Join the discussion on the following article:
Amtrak seeks more capital investment, less operating support in fiscal year 2014
mica like all short sighted repub/baggers has no problem spending everyday on a bloated, imperial military what Amtrak wants and deserves for one year. The $3 back for every $1 spent for infrastructure since 2010 should be noted by the socialism nut cases also.
Hope they succeed. They certainly need to make capital expenditures.
Germany’s DB carried an average of 5.4 million passengers per day within Germany on their 25,000+ daily train departures on at 35,000km system with 5600+ stations (>10x more than Amtrak) and 2 million on their buses (presumably much on the autobahn) according to DB’s annual report. Is this low demand for a population of 80 million people? Do 5600+ destinations constitute not going to places where people want to go ( a stop every 6km on the system!)
The point is that Germany has a balanced transport network. Who imagines that highways are indispensable? No one with half a mind. On the contrary is is obvious that roads are not the only solution to transportation. Given the costs of running a vehicle, traffic congestion, pollution from emissions and the eventual need to ween ourselves from the internal combustion engine (yes oil will run out and in my opinion is too valuable a resource to burn) and move top superior electric propulsion. Trains provide efficient, comfortable and preferred mode of transport, Amtrak statistics support this trend despite their 19th century railroad operation.
Not one mode of transportation does not suck up a lot of government subsidy. If we all paid the real costs of travel there would be a lot of screaming, wailing and gnashing of teeth. This is without the unknown costs of to our environment from greenhouse gas emissions.
In closing, it would be great if we could have some good fact based discussion in this forum, rather than being a sounding board,on the part of some individuals, acting as a “banner repeater” for some specific political “home signal.”
Germany’s DB carried an average of 5.4 million passengers per day within Germany on their 25,000+ daily train departures on at 35,000km system with 5600+ stations (>10x more than Amtrak) and 2 million on their buses (presumably much on the autobahn) according to DB’s annual report. Is this low demand for a population of 80 million people? Do 5600+ destinations constitute not going to places where people want to go ( a stop every 6km on the system!)
The point is that Germany has a balanced transport network. Who imagines that highways are indispensable? No one with half a mind. On the contrary is is obvious that roads are not the only solution to transportation. Given the costs of running a vehicle, traffic congestion, pollution from emissions and the eventual need to ween ourselves from the internal combustion engine (yes oil will run out and in my opinion is too valuable a resource to burn) and move top superior electric propulsion. Trains provide efficient, comfortable and preferred mode of transport, Amtrak statistics support this trend despite their 19th century railroad operation.
Not one mode of transportation does not suck up a lot of government subsidy. If we all paid the real costs of travel there would be a lot of screaming, wailing and gnashing of teeth. This is without the unknown costs of to our environment from greenhouse gas emissions.
In closing, it would be great if we could have some good fact based discussion in this forum, rather than being a sounding board,on the part of some individuals, acting as a “banner repeater” for some specific political “home signal.”
@ Guse: it’s obvious that you have never been to Germany because you have no knowedge about Germany’s ICE or the autobahn. I have been to Germany twice, in the last 7 years, and have ridden the ICE and autobahn extensively. The ICE has fast routes to all major German cities. And the trains are scheduled, hour on the hour. The autobahn, on the other hand, is clogged with congestion and traffic jams, mostly from big trucks. Germany, and other western European countries, don’t have extensive intermodel container trains, like we have here in the US. So Guse, travel to Germany, get the facts, and then we’ll talk!!!
In the quest for lively debate, we’ve had some “drive-by shootings” and “shotgun blasts”, so I’d like to toss in a grenade or two.
I don’t agree that Democrats are good for passenger trains and Republicans are bad. Read Don Phillips column in Feb 2013 TRAINS. Obama has used the passenger train as a talking point or to spread money (examples: California to buy passenger cars and Illinois to buy locomotives). Republicans have made good things happen to the passenger train (examples: Reistrup, Claytor, Gunn, and Kummant were Republican appointees, and Virginia under Republican leadership has expanded passenger service).
