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Ridership increases on North Carolina passenger trains
You might also add Georgia to that list.
In reply to Mr. Paul E.Vinson of Texas re. passenger rail serving TN &KY. These states are not in close proximity to the dense population of the northeast corridor and largely served by freight lines that operate, for the most part, speeds in the 40 to 50 mile range, often twisting and turning in undulating terrain. For example the old Southern line from Bristol to Knoxville and Chattanooga , built in the mid 19th century, was never rebuilt to 79mph standards like the Washington to Atlanta Southern main. There are political considerations to be addressed also, similar to those of Texas.
In reply to Mr. Paul E.Vinson of Texas re. passenger rail serving TN &KY. These states are not in close proximity to the dense population of the northeast corridor and largely served by freight lines that operate, for the most part, speeds in the 40 to 50 mile range, often twisting and turning in undulating terrain. For example the old Southern line from Bristol to Knoxville and Chattanooga , built in the mid 19th century, was never rebuilt to 79mph standards like the Washington to Atlanta Southern main. There are political considerations to be addressed also, similar to those of Texas.
170,266 riders annually. Most of them are most likely repeats. What is the population of the state? When you stop and think about it, that is not very many for the money being spent. $520M in taxpayer “grants” and the return is only $3.3M. Yet, somehow, Amtrak is a success. If this was Wall Street, these same lovers of Amtrak would be screaming for the heads of those investing in the private sector. If this was any freight railroad, the shareholders would be eliminating the current CEO and management in very short order for losing massive amounts of capital and grossly poor operations.
Why do Tennessee and Kentucky not follow the fine example of Virginia and North Carolina, their contiguous neighbours to the east. The big cities of Nashville and Louisville have no inter-city passenger trains, not to mention Lexington, Knoxville, and Chattanooga.
South Carolina should be part of this but that would make sense and be logical. Therefore it’s not going to happen…
The service has the 2nd highest return rate on revenue of all Amtrak routes with the state of NC only contributing around $100,000 a year in subsidies. Jeffery Guse, you also miss the point that these funds are upgrading the state owned NCRR which sees nearly 40 freight trains a day in addition to the passenger trains. This investment is not only for Amtrak, but to promote freight traffic along the route. Also, NC General Assembly has tried to do some crazy stuff recently (ie. attempt to establish a state religion), but they believe these improvements are good for business and the future of the state.
NC should be congratulated as this is a bottom up effort as opposed to a type of top down planning, this is what you want.
As was stated, improvements are to leverage the success to increase ridership.
However, as far as the comments, Mr. Guise quotes actual numbers to make his point, ie basically a cost/benefit argument.
Eventually these services have to be judged to some extent on that basis. Comparing actual figures to an argument of
everybody know highways are … is basically a non argument.
At some point, say for Illinois, you have to say OK, we “invested a couple billion”, what do we have?
the goose clearly hates everything. what a sad way to go through life.
Naturally, the Goose has to throw his usual non-sense about Amtrak’s subsidy. Goosie, you can’t seem to wrap your pea sized brain around the fact that EVERY passenger carrying mode REQUIRES a subsidy. What Amtrak receives as a subsidy is PEANUTS compared to air travel not to speak of roads and highways. You just plain hate Amtrak.
A Tennessee politician decided that we didn’t need trains. Somehow Memphis has a train running through it. We would like to have passenger trains in other parts of the state as well.
I often wonder if the silly goose ever returns to this website to read what everybody else is writing about him. No, can’t possibly. He’d be so ashamed and embarrassed he’d never be heard from again.
This Louisvillian is proud of what they’ve accomplished in “The Old North State” (state song of Tarheelia). It shows that when you’ve got a plan and you execute it well good things happen, even in a day of critical mass. Congratulations NC! May your tribe increase.
I think part of the reason for the success of this program is on time performance. With the northbound Carolinian originating in Charlotte, and the southbound Piedmont originating in Raleigh, there’s only a slight chance either of these will be late between those two points.
For NC - put on a train to Asheville & quit talking about it.
The Amtrak train that is going to eventually run to Roanoke should extend to Bristol & beyond.
Once again Goose is dead-on right. 170,000 + people take the “Piedmont” between Raleigh and Charlotte. Another 318,000 take the “Carolinian” between New York and Charlotte. How many people fly between these cities? How many drive? What is the subsidy per traveller? I think the train loses.
For your information the train is a bargain for the taxpayer, Robert McGuire. You been listening to the fowl foul from Illinois too much.