Take The Train

Amtrak funding now has a veto-proof majority in both the House and the Senate, though it looks to me like there may be some reconciliation issues. The die-hard nature of the Bush administration's opposition to this broadly supported measure is a little puzzling, but he's a really bad president so this is what you get. There's much to criticize in the Amtrak status quo, but it's not as if the White House has come up with some visionary alternative strategy for passenger rail in the United States.

Meanwhile, I'll be hopping on a train soon to go to New York for tonight's book talk and signing at the Strand.

Comments

Amtrak funding now has a veto-proof majority in both the House and the Senate

Of course it does. Amtrak is one of the biggest pork projects in the country, employing people in just about every congressional district.

Rail is a good idea, but Amtrak as currently operated and subsidized is a mess.

Posted by right | June 12, 2008 9:19 AM

Yeah, this was an odd dispute in that Bush was right that Amtrak is currently wasting a lot of money. But that is precisely because it is directing funds to so many different states and districts in ways that really can't be justified, and Bush didn't provide a superior alternative. So, he just lost the fight once all the relevant representatives cut a deal, rather than getting any sort of actual reform.

But I long since learned these folks really have no idea how to govern.

Posted by DTM | June 12, 2008 9:36 AM

One of the suggestions I've heard made is that Amtrak should get out of the passenger rail business and instead start purchasing freight tracks. The poor quality of track seems to be the number one reason that high-speed rail isn't continuous even in the Northeast Corridor. Similarly, the poor quality of customer service seems to be the reason that Amtrak suffers so much.

The idea is to come up with a solution that leads to better privatized passenger rail service with government investing in infrastructure.

Posted by The Atlantic cleaning staff | June 12, 2008 9:40 AM

I'm not quite sure how subsidizing empty trains to travel from Santa Fe to Kansas City or from Minneapolis to Montana is supposed to benefit the environment, or anything other than congressional re-election.

This veto is one of the better things Bush has done.

Posted by Chris | June 12, 2008 9:41 AM

Chris, the problem with your stance is that most Amtrak funding goes to the corridors -- the Northeast, the Pacific Surfiliner, etc. And those transcontinental trains aren't empty, not by a long shot. Try riding one -- if you can get a reservation.

I personally like "the Atlantic cleaning staff"s recommendation of having the government get into the rail infrastructure business. A government run and funded infrastructure system could eventually cover a large proportion of its costs through access fees paid by freight and passenger rail operators and basically serve as an Interstate 2.0 kind of transportation plan. The current system, if you can call it that, does not have nearly enough capacity. Single track from Chicago to New Orleans, Chicago to St. Louis and on most of the NAFTA lines through Texas causing massive delays for freight and passenger alike. The disaster that is the Shore Line in Connecticut; 100-year-old infrastructure in western Connecticut, not owned by Amtrak but by a commuter rail network; and drawbridge central in the eastern part of the state where Congress turned down the chance to build a new high-speed line farther inland. Countless other examples.

Government should come in and do what it did for highways. Widen the lines. Build new ones. Create an open access system for all potential operators.

Posted by DBX | June 12, 2008 10:02 AM

I agree with The Atlantic cleaning staff and DBX about the government doing infrastructure and letting private companies offer service, except I would note it isn't likely the government could recoup most of its infrastructure costs just from access fees. But nor should it have to ... better rail infrastructure will have large externalities (e.g., environmental, land use, reduced congestion on other modes of transportation, even national security), so there is no reason to expect the direct users to be able to pay all the costs of providing economically-justifiable infrastructure.

Posted by DTM | June 12, 2008 10:13 AM

Government should come in and do what it did for highways. Widen the lines. Build new ones. Create an open access system for all potential operators.

Exactly. Public subsidies for infrastructure and open access for service providers. Just like road and air travel. Instead we have something approaching the inverse arrangement and it's a total clusterfuck.

I'd happily support a phase-out of Amtrak subsidies if the savings were used to buy up track and abandoned right-of-way, modernize the system, and lease it back to the rail operators.

Posted by LaFollette Progressive | June 12, 2008 10:18 AM

The Atlantic cleaning staff:
One of the suggestions I've heard made is that Amtrak should get out of the passenger rail business and instead start purchasing freight tracks.

Uh, and do what with the track, if they're out of the passenger rail business? You mean that should just own the tracks and rent them out to passenger operators?

