I never thought I would start an Amtrak topic but…I was wondering what trains would come off in California if Amtrak lost its battle. I know California has a financial stake in the corridor trains, so would they keep the San Joaquins(Bakersfield), Capitols and Pacific Surfliners? I know we’ll loose the Zepher,Starlight,Chief & Sunset.
Amtrak is one of better passenger railroads and. It would be sad if they lost the battle but would be just as worse for any other state to not just for.California it would just be just as worse for wisconsin to because we would lose the hiwatha line that runs from
Milwaukee to chiacgo.
I was under the impression that Mr. Gunn would shut the whole Amtrak system down… All of it…
Ya know I read, now I’m not sure if it was in the Philadelphia Inquirer or an issue of Trains Magizine, that if Amtrak was broken up individual states would have to pay for the the upkeep of infastructure and trains in their state and provide passenger service in their state w/ connections to other states. Then I read that the Northeast Corridor would be still owned by the federal government and will continue it’s normal opperation, since it’s the heart and soul of Amtrak. I personally don’t think this is the best solution because, what if you get a state that doesn’t want to pay. Will the federal governement then step in and say that evey state has to pay it’s the law?? What happens if a passenger got on the train in a different state, and wanted to go to a state that didn’t pay?? That could be really interesting and could cause a lot of contraversy.
Every state except Mass Conn Rhode Island New York New Jersey Pennsylvania Delaware Maryland (Washington DC) and Virginia would lose passenger serive. I would also add california and illinois for not losing service.
You would still see the Zephyr to Reno under Amtrak CA they are in the planning stages of adding a couple Capitals all the way to Reno per day. So I doubt that they would kill of the Zephyr compeltely. I bet they would also just extend the Surfliners north to San Jose where they could connect with the Capitols. And I am hearing that Caltrans is planning on adding a commuter line from Redding to Sacramento as well. So you would have most of those routes covered in CA. Who knows if CA and Oregon would work out a Deal to get the Starlight to Eugene, but from Eugene to Seattle.
Brad
Amtrak California (the Capitols, San Joaquins, and Pacific Surfliners) as I understand are fully funded by the State of California. I agree with goduckies that if Amtrak were to flatline, then California might do things like extend the Surfliners north or extend the Capitols outward to Reno.
The problem in any Amtrak bankruptcy is that who runs the 403(b) trains? The various states contract with Amtrak to run that service. If Amtrak is gone as a corporation, then the States would have to form their own and take over maintenance. In essence, it would be May 1971 all over again on a state level.
The House did apparenty vote to restore 1.2 billion of funding today–.6 billion less than what Amtrak needs. So hopefully we’ve not seen the last of the CZ. No matter how many try to kill it, it keeps coming back 
I can live with that subsidy, make the North East states pay for the upgrades on the NEC, since most of the use is for their commuter rails anyways!
Brad
So most likely California will keep running the short dx trains?
that would be my guess, since there is tremendous ridership for all of the routes, I think they will be fine.
Brad
Maybe VIA Rail will buy the long distance stuff and operate passenger trains in the U.S like seeing CN invade the U.S in freight trains.
Forget about China taking over the U.S; Canada is marching in…[(-D][(-D][:-,]
Canada is marching in…Now there is a threat…Come on, on a good day our salvation army could kick your a$$.[(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D]
Just kidding…
Not if we did a study first. A good Royal Commision study and we will see. No one does studies better then us. Then we might do another study.[swg][swg]