about Passenger Rail than they did just five years ago. And they are all positive – for Passenger Rail.

The media attention is in a few distinct categories, but it all shows that the general public is either becoming more aware of Passenger Rail alternatives or being pressed to do so by keen observers. The categories:

News stories of startups of new passenger service, both Amtrak and privately run.

News stories about groups that advocate Passenger Rail improvements including the institution of new lines.

Editorials advocating improvements or new lines.

Opinion pieces stating what a bunch of transportation dunderheads we have in our governments. Them Politicians.

Meanwhile, back on The Hill, Congress continues its obstructive tactics to marginalize Amtrak and snatch as much money as possible for highways and air transport.

A local buffet restaurant once placed television advertising that suggested potential customers’ ignorance of the goodness of their product by smacking them in the face with a heavy frying pan and then having the question “When will it hit you?” running over the still-ringing gong of the frying pan. Well, when the hell will it hit the government? Them Politicians.

The way we see it, government must do several things, among which are:

Fund Amtrak in an enlightened and non-politicized way. That means realistic spending on new and improved equipment and services.

Continue and increase subsidies for increased service by private carriers. Include short lines in the bidding process and don’t prohibit startups from participating.

Stop the process of hamstringing railroads with re-regulation. Possibly the only reason private rail is healthy today is the de-regulation that occurred almost three decades ago. If the so-called re-regulation takes place, limiting rate-making and abolishing the anti-trust exemption for railroads, it will take another quarter century to kill them off. So look at another fifty years before we get back to what we have today - if the politicians have anything to say about it. Unfortunately, they do.

Wise up when it comes to implementing un-realistic risk management. No mode of transport is perfectly safe.

Educate the public that Passenger Rail does not make money up front. It is a necessary public service that helps everybody else make money, increases commerce, and improves government bottom line with a rising economy.

Stop listening to the tree-huggers and NIMBYs and let Passenger Rail be the green source of transport it has always been. It is ironic that the same person who doesn’t want a train running past the house won’t complain when the same number of folks drive by in heavy-polluting SUVs.

When will it hit them?

© 2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com

Transportation and Oil

Both are in crisis. Both are controversial. And in both cases, the United States Government is to stupid to see it.

These two crises are one - in more ways than one.

Both have been precipitated by long years of public and governmental complacency and by the inability of private sector businesses to see beyond the current quarter and the bottom line. Both are fed by the lack of public imagination of our politicians and by the ability of special interest groups to influence public policy.

Case one: Much of our government and most of the public doesn't think there is a transporation crisis or an oil crisis. They think of it more in terms of high prices and/or lack of service. They believe that the businesses that provide product or service can remedy any problems by not overcharging the public.

Case two: Controversy over the place for Passenger Rail in our society hasn't stopped for one second since private Passenger Rail fell in the late 60s. About the same time, controversy over whether we should be getting oil from our own shores began.

Case three: The public does not see and crisis unless it is presented as such by the media. Ditto for the government. Government and legislation chases problems that are in the news, not those that never make the front page or Nightline.

Case four: Investing in both transportation and oil production or refining right now is a risky business. The bottom line is months (many quarters) if not years away. The pension funds and the trust funds that control the equity won't stand for it.

Case five: If you can't think of an easy fix for the problem, oil or transportation, then no fix is better than a partial one. We can ride it out until a good fix comes along. This is foolhardy and won't work.

Case six: Fixes are going to cost money, and they won't come about if railroads (read Amtrak), airlines and oil companies just lower their prices. They are already all disincentivized by government, and loss of profit motive removes even more incentives for innovation.

Case seven: Environmental activists have done wonders for us since the 1970s. Think DDT and detergents in the waterways. But many if not most are now over the edge and looking for a cause that hasn't been tackled. Most of the causes are minor ones, at best, and don't require the heavy-handed approach that the major ones did. They need to pull back from both oil and transportation projects so we can actually get something done in this country. Dubai wouldn't be as spectacular if they had environmentalists to tell them they couldn't transform the pristine desert environs.

Just a few thoughts. We will shut up now.

©2008 - C. A. Turek - mistertrains@gmail.com