Anyway, the freight railroads aren't selling any useful track to anybody, because they have all the business they can handle right now. They're probably wishing they hadn't abandoned quite as much in the 60's, 70's, and 80's as they actually did.

The poor quality of track seems to be the number one reason that high-speed rail isn't continuous even in the Northeast Corridor.

High speed rail is really really expensive to build and maintain, which explains why neither the freight railroads nor the government have built any outside the NE corridor. It also explains why even the NE corridor isn't terribly high speed by world standards.

Chris:
I'm not quite sure how subsidizing empty trains to travel from Santa Fe to Kansas City or from Minneapolis to Montana is supposed to benefit the environment...

Ah, ok, how about full trains? Does that make a difference?

Posted by BP Beckley | June 12, 2008 10:24 AM

The Atlantic cleaning staff:
One of the suggestions I've heard made is that Amtrak should get out of the passenger rail business and instead start purchasing freight tracks.

Uh, and do what with the track, if they're out of the passenger rail business? You mean that should just own the tracks and rent them out to passenger operators?

Anyway, the freight railroads aren't selling any useful track to anybody, because they have all the business they can handle right now. They're probably wishing they hadn't abandoned quite as much in the 60's, 70's, and 80's as they actually did.

The poor quality of track seems to be the number one reason that high-speed rail isn't continuous even in the Northeast Corridor.

High speed rail is really really expensive to build and maintain, which explains why neither the freight railroads nor the government have built any outside the NE corridor. It also explains why even the NE corridor isn't terribly high speed by world standards.

Chris:
I'm not quite sure how subsidizing empty trains to travel from Santa Fe to Kansas City or from Minneapolis to Montana is supposed to benefit the environment...

Ah, ok, how about full trains? Does that make a difference?

Posted by BP Beckley | June 12, 2008 10:27 AM

There's much to criticize in the Amtrak status quo

Yeah, like, the food suuuucks. With the exception of the cheese and cracker plate, which is delish (Babybel and Cabot cheese with Carr's water crackers and wheat crackers), although by the time I get on a northbound train in Philly, motherfucking DC chotchbag lobbyists have taken all the cheese. It's better when I get back on a sobo in Boston, but even then, ya gotta act fast on the cheese and crackers because by the time you get to Providence, all those mouth-breathing Vhode Iland weetahhds come on and start scarfin' that shit up.

More seriously, the Shore Line strech in east/central Connecticut (which is actually well over 100 years old) is routinely delayed all summer because, get this, while Amtrak has its own power source for the trains, the signals run off the local grid. So, during a heatwave, when a/c taxes the system and causes brownouts, it fucks up the Amtrak signals.

Railroad reform is going to be hard work. I'm all for widening lines and building new ones, but the very thought of that is a regulatory/legal/political clusterfuck--land cost, nimbyism, environmental impact, the auto/air/bus lobbies, ect.. There's got to be a lot of strong will to make this kind of reform happen, because the institutional and political forces are strongly stacked up against it.

Posted by Philly | June 12, 2008 10:27 AM

You would think with all the earmarks that the pigs in Congress lard each other with that they could at least keep their hands off Amtrak. But no, even that has been turned into another pork fest, just like Homeland Security.

Amtrak could be a self-supporting, valuable operation if allowed to focus on routes in the dense corridors like Boston-DC. But rational resource allocation just isn't something the GOPocratic pigs care about.

Posted by kafka | June 12, 2008 10:28 AM

Fine, then let us alo have a Federal rail ticket tax which recoups as large a percentage of Federal expenditures for rail travel as the Federal gas tax does the percentage of Federal expenditures for road travel.

Posted by Will Allen | June 12, 2008 10:29 AM

Things Bush (and McCain) are also probably against:

1) Vitamins
2) Sunlight
3) Laughing
4) Ice Cream
5) Biking Paths
6) Organic Food
7) Cage Free Eggs
8) Free-Range Chickens
9) Solar Energy
10) The concept of "compassion"

This list could go on forever...

Posted by edsbowlingshoe | June 12, 2008 10:34 AM

I personally like taking Amtrak along the NE corridor-- it's more comfortable than flying and I can get more work done, I find. I also am a big supporter of alternative modes of transportation in general and generally I think I'm on the progressive end of the spectrum.