I also don’t agree that to be pro-passenger train means you must be pro-Amtrak. Rep Mica is right if he is saying Amtrak isn’t the only way to run passenger trains. It may be the only way to operate a long-distance inter-regional national network vice a regional or intra-state, e.g., NEC, Midwest, or North Carolina, service. I believe the jury is still out on that one.
Finally, as a retired member of the “bloated, imperial military” (Colonel, U.S. Army Transportation Corps), having a national all-weather rail passenger network may be consistent with the national government’s responsibility to “provide for the common defense.” Our government has made many
“internal” improvements, e.g., canals, lighthouses, and roads, over the years to support national defense that alse served to “promote the general welfare” of our country. Today we have the Interstate system and the Strategic Rail Corridor Network (STRACNET). Perhaps it’s is time look at the national rail passenger network as a resource to meet strategic mobility requirements.
In the quest for lively debate, we’ve had some “drive-by shootings” and “shotgun blasts”, so I’d like to toss in a grenade or two.
I don’t agree that Democrats are good for passenger trains and Republicans are bad. Read Don Phillips column in Feb 2013 TRAINS. Obama has used the passenger train as a talking point or to spread money (examples: California to buy passenger cars and Illinois to buy locomotives). Republicans have made good things happen to the passenger train (examples: Reistrup, Claytor, Gunn, and Kummant were Republican appointees, and Virginia under Republican leadership has expanded passenger service).
I also don’t agree that to be pro-passenger train means you must be pro-Amtrak. Rep Mica is right if he is saying Amtrak isn’t the only way to run passenger trains. It may be the only way to operate a long-distance inter-regional national network vice a regional or intra-state, e.g., NEC, Midwest, or North Carolina, service. I believe the jury is still out on that one.
Finally, as a retired member of the “bloated, imperial military” (Colonel, U.S. Army Transportation Corps), having a national all-weather rail passenger network may be consistent with the national government’s responsibility to “provide for the common defense.” Our government has made many
“internal” improvements, e.g., canals, lighthouses, and roads, over the years to support national defense that alse served to “promote the general welfare” of our country. Today we have the Interstate system and the Strategic Rail Corridor Network (STRACNET). Perhaps it’s is time look at the national rail passenger network as a resource to meet strategic mobility requirements.
In the quest for lively debate, we’ve had some “drive-by shootings” and “shotgun blasts”, so I’d like to toss in a grenade or two.
I don’t agree that Democrats are good for passenger trains and Republicans are bad. Read Don Phillips column in Feb 2013 TRAINS. Obama has used the passenger train as a talking point or to spread money (examples: California to buy passenger cars and Illinois to buy locomotives). Republicans have made good things happen to the passenger train (examples: Reistrup, Claytor, Gunn, and Kummant were Republican appointees, and Virginia under Republican leadership has expanded passenger service).
I also don’t agree that to be pro-passenger train means you must be pro-Amtrak. Rep Mica is right if he is saying Amtrak isn’t the only way to run passenger trains. It may be the only way to operate a long-distance inter-regional national network vice a regional or intra-state, e.g., NEC, Midwest, or North Carolina, service. I believe the jury is still out on that one.
Finally, as a retired member of the “bloated, imperial military” (Colonel, U.S. Army Transportation Corps), having a national all-weather rail passenger network may be consistent with the national government’s responsibility to “provide for the common defense.” Our government has made many
“internal” improvements, e.g., canals, lighthouses, and roads, over the years to support national defense that alse served to “promote the general welfare” of our country. Today we have the Interstate system and the Strategic Rail Corridor Network (STRACNET). Perhaps it’s is time look at the national rail passenger network as a resource to meet strategic mobility requirements.
If Amtrak is going to spend more on capital improvements, I sure hope they go for more rolling stock. It’s been a chronic shortage for them going back to the late 1970’s when the Superliner I car order was cut as part of the deal to settle the Pullman/Standard strike. Amtrak also never exercised an option they had on the Superliner II’s. both of the superliner car order cutbacks have resulted in lower equipemnt capacity on the exisiting trains, and meant cutbacks on other long-distance routes including the North Coast Hiawatha, the Lone Star, the Floridian, the Desert Wind, and the Pioneer. All 5 of these trains might still be running now if the car orders were not cut, but politics got in the way, and I see plenty of fault on both sides of the aisle.
