Actually, Ed, I think Fed Matching Funds tend to be 80/20, not 90/10. At least, on a local rail project this is what our county Land Use Dept are saying.
I understand your qualms about “the strings”. And these should be reduced. But it IS a system that, by and large, does work. I can be pragmatic and live with the 10% of ridiculousness that comes along with it.
Besides there is something to be said for a central coordination for rail, as few systems would be wholly contained within one state. Better that Fed does it than that we create a new suprastate organization and another layer of gov.
Actually a more accurate way of phrasing your example would be that Amtrak (or any other carrier) would pay a Diesel Fuel Tax (or a kilowatt tax for electric systems) which would go to the Fed. This would, of course, be passed on to the consumer in his ticket.
Does the FRA not provide some construction standards as it is? Or is this voluntary through AAR? Or can you, as a RR, build anything you want, and if it doesn’t work, it’s your problem?
The real question still remains.Why are they still throwing money away on Amtrak? Amtrak has lost money since 1971.Surely they still don’t believe the big lie of 1971! In 31 years Amtark has noting but lose money hand over fist,why keep throwing good money after bad? Why should we spend ANY money on a system that will never make a profit.
Kind of silly isn’t it? But,then we are talking about capitol hill and their foolish spending habits.
If we put Amtrak on par with, say, Greyhound, then we have to take the infrastructure costs out of the equation, and figure only maintenance and operational expenses.
Operationally, it is alleged that the NEC trains are mostly profitable or break-even.
There is some question on how the Acela books are, and whether or not they’ve been “cooked”. My instinct would be that they have been, as it is a new program and invariable the accounting on a new program is skewed towards “optimistic”. However, it is not unreasonable to say that it may be approaching break-even status.
In this case, teh scenario would be for the state governments to fund those trains which do not meet the operational costs. Note that
Gunn recently conceded the idea that “there needs to be some cost recovery formula” (para) equating that there would be a level of cost recovery which would be fixed, so that any train below that would go, and any above would keep operating.
Not the same as profitable or even break-even, but a step forward all the same.
Did you read the poll? Some 70 percent of the American people want Amtrak! Under your argument people in Texas should oppose the construction of federally funded highways in Hawaii.
It was the same in Highland Park, the richest inner suburb of Dallas. DART elections passed easily in Highland Park. Why? While the people of Highland Park do not ride a bus, or light rail, they are usually driving around in their Jaguars, Mercedes, and Rolls, their household help do. Since most of their household help have chunkers of automobiles, no one in Highland Park wants their household help to drive and park their chunkers in their neighborhoods. Better, they ridea nice new bus…preferrably burnin liguidified gas than diesel…
Yes I know that the current match is 80/20 but I believe it was 90/10 in the beginning and later scaled back to 80/20. Even now the 90/10 ratio is used on some projects. The problem I have is that it is a massive leverage from the Federal Government, but they are only giving us our own money back. If the ratio were changed to 50/50, it wouldn’t cost the consumer any more because they would only have to change who gets the tax revenues at the pump. It all comes from gas taxes. The exact ratio of Fed/State appropriations is only a detail which may be negotiated.
The reason I used a tax per mile in my example is because if you tax the fuel per gallon you will either have to charge a super high rate per gallon by comparrison to the highway gas tax, or you will only raise a tiny sum of money and won’t be able to build enough R/W to make progress.
I am pretty sure there are required standards for geometric design of railroads already, but I think new standards would be needed for the new Amtrak system since there is such support for the new highspeed corridors.
I would expect that a railroad could build anything they wanted but if they don’t adhear to the standards the engineer would be liable for injuries to the public. No engineer is going to accept that liability so they are going to design to the standard.
You do realize that acceptance of the highway model I have outlined would mean the user accepts the full cost of the system? - Ed
I try to overlook grammer errors in order to figure out what somebody is proposing in their posts, but in this case, I need clarification. Could you restate this thought?