However, I am definitely NOT a supporter of Amtrak in its current form. I just graduated from the Kennedy School of Government, where in a transportation policy class we read two different case studies on Amtrak and its struggles. Having seen some of Amtrak's budget numbers, I will confirm that, as a number of other commenters noted, many of the cross-country routes are not, and will never be, competitive means of traveling or remotely profitable. People are going to take cars or planes instead. Yes, part of the problem is that Amtrak doesn't own the rights of way (it only owns ROW in the NE), but the bigger part of the problem is that even if it did, it takes far longer than flying and is almost as expensive! Intercity passenger rail just doesn't have a market in the US (NOTE: I am 100% in favor of expanding COMMUTER rail, which is totally different).

The problem with cutting these routes, however, is that right now, Amtrak is benefiting from some economies of scale in station management and administrative costs, so that even those routes that seem like they could operate profitably if the rest of the fat were trimmed, like the Acela, probably can't if they have to bear the whole costs of supporting passenger rail administration. Amtrak could require LESS subsidies if it only operated in corridors, but it will never be self-sufficient as Bush wants.

I readily admit that there may be some good reasons to subsidize passenger rail, but the typical reasons-- environmental benefits, lower congestion on roads or airports-- only suggest small subsidies at best. I think the better plan, for now, at least, is to correct the other subsidies that the government offer competing modes of transportation, like cars and airplanes, to reflect their social values, and then see how their costs compare to passenger rail. I suspect it may look better at that point.

Meanwhile, with passenger rail, what's the harm in privatizing some of the routes? Put each route, or bundles of routes, up for concession contracts, with those routes that no one bids on going out of service. This is a better way to avoid the political heat involved with shutting down routes that are costing all taxpayers outlandish sums of money, while possibly improving service on those routes that are actually worth saving.

Posted by smart growth-smarter policy | June 12, 2008 10:55 AM

First: it is unreasonable to expect that Bush, who has no interest in transportation policy or any kind of intelligent use of government to form efficient policies, is interest in, much less capable of, providing a better alternative to the broken Amtrak funding system.

Next, the reason those empty transcontinental trains still run is in part because Congressmen want some kind of passenger service to serve their isolated districts. However, I don't see why this couldn't be just as easily accomplished with buses. It's not like traffic congestion is a factor, as it would be in the NE Corridor.

This is a better way to avoid the political heat involved with shutting down routes that are costing all taxpayers outlandish sums of money

Actually, in the scheme of things, Amtrak doesn't cost "outlandish sums of money." That's why we tolerate it. Compare Amtrak to the Farm Bill or to the Iraq war, and it just doesn't seem like a big deal.

Meanwhile, Sen. Coburn decides to draw a line in the sand over $150 million worth of DC Metro dedicated funding.

Posted by Tyro | June 12, 2008 11:15 AM

"Yes, part of the problem is that Amtrak doesn't own the rights of way (it only owns ROW in the NE), but the bigger part of the problem is that even if it did, it takes far longer than flying and is almost as expensive! Intercity passenger rail just doesn't have a market in the US."

In a country the width of a continent, I think we need to distinguish different kinds of intercity transport. Taking a train from NYC to LA will not be competitive with air travel. Taking a train from Chicago to St. Louis, however, could be competitive with air travel.

"I readily admit that there may be some good reasons to subsidize passenger rail, but the typical reasons-- environmental benefits, lower congestion on roads or airports-- only suggest small subsidies at best."

I agree with this in the general sense, since I agree a lot of long distance train travel makes no sense, and for that matter a lot of short distance train travel also won't make sense. So, trains are always going to be just one of the three major legs in U.S. passenger transport, and maybe always the smallest of the three.

But I also think the subsidies for particular routes could be quite high in relation to their costs. Again, take something like high speed routes out of Chicago ... the air congestion problem in O'Hare is affecting the whole country, and meanwhile a lot of the regional routes out of Chicago are very wasteful from an energy and environmental perspective (airplanes get a lot more wasteful if they just go up and down rather than cruising, and similarly if you need to use smaller planes, and so on).

Posted by DTM | June 12, 2008 11:29 AM

I am now for several months visiting Germany, so I have several comparisons.

1. Train service is plentiful, some trains are very fast, on principal directions there is train every hour, so you just go to the station when you feel like traveling. At worst, you have to start in the restaurant car.

