"RICHMOND – A group of independent candidates for the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives argued Monday that a greater public commitment to high-speed rail can ease Virginia’s traffic woes and reduce the country’s dependence on foreign oil.
"But they may have a tough time getting their message out in races dominated by major-party candidates with ample campaign treasuries.
"The roster of independent candidates includes Gail Parker, a candidate for the U.S. Senate seat held by Republican George Allen. Calling herself Gail “For Rail” Parker, the Alexandria resident is trying to raise the profile of her top issue while Allen and Democrat James Webb spar over the war in Iraq and other national security and economic issues.
“From the tip of my head to the bottom of my toes, I know Virginians want more trains and less traffic,” Parker said at a Richmond press conference. “We need more candidates on the ballot to advocate for rail. We need more ordinary Virginians to get involved in the process and run for office.”
Rats! I was hoping for something new and innovative from the pro-transit people, but this is the same old dead end stuff.
If I may, I will bring some axioms for the transit folks to consider…
Short haul passenger rail systems, otherwise known as transit, have a major flaw that totally erases their efficiency advantage - people still have to get from their homes to the rail station, and they need to do so on their own schedules, not the transit authority’s schedule. So much time and fuel are wasted getting from home to the station because folks usually have to travel off the direct route to get to the station, and they have to take precious time out of their day to meet the schedules that could be better spent with the family, et al. What ends up happening is that the transit systems are underutilized most of the time, which is a per capita waste.
Even people that use transit still need to have access to a personal vehicle from time to time, and it would be useful if they could bring their vehicle with them on the transit system. You never know when you might need to make an unscheduled trip to where-ever, which is usually not on the transit route. How about a version of AutoTrain for short haul passenger systems? Has is ever been tried?
As for HSR, if you want serious consideration from capital markets for such a project, you need to predicate it toward moving freight, and then glom on the passenger services as an afterthought. Moving freight makes money, moving passengers does not (moving passengers could make money in theory, but no one has figured out how to do so yet with rail. We do know publicly-funded passenger rail systems are hard wired not to make money.) HSR is the one rail option that could take a vast majority of freight off the roads in the long haul and medium haul corridors, and if it’s fast enough it could take it off the short haul corridors as well
On the issue of fuel efficiency, David Lawyer has a web site that argues that automobiles were actually more energy efficient than trains on a passenger-mile basis – he gives reasons why the low rolling resistance of trains is counterbalanced by other factors – but the adoption of automobiles granted greater flexibility and hence much more travel and hence more energy consumption. Or rather, the folks in the trolley car and steam train days used a lot less energy than today because they just didn’t get out by today’s standards.
If a return to rail is to make a big splash in terms of congestion relief and reduction of need for oil, it won’t be as a one-for-one replacement for current patterns of automobile trips. It will have to be as a reordering of housing patterns that will reduce the need to take trips (more things in your neighborhood). A lot of the “smart growth” and “new urbanism” people who promote light rail (modern lingo for trolley cars) are hip to this.
Part of the criticism of autos is that in some ways the large amount of driving people do is enabled by autos being much more convenient and flexible than trains. But a large measure of the amount of driving people do is because autos work against density – to avoid congestion and provide parking you need lower density, which pushes people further out, which results in more driving yet.
But reduction of housing density has been a major social goal these past 50 years. When people talk about the demise of trains and interrurbans and even bus transit, they blame GM, Firestone Rubber, and the concrete paving industry. How about pointing at the tax deduction for home mortgage payments as the big train killer?
Perhaps there was a hidden agenda to reducing density and pushing people out into automobile suburbs in the form of the atom bomb – did we envision returning to a more bomb-proof dispersed village culture (didn’t Mao talk about the sheer mass of villages making China immun
One problem with this is where would you put the autos when you get to the destinations? Most downtown areas have little space for the autos of people that chose to drive now, when you add all the cars that sit in the suburban stations all day, you will end up with a mess. Building more parking garages is not an option in a lot of cities as downtown land values are to high to use on garages. Chicago is a good example as many old garages where torn down to put in new office buildings, parking in the loop is an issue for a lot of people.
A big argument in passenger-train advocacy is that yes, rail/transit/Amtrak gets taxpayer subsidy, but Amtrak gets such a tiny sliver of a public transportation budget, and even transportation is a sliver compared to the public moneys thrown at the items Senator Allen and his Democratic Party opponent argue about.
One thing I will grant you is that the uncertainty in the subsidy and the Perils of Pauline way to the Amtrak appropriation are no way to run a railroad. If 1.8 billion is too much for Amtrak and .9 billion is OK, well then appropriate .9 billion a year over the next 10 years with adjustment for inflation, and then Amtrak can plan .9 billion a year worth of train service.
As for the Amtrak-is-getting-crumbs argument, intercity air is 100:1 in passenger miles over Amtrak, and highways are 5:1 in passenger miles intercity over air (maybe not in Chicago-LA end-to-end where air dominates, but overall). If highways get 30 billion and air gets 12 billion, this suggests that Amtrak should be funded to the tune of 12-15 million, not 1-1.5 billion. OK, OK, I am not including the 9-11 airline bailout, grants to NASA for aerodynamic research, crossover from military contracts to civilian technology. Throw in those added costs (neglecting that about 80 percent of FAA’s 12 billion comes out of fuel, ticket taxes or other user fee arrangements) – what multiple of 15 million to you get for Amtrak?
OK, Amtrak is a skeleton network with high overhead. Let’s say Amtrak accounting is goofy and no one knows what is what, but transit systems look to paying about 50 percent of their direct operating costs out of fares – rolling stock and other infrastructure is often regarded as a grant
Madison, Wisconsin has this thing called Halloween on State Street. University students along with others from outside the University and Madison come to State Street in costume on Halloween to get quite thoroughly drunk, and the City, yes the normally permissive and liberal and grew-up-in-the-60’s elected officials are getting quite tired of the mayhem that results. Halloween on State Street is much like Mardi Gras on Bourbon Street back in the day in New Orleans, for the visitors, the crowds, the fun, the notariety, and the unlawful breaking of things.
This year, the City got the idea of roping off State Street and charging people $5 a head to get in – essentially a “cover” charge for State Street. Whether this will work or have people jumping the rope line or drinking off State Street is unknown. What is known is that $5/person will cover only 1/3 the price of overtime for all of the required police to keep things down to a dull roar.
$5/person is transit-subsidy thinking. Why not charge a full $15 to get in? If you turn people away at that level, well, you need to pay for fewer police on duty. Suppose $15 or even $5 is untenable – collecting all of that money and guarding the entrances. Why don’t you charge the bar owners on State Street the full fare for the police wages? We would have shut down this Midwestern October Mardi Gras if it weren’t for the bar owners complaining about all of the lost revenue – Halloween is not one of these convention/visitor/tourism things that otherwise contributes to the local economy.
As to these Chicago business who are replacing parking ramps with office space – couldn’t you h