“While the people of Highland Park do not ride a bus, or light rail, they are usually driving around in their Jaguars, Mercedes, and Rolls, their household help do.”
Please understand that my thesis is simply that we can do more on the local level than the federal government can do on the national level. Under my proposal, Hawaii would get to keep all the taxes collected at the pump and they could use it all to build roads in Hawaii. Texas would get to keep all the taxes collected at the pump and they could use it all to build roads in Texas. Both Hawaii and Texas would have more money to build roads (or charge lower taxes) because they would not be paying federal government overhead.
Your question is almost beneath a response. As you are aware, the Federal government is required to provide defense and police. The others are negotiable. If a poll indicated that 55 percent of Americans were in favor of rape, would that be sufficient grounds to remove the legal barriers?
I’m with you concerning the federal government throwing away my money. I believe the best way to illustrate the folly is to have the users accept the full cost. Then they would be outraged at Amtrak throwing away their money.
This would in turn inspire Amtrak to real reforms or they would fold. This is as it should be. - Ed
Do you honestly believe AMT can run at a profit?Think about the commuter trains,which are run with reduced crews,no amenities,packed to capacity.They are subsidized through taxes because they can’t run at a profit.The decison this country has to make is either to give AMT the funds it needs,and not just enough to keep it running year to year,or put it out of its misery.
What else would you do to make AMT profitable besides make it a privitly run RR?Do away with union contract labor?Make the tickets so expensive that no one could afford to buy one? Just curious.Even the European passenger RR’s are subsidized by thier countries,and we’re talking about countries the size of most western states.
If our people want the trains to run…it should be funded and quit ringing our hands about spending a little money for having the service.
Making a profit is as we all know a pipe dream…Running Amtrak passenger trains is not the end of the world…First revamp the wrongs and I believe we have a Gen. Mgr. now who knows how to do so…and get on with the program. Maybe in the near future High Speed Rail will start to get a foot hold and we can start to morph the system into something to really do the job…
QM Exactly!!! Either give it the money it needs and not band-aide approaches like has gone on for 32 yrs,or we shoot it and put it out of its misery.Running a nation-wide rail passenger system at a profit is a pipe dream that will never happen.
Yes, i understand that the consequence of the “Highway Model” means user pays. Fine by me!
But i beleive that the early system would probably have to be bonded, as there is no “nest egg” to start with, and an IPO just aint gonna happen.
Boy, you sure have started another killer thread with this one. What, trying to beat my record with the “Passenger Trains” thread? I think it was the all time record holder for longest thread.
Surely the next sentence would clear up the matter: Since most of their household help have chunkers for automobiles, no one in Highland Park wants their household help to drive and park their chunkers in their neighborhoods.
The average Highland Park home lists for over one million dollars. It is not a place where you would see any car of 1977 vintage rusting away…parked in front of any mansion or any mansion’s drive way…
As for government overhead, the increased burden to the states of collecting and counting the federal gasoline tax would be the same as it is for the federal government.
Under your proposal Texas and Hawaii would probably do well, however, some states would not do so well, such as Montana, Wyoming, South Dakota, and North Dakota. I am sure this list is longer, but it is painfully obvious that these 4 large states with very small population would be hurt . Truckers traveling on I-94, I-90, and I-80 might have a dirt road to get to the west coast instead of a paved interstate…
Thanks for clearing that up for me. I don’t have household help so the whole idea was a bit foreign to me.
Yes, I agree that some states get a good deal from the federal program. In the industry, we call those states ‘benificiary states’ and some states are called ‘donner states.’
Yea, this is one area where the trucks get a major leg up. Trucks benefit most from the interstates out west in the ‘big rectangles’. This is another reason I think the federal program needs to be scaled back to a maintanence role. In my opinion the states should take over the lead in new construction. But I digress . . .
If a locality like Highland park wants to buy a program to bring their hired help to the house, I guess that is OK. But I don’t want a federal program to take domestics to work. I am still having trouble with the incredible elitest nature of that issue.