2. On long distance planes are cheaper. This is manifestly not the case further east, starting from Poland. Getting from Warsaw to St. Petersburg by train costs a fraction of the flight cost, and the sleeping places in Russian cars are very convenient. And unlimited amount of hot water from the samovar! Recommendation: samovars on Amtrak long distance trains, as well as decent comforters and pillows.

3. Slower German passenger trains still move rather briskly, but, listen to this: they share tracks with freight trains that go with the same speed. This can actually be economical -- a set of tracks a bit similar to interstate system that would provide express freight service, same speed as interstates. This would save fuel AND labor on long distance tracking, so it could be a bussiness with revenue in the order of hundred billion dollars. That would nicely help with hydrocarbon balance etc, plus you could add a modicum of short passenger trains. But the true economies and energy savings would come from freight.

4. In this context, a schema to "buy tracks around the country" can make sense. Basically, on important train routes new express tracks would be added, and some public-private consortium could own and operate it.

5. I would also encourage to decrease short distance airplane connection in favor of trains and buses. I suspect that on big distances planes are actually quite fuel efficient, they fly high where the air resistance is low. But short haul aviation is just gumming the airport capacity, wastes fuel etc.

Posted by piotr | June 12, 2008 12:16 PM

Full trains wouldn't make maintaining these extraordinarily long tracks efficient if demand can only satisfy one or two trains per day.

Posted by Chris | June 12, 2008 12:19 PM

I'm happy to see Congress getting behind a federally funded, public transportation bill, but whether it's more money or re-organizing how they do business, something needs to be done about Amtrak's Northeast Corridor line. As noted above, these are about the only tracks Amtrak actually owns, and they are, in my opinion, atrocious. I take a NJ Transit train from the Jersey Shore to NYC and back again every weekday and, seriously, one out of every three days, there is a significant delay. I'm not talking five minutes...I'm talking 15 minutes to an hour. And it's almost always because of an Amtrak breakdown or switch problem or overhead wire problem, etc. I rarely encounter problem on the NJ Coast Line...it's only when we get on the NEC tracks that the problems start. Unfortunately, NJ Transit doesn't own any tracks that go directly into NYC.

The engines are old, the new Acelas can't travel at their top speeds and the infrastructure is apparently falling apart. If gas prices weren't so high right now, I guarantee that more people would be driving their cars to work as a result of the train delay mess.

I'm all for public transportation - but one that gets you in the office an hour late at least once, often twice a month, is unacceptable.

As for city to city travel, I've opted to take the train from Newark, NJ, to DC, over a plane twice. It's actually quicker than a flight, slightly cheaper, and more comfortable. And as bad as Amtrak can be on the NEC, it's still less susceptible to delays than the airlines, especially in bad weather. Perhaps Amtrak, if they're going to stay in business, should put much of their focus on their commuter lines and the NEC and perhaps abandon some or most of their longer, less popular routes?

Posted by OGLiberal | June 12, 2008 12:49 PM

Wow, talk about swallowing a camel and straining at a gnat! In its entire history, Amtrak has cost the taxpayer about as much as three months of the Iraq War.

But, wait, there's more! For the hundreds of billions we've spent in Iraq, we get oil prices over $130/bbl and tens of thousands of American casualties, a world united in thinking we're not as smart as we thought we were, and- special bonus!- $24 billion in fraud and theft by Halliburton and friends, enough to run Amtrak for about 25 years.

For the almost $40 billion we've spent on Amtrak over the past 38 years, we have a skeleton of national rail service, some regional corridors of state-federal partnership, and one high-speed corridor demonstrating that we haven't entirely devolved to the level of cats studying the doorknob principle.

Now, I can already hear the chorus of protest- "The Iraq War has nothing to do with the waste and corruption at Amtrak!"

Bullshit. In the first place nobody here has presented one iota of evidence of waste and corruption. In 38 years of efforts to kill Amtrak no responsible commentator has made any such allegation.

In the second place, the Iraq War happened because 50 years of federal subsidies for cars and planes (over $3 trillion, but who's counting) had left this nation so oil-addicted that our "leaders" thought the only way for the party to go on was for us to seize the high ground in the oil regions of the world.

Now, I know a lot of you desperately need to believe that your personal choices about transportation had no influence at all on American foreign policy. I mean, hey, it's not like this is a democracy or something, where the people you voted for are making those decisions.

