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[quote]QUOTE: Originally posted by donclark I think this time Amtrak is going to lose its transcontintentals and some other long distance lines.... Oh, the NEC will survive, possibly with a cash infusion from the states it serves..... and possibly the Auto Train.... However, I still see no vision from Amtrak about its future.... The future of passenger railroads in America is not the status quo of running out of date equipment on out of date tracks..... Now is the time to move on HSR, and convince the nation it can afford a up to date HSR system from New York to Chicago, and further south on the eastern seaboard, plus a line from Northern California to Southern California..... All of these HSR lines if properly funded and built could turn a profit....something the airlines are failing to do...... [/quote] An HSR infrastructure will need some sort of user fee to pay the majority of it's costs, same as the highway trust fund and the waterways trust fund. Currently, we have an 18 cents per gallon tax on diesel fuel for the highway trust fund, and a 20 cents per gallon tax on fuel for the barge lines (albeit only on a few of the waterway corridors). How about this: Change the Highway Trust Fund and the waterway trust fund into the Infrastructure Trust Fund, and charge 20 or 30 cents per gallon on all diesel fuel used for transportation whether it be trucks, barge lines, or railroads? The funds from this trust fund woult then be distributed among highway, waterway, and rail infrastructure projects (both high speed corridors and open access freight corridors).
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