I seem to recall that the UP has now almost finished restoring the former CNW double-track mainline in Iowa. And then there is the former IC north- south mainline. There probably are others.
But it was not a mistake to rip up the C&NW’s second main track! It was not needed and the cost of trying to maintain it exceeded the cost of restoring it. As for the IC north-south main line, who is saying it needs to have the second main track restored?
Go back to your original statement where you said there are main lines and double-track we tore up we wish we had now (and presumably cannot recover without excess cost we could have avoided). How about telling me who is doing the wishing, because if they work for a railroad I do not know who they are. Other than the aforementioned NEC and some terminal trackage, that is.
RWM
I hear what you’re saying, but there is a whole group of people that believe that trucks do more damage to highways than what they pay to use them. The truth, I think, is that neither cars or trucks pay their fair share of what a highway costs to build and maintain.
I might have to go digging, but somewhere (a GAO study? DOT?) i recently read that heavy trucks pay about 80% of their share of interstate highway usage.
I do have a 8 1/2 x 11 drawing of rail car with 24 degree pivot that I sent to Trailer Train in 1991
and a layout for a possible Terminal that is a larger print. These were just my conceptual drawings when I started this study. I also have the one page comment from Trailer Train.
Same logic could have applied to railroads. I think the only difference was that roads and waterways were well established early in the country’s history. Real railroad building came along later after the industrial revolution was well underway. There is nothing fundamental about a road the makes it a “public good” any more than there is something about a railroad that keeps it from being a “public good”.
Except that such differential/ disparate/ ‘discriminatory treatment’ is already being done, and has been for many years. From the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission’s Toll Schedule Effective January 4, 2009, at:
http://www.paturnpike.com/toll/images/pdfs/PTC%202009%20Cash%20Tolls%20BW%20Booklet.pdf
*When using the Pennsylvania Turnpike and Turnpike Extensions, your toll may be based on number of axles, vehicle weight, or both. See the guide below for Vehicle Class information.*rmation
It was more of a rhetorical question than a real one, so I didn’t take a lot of time or space to set out all the details. Also, it was for the ‘‘Be careful what you wish for’’ strategic aspect - do we really want a private road network established to carry the trucks that compete with railroads, even for the legitimate reason of forcing them to pay more of their true costs ?
And, to get the reader to your 2. on a ‘Yes, but . . .’ analysis - I q
Not a Chicago native. Grew up in a small town in downstate Illinois. Antioch has almost as many people as the county I grew up in. I came to the Chicago area to go to grad school at Northwestern 35 years ago when I got out of the Army. Wound up staying here. Didn’t always live around Antioch.
I pay two tolls per workday. Sometimes I pay three if I change my route home as I did this evening.
It is basically painless. I have this little white box stuck up by my rear view mirror $0.50 is deducted from my account when I exit and enter I-294. They just expanded 294 from three lanes to four in each direction. It’s made the commute much better. I’ll gladly fork over $5.00, sometimes a little more, per week for a nice uncongested drive. I sip coffee, listen to the radio, stay cool in summer and warm in winter. Move on my own schedule (with some imput from “The Company.”) When my account gets low they just put $40.00 on my Master Card and off I go.
It’s a limited access highway funded by tolls. As they all should be.
[quote user=“schlimm”]
You are telescoping several separate points. Highways were not constructed primarily for commercial truckers, but they benefit from them as though they were without paying the full price. This is simply a coincidental but natural consequence of the sensible notion that dates from the 1800’s: that the nation needs good roads from which everyone benefits. There really isn’t anything to do about this. Placing tolls on Interstates would force a burden (time, convenience, economic) on everyone merely to “Make Even” for trucks vs. rails. That would be as silly as following the logic of going the full route of putting tolls on all roads. Privatizing various areas of economic activity as a “one size fits all” answer to every problem suggests a misapplication of free market economics . You are also confounding over-regulation of the rails (or more accurately, regulation after its original purpose no longer was a factor) with economic costs.
greyhounds - A couple of succinct, well-written policy statements in your 2 posts above. Thank you ! [bow] The benefit from your unfortunately frequent practice and repetition is showing . . . [sigh] Would that the politicians would see and act on it that clearly. [V]
Any idea of what the 80,000 lb. truck would pay in tolls for the same distance as your 50 cents ?
“Perfection is not optimum.” [Copyright PDN 2009.]
Actually, the optimization that you describe is perfection - or pretty darn close, for the situation we have. What else would we want to do differently, or better ? And how ?
Thanks again.
- Paul North.
I don’t see how any of the Class 1s think of it the way you do, Greyhounds. Their public statements and visible actions are at odds with this ideology.
RWM
Recent FHWA study. I read it and thought the methodology was designed to try and get the result as close to 100% as possible.
RWM
[quote user=“Paul_D_North_Jr”]
It was more of a rhetorical question than a real one, so I didn’t take a lot of time or space to set out all the details. Also, it was for the ‘‘Be careful what you wish for’’ strategic aspect - do we really want a private road network established to carry the trucks that compete with railroads, even for the legitimate reason of forcing them to pay more of their true costs ?
And, to get the reader to your 2. on a ‘Yes, but . . .’ analysis - I quite agree, that should be a ‘show-stopper’. It might also useful for esatablishing an upper bound for what rail rates could be - what the traffic will or might bear - before it would be feasible to turn to a fully-allocated costs highway method. But how many civil engineering projects have there been with all kinds of grandiose projections of the high traffic or user volumes and revenues, and low costs - that la
greyhounds: Since you have not demonstrated an understanding of externalities, there isn’t any point in continuing the discussion
RWM - For two rational and well-educated professionals that we are, I don’t understand why we so often seem to be miscommunicating - or are you being a ‘Devil’s advocate’ here, which is fine too ? Well, nevertheless, here I/ we go again -
I wrote that simply in response to oltmannd/ Don’s suggestion to privatize the highway network, so as to result in trucks paying more of their fair share of the costs. My initial point or concern with that is - What if that happens in a place where the trucks can cherry-pick high-rated traffic off the railroad ? Or - What happens if the truck toll rates are then set or rigged - whether by design or mistake - to be artificially low ? And of course the basic structural finance problem that the railroads have to pretty much raise and pay for their entire infrastructure investment ‘up front’ before a revenue wheel turns over any of it, whereas the trucks on a tollway can repay its investment cost on a more gradual and spread-out ‘pay-as-you-go’ basis. And so then there’s a new competitor on the bl
Paul: Between you and RWM I’m going to need a couple of large book staplers! I’ve been printing off both of your responses–just so that I can ‘edumicate’ myself on this topic—[:)]
I believe that not only all expressways, but all other public roads will become toll roads within a decade or less under a fully automated system, which will include standard tracking, pricing, and billing equipment in every car. Non-congestion will be rationed by price. The more you pay, the closer to the speed limit you can drive.
I heard that one type of “drive by wire”(?) method had even been considered a few years ago by at least one manufacturer with that in mind–as a tracking system. One would/could see a set of alternatives being made—but still paying a set fee based on distance as well—