But the fact is that the silly verbal games played here by Amtrak-haters are exactly what got us into Iraq. Yes, the total mix of "it's not about oil" and "Americans will never give up their cars" and "the whole world wants to be like us" and "we'll save money by privatizing it" is exactly what got us in Iraq.

And now you want to sell the American public a big dish of your magic beans. Well, thanks, but I've heard a duck fart underwater before.

Posted by serial catowner | June 12, 2008 1:33 PM

I see some arguments here for using the government to build new infrastructure, which involves a political and regulatory mess: there's plenty of need to apply eminent domain, etc.

I can't see any arguments for the continued government ownership of an entire passenger rail company. As we've repeatedly noted, the current level of subsidies is outlandish compared to any possible justification.

Frankly, intercity passenger rail is not going to be viable in the US outside a few important niches (the Northeast corridor, maybe a California corridor, etc.). As Piotr noted, in Germany and Western Europe at large, it's actually cheaper to use planes for long-distance routes, and it's much more convenient. "Long distance" in Europe is "short to medium distance" in the US: the distance from Paris to Berlin is roughly the same as the distance from Portland to San Francisco, yet plane trips average around $200 while the cheapest rail is $300. Adding that to the difference in trip length, 1.5 hours to 12 hours, it's clear that no sane person would take the train for a trip of this distance, even in Europe, where passenger rail transport is undeniably far more developed.

Of course, if we just let the market decide and stopped dishing out absurd subsidies, you wouldn't have to trust me when I say that long-distance rail isn't viable in the US: consumers would just make their own choices. Government, at most, should be investing in rail infrastructure.

(I think that a lot of the debate here results from some kind of weird emotional conflation of commuter rail and intercity rail, even when the two are completely different. There are lots of good reasons for government to become involved in commuter rail, and almost all of them fall apart when we move to longer distances.)

Posted by Matt Rognlie | June 12, 2008 1:52 PM

Well, golly, catowner, I fully support boosting gasoline taxes to cover the cost of our military involvement in the Persian Gulf, and to fully cover the cost of all road construction maintainence, and have for years. Why won't you support having the people who like to take trains cover the cost of taking the train?

While we're at it, can we end the waste involved in transferring wealth from young poor people to wealthy and near-wealthy old people?

Posted by Will Allen | June 12, 2008 1:53 PM

Now, in a previous thread I was accused of being an irrational hysteric, unwilling to consider thoroughly the rational and realistic proposals made by Amtrak opponents. So, let's look at some of the comments here.

For example, the first comment calls Amtrak "one of the biggest pork projects in the country". ROFLMAO. Holy misplaced sense of proportion, Batshit-crazy Man!

Ok, on to the idea of having the government build the rails and then leasing them, at a loss, to a private company, who would then make a profit. And really, how can "private enterprise" fail, if the taxpayer pays most of the bills?

Well, by a curious coincidence, that idea has been tried in Britain. And it has failed, bigtime. Rail service in Britain is more expensive, more dangerous, less convenient, and provides Britain less energy security than any other Western European country. Not to mention the fact that Amtrak already is a private corporation running on leased rails. Facts are inconvenient things.

Or, how about discontinuing the long-distance runs and providing bus service instead? Oh, that's right, been there, done that, and it failed. Yes, I'm so old that I have actually ridden buses across county lines to get someplace. That was a while ago.

Or how about the idea that people would rather drive across the country instead of taking the train? Having done both, once again, I'm ROFLMAO. Holy tourist, Batshit-crazy Man, do you think you can still buy bennies at truckstops?

Now, as for having the government get into the rail infrastructure business- do any of you people know anything at all about railroads?

Aside from the fact that the federal government already is in the rail infrastructure business, where highways meet rails, where strategic needs demand freight rail service, and where rational planning dictates investments in passenger rail- aside from that, the freight railroads have been doing a great job building high-capacity freight rail systems, and wouldn't have any interest in partnering with the government at this point.

Back when the freight railroads had monopolies, it was a bad thing to allow them to charge preferential rates, refuse to haul certain classes of freight, or discontinue service to small markets. But now that the government has carpeted the land with roads, dammed the rivers to provide barge services, and built airports, staffed with federal air controllers using federal air control systems, the freight customer has a choice.

It may be that this vast web of government subsidy to roads, airports, and barges will fall flat on its face when oil heads for $200/bbl. I'm not the one claiming these huge subsidies for everything-but-rail are a good idea. But that's how we've done things for the past 50 years, and the freight railroads, the one element of our economy that is arguably world-class, will have no interest in giving away what they've built now.