Among those of us who don’t have gold plating on the lug nuts of all four of our Ferrari’s wheels, are comrades who try to find the meaning of Mica’s definition of Amtrak as a "Soviet-style passenger rail system.
Recovered 88% of its operating cost…
Need: in 1958, now legal to drive in a city of over-a-million people, tried a couple of driving sorties from our Long Island homeland to Manhatten which was 35 minutes away on the “Route of the Dashing Commuter,” the LIRR.
Gonna buy a pro-level slide-rule with fellow college freshman, best-bud, and we, in mid-morning traffic, emerged from the tunnel under the East (or North) River; take your pick. Then spent about 25 minutes trying to find a parking space, after we did we still had a long walk.
The LIRR, a subway ride, and a football-field-sized walk to the store determined to be best supplier…saved 30 minutes.
Mica deprives U.S. (us) from the rail’ and public transportation because it is a “Soviet style transporta…”
Can Mica say that all or most or some of his experiences when driving or being driven in an automotive, aeronautical or nautical mode find the arrogance to say ""Soviet style…it certainly has “Commy Pinko-McCarthy…” era implications.
And, “only in America” (I guess he’s talking about the United States) are there politicians who think mass transportation can be run without subsidies.
If Amtrak is making $3 for every $1 the government is pumping into it, when is it time to stop priming the pump and let Amtrak finance itself? In the private sector, making $3 on every $1 invested is mega-profit of the most evil proportions and usually results in new socialist schemes to tax the daylights out of the private sector. According to socialists, the priming never stops as long as the scheme is socialist. In fact, it only gets more intense.
As for the rest of the socialist world, last I heard, they are on the fast track to where Cyprus is now. Much is due to extravagant government spending on socialist projects that need constant infusions of money. Such as so-called high speed rail. If high speed rail is so great, then why do Germans use the Autobahn and drive their privately owned cars really fast? Possibly because trains don’t go where most people need to go and when they need to be there?
Like all socialists, Boardman is really good at doctoring up the numbers for the desired effect. But terrible when it comes to dealing with economic reality.
CEO Joe Board man is among the things to happen Amtrak as well as a pro-rail White House. Meanwhile, Rep. John Mica is the Grinch opposing support for passenger trains. As the song goes, “You’re a mean one, Mr. Grinch…”
At least the mean and nasty old Soviet Union got one thing right. Maybe Rep. Mica could try and get something right, too.
Mica is apparently not aware of the Russian high speed line between Moscow and St. Petersburg, the acquisition of hundreds of new passenger cars for intercity and commuter services, new DMUs and new EMUs, and Talgos for service to the Ukraine, Poland and Germany. It is certainly not the railway that the Soviets operated and is clearly getting better and better all the time. And there is lots of progress in other former USSR republics: Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Ubekistan and others.
Let’s support passenger rail to the extent we support roads. The other option is to remove all transportation subsidies. Our government nerds to stop treating passenger rail as the stepchild.
I thought John Mica was suppose to step down. Apparently, he won’t go until he does his dirty work. We must deprive this jerk by forcibly removing him. Hey Micky Mica; Time to go!!
I have been a very active and vocal objector to Rep. John Mica. I have called his office, sent him letters (which go unanswered), When you call his either of his offices and you are directed to one of his pages…you are politely told that Sen Mica is not interested in public opinions regarding his performance, comments, nor opionions on the transportation committee.
Jeffrey, sounds like a perfect description of our highway and airway network. Ever wonder who pays for Air Traffic Controllers? Why would any air control towers be closing under sequester if private planes where paying their way?
Then again, how can we maintain and let alone expand the highway networks if the Federal Gas Tax hasn’t been raised since 1993, coming on twenty years. Have you gone twenty years living on the same income? Not too mention the fact that gasoline consumption has actually decreased by over a million gallons a day since peak usage in 2007.
Your thoughts are simplistic, this county has expanded, grown and succeeded with Federal investment in infrastructure.