Oh- in case it's not obvious- the kind of rail line you build for freight is entirely different from the kind or rail line you build for passengers. Unless you're incredibly smart, like the Germans, who can also charge $2000 for a drivers license that lets you drive on a highway with no speed limits.

So. Therz yer substantive comment. I hope I haven't used too many big words for the Amtrak haters here.

Posted by serial catowner | June 12, 2008 2:12 PM

Catowner, perhaps you can employ your titanic intellect to explain how advocating that the users of a service pay for the costs of the service entails the emotion known as "hate". Oh, by the way; in the previous thread, you were criticized for employing insulting ad hominem language while attributing irrationality to others. Now, could you please act the age you claim to be?

Posted by Will Allen | June 12, 2008 2:28 PM

As for Matt Rognlie, he takes some good ideas to fashionable, but wrong, extremes.

Let's start with the last observation, that if we stopped dishing out absurd subsidies, the market would decide.

Decide to go nowhere, that is, because without the federal funding for the airports (and bail-outs for failing airlines), and the $2 trillion we need to spend to keep our roads intact, movement grinds to a halt here. Don't even think about riverboats, remember, we're cutting the absurd subsidies in this thought experiment, and the Bureau of Reclamation is right at the head of that list.

Rognlie doesn't want us to get involved in a "political and regulatory mess...eminent domain etc". Gee, Matt, maybe you ain't been keeping up with current events, but we're already involved in a political and regulatory mess involving issues of eminent domain- and we have been, for over a century, because, left to the "magic of the marketplace", private enterprise crashes and burns. Crack a history book once in a while.

For a century the US federal government was funded by selling public lands (stolen from the existing inhabitants), a market boom that could only be sustained by building railroads to carry the people to, and the products from, these public lands. Before the railroads, land more than 20 miles from a navigable waterway had no value.

Today, we are a complex society, one in which the Port of Seattle can need to build a third runway because of commuter air traffic to cities less than 400 miles away. In Europe, high-speed rail takes market share from air when the distance is less than 400 miles.

Rognlie is conveniently (for his argument) ignoring corridors like the Portland-Tacoma-Seattle-Vancouver BC corridor that links the big ports north of San Francisco. He's using the speed of the slowest trains to "prove" that people would take planes instead. And, of course, Piotr wasn't saying it was actually cheaper to fly planes than run trains- he was saying that when you buy the ticket, it's cheaper to the purchaser, in countries where the government has decided to make it so.

Matt is right that there's a lot of confusion out there, but, that's why we have comment threads, and they'd be pretty boring if you had to pass a test to post. There's no absolute right or wrong, but there is a pile of stuff that happened before, and it's smart to know some of this stuff, if only to surrender gracefully sometimes, not because we are personal failures, but simply because the subject is so big and we are so small.

Still, I'm betting that, in the 21st century, the smart money is on rail.

Posted by serial catowner | June 12, 2008 2:52 PM

Well, Amtrak actually subsidizes Chessie by paying for all track insurance and most of its maintenance. Amtrak users should start paying the same percentage of the cost of a ticket that passenger cars and airplanes and freight trucks, trains, and planes do. We have an idea of what it costs to run Amtrak, unlike, say the department of defense whose books are at least a trillion dollars off and inauditible. At least there is a chance that subsidizing train use at a level equal to other transportation modes would make us a little safer.

Posted by Peter Driscoll | June 12, 2008 3:06 PM

Yeah, Will, I thought that was pretty funny how somebody else could use the word "foamer" to describe a person who simply likes trains, but when I used the same word to describe rightwingers who spring into full attack mode when they hear the word Amtrak, it becomes ad hominem.

Frankly, I'm mildly disgusted with the endless string of childish epithets directed at average older Americans because they expect to keep receiving their SS checks, because they think maybe the much-vaunted "best medical system in the world" might actually save their life if they get a cold in their old age, or if they simply like riding trains more than flying, and have already paid plenty of taxes to support both systems.

OTOH, I have no problem at all handing back the rightwingers their own words when they describe the speaker. For example, you, Will, are a quibbler. Like a blind-folded dart player, a few of your throws make it to the board, but a lot more hit some innocent bystander in the butt.

So, why don't you go off and figure out the real cost of every little thing. When you've finished that job, sometime in the 22nd century, you can emerge to a world baked by global warming and start on your quest for the last remaining woman in the world, the one who was also living in a cave figuring something to the 9000th decimal.

I'm sure you'll make a lovely couple.

Posted by serial catowner | June 12, 2008 3:16 PM

catowner, if you had read my post with any care, you would have noticed that I was making a distinction between government creation of infrastructure and continued government subsidies for the operation of a rail network. The former may be justified; the latter certainly is not.

Your deal mostly in random, context-free numbers. For instance, you say that we need to spend "$2 trillion" to keep our roads intact. Over what period of time? How many passenger-miles will these roads support? I've repeatedly noted that the subsidies given to Amtrak are far greater, relative to the amount of transportation that Amtrak actually supports, than those given to highways. You're free to dispute this analysis, but you'll need to do more than cite specious figures and claim, without justification, that they settle the argument.

You criticize me for not mentioning the Northwest corridor as a place for viable passenger rail. As it happens, I think that this may be a route where passenger rail has a future -- but I'm hardly obligated to mention every single potential market when I'm discussing the subject. And you keep missing the core point of this whole discussion, which is that only by freeing passenger rail from a politically mismanaged government corporation can we actually see which routes make sense. Might it be economical to run passenger trains from Portland to Seattle? Of course! If it's really economical, however, it should be possible without government subsidies that are far disproportionate to the subsidies given to every other kind of passenger transit.

The last point is really important. Given the passenger-miles it handles, Amtrak really does get much higher subsidies than highways, roads, or air travel. If you dispute this point, I challenge you to find other figures, do the arithmetic, and present it to us.

Posted by Matt Rognlie | June 12, 2008 3:29 PM

Yes, catowner, anyone who questions the wisdom of Amtrak subsidies in their current form is a "rightwinger", no matter the context of their total political outlook. That you would complain of being mildly disgusted by the alleged "childish epithets" hurled by others is too silly for words. Look, you like trains, and want people who don't like trains to pay for the overwhelmingly larger percentage of the cost to run them. Why not just say so?

Posted by Will Allen | June 12, 2008 3:30 PM

Will Allen, it is simply a fact that almost everyone who has a problem with Amtrak subsidies has no interest in using the government to form good public policies at all. Thus, it's probably best to ignore most of them. There are a few well-intentioned exceptions, but I generally regard them as guilty of fundamentalist libertarian fanaticism until proven innocent.

I've little interest in the libertarian cult, and I've little interest in hearing their worthless opinions on Amtrak, since their opinions on all other government initiatives are just as hostile and worthless. So excuse me if I'm a bit dismissive of those who criticize the current Amtrak bill. I'm willing ONLY to entertain the opinions of people who are supportive of a comprehensive, alternative transportation policy, rather than the opinions of the destructive "burn it all down" crowd.

Posted by Tyro | June 12, 2008 3:50 PM

Yes, Tyro, I understand that you are only interested in interacting with people who largely agree with you.

Posted by Will Allen | June 12, 2008 3:53 PM

Will, I couldn't care less what the nation does about trains. Every once in awhile, though, I like to remind readers that there is more to the story than National Review, the Weekly Standard, or even the Atlantic are talking about.

Matt, in the world or railroads, the creation of infrastructure and the operations costs are almost seamless. The infrastructure has no meaning at all if operation does not happen, and operation is directly proportional to infrastructure and markets. Or, to put it another way, operations costs are inversely proportional to investment in infrastructure. In any case, operations costs for Amtrak have been covered by farebox revenue in most years.

The $2 trillion is an accepted minimal figure for repairs needed to our road and bridge infrastructure, most say within 20 years. This was reported a month or so ago at a big national conference if you want to google it.

No, you don't need to list every possible corridor- unless you're claiming that there are only one or two. Re-read your relevant comment.

And, no, "freeing passenger rail from a politically mismanaged government corporation" is not the "core point of this discussion". It is the perseveration of rightwing commenters who display little actual knowledge about railroads, but have offered no proof whatever that their assertions have any real basis.

In fact, to any rational person, the whole thing sounds insane-
"Fuel prices climbing? Well, let's be sure to kill Amtrak, oh, and, nationalize the freight lines, because if there's one thing we're good at, it's nationalizing railroads."

There's even a logical disconnect in there- see if you can find it.

Now, when you're doing your calculations about what gets subsidized, you seem to be forgetting one thing- after the government builds the road, you have to provide your own car.

Now, I know this will sound crazy and radical and so forth, but in some countries, people actually elect representatives who have the government build the roads and the cars (these systems are called railroads) and the people will approve of all this and pay taxes for it because it works better. And if you measure by crude metrics like time off, lifespan, or what you eat, it actually does seem to work better. Who knew.

But maybe it wouldn't work here. Maybe we should give Halliburton and Blackwater contracts to run railroads on right-of-way the taxpayers build for them. Only time will tell. I'm guessing that by now it won't be very much time before we learn.

Posted by serial catowner | June 12, 2008 4:45 PM

Catowner, your statements are so bizarre that I don't think discussion is really even worthwhile at this point:

"In any case, operations costs for Amtrak have been covered by farebox revenue in most years."

No, it hasn't. Thus the discussion over billions in losses and the massive subsidies that keep Amtrak afloat.

"No, you don't need to list every possible corridor- unless you're claiming that there are only one or two. Re-read your relevant comment."

I referred to a "few important niches," and mentioned "the Northeast corridor, maybe a California corridor, etc." as a follow-up. The "etc." here fairly clearly indicates that I understand there are more possibilities.

"Fuel prices climbing? Well, let's be sure to kill Amtrak, oh, and, nationalize the freight lines, because if there's one thing we're good at, it's nationalizing railroads."

What the hell are you talking about? I certainly have not suggested that we nationalize the freight lines -- in fact, since my entire point is that we're not good at nationalizing railroads, this is obviously not a position I would support. Maybe you think that you're engaging in some sly, creative mockery of Amtrak critics, but I just think you're incredibly dense.

"Now, when you're doing your calculations about what gets subsidized, you seem to be forgetting one thing- after the government builds the road, you have to provide your own car."

Yes, you have to provide your own car, but people factor this into their budgetary decisions and still decide to take roads. This has to be the most completely inane point in this discussion so far.

"The $2 trillion is an accepted minimal figure for repairs needed to our road and bridge infrastructure, most say within 20 years."

Fine, I'll even grant you this figure. $2 trillion over 20 years is $100 billion a year. Since Americans travel almost 5 trillion passenger-miles on highways each year, this works out to 2 cents per passenger mile.

Meanwhile, Amtrak is getting subsidized at around $2 billion a year, but accounts for fewer than 6 billion passenger-miles each year. This works out to 33 cents per passenger mile.

So even with a figure you're throwing into the discussion without citation, and even ignoring the fact that the gas tax acts as a usage fee that helps pay for road and highway improvements, Amtrak's subsidy is still far larger.

Look, you are so clueless about actual policy analysis that it's painful to continue this back-and-forth. If you want to keep going, you should either (1) try to justify the fact that Amtrak has a subsidy that is at least 10-100 times larger than that offered to roads, given the transportation that each provides, or (2) challenge this fact using accurate data and arithmetic. Confused tirades against "right-wingers," made all the more hilarious by the fact that I'm actually a registered Democrat, disqualify you from serious discussion.

Posted by Matt Rognlie | June 12, 2008 5:38 PM

Will Allen, I only have an interest in interacting with people who exist in the same universe I do. Delusional anti-government fanatics like yourself do not qualify. You can't discuss the best way for government to handle transportation infrastructure with someone who wants to blow government up.

That, unfortauntely, is the dilemma faced here: this isn't about competing visions for how best to provide efficient transportation infrastructure for the future. It's one group that wants to build one kind of it, and another gorup that wants to annihilate both the infrastructure and the opposing group, on ideological principle.

Fanatical libertarianism exists in a moral universe that is incompatible with the sort of policy issues we're discussing, in the same way that a bunch of landlords would have trouble discussing with a Communist what the best rental policies are.

Posted by Tyro | June 13, 2008 11:56 AM

For the benefit of readers who have made it this far, I will simply note that

a) see Wikipedia for the fact that over the past 38 years the Amtrak subsidy has averaged less than a billion a year, and that the subsidy has been needed because of capital expenses and pre-existing labor agreement obligations assumed by Amtrak at the formation of the company.

b) see your gas pump and local newspaper for the fact that Americans are driving less and taking transit more.

c) See the DLC and Joe Lieberman for the fact that being a 'registered Democrat' might not mean that much.

Posted by serial catowner | June 13, 2008 12:24 PM