Doofus Libertarians at it again

[Anonymous]

Reason magazine (which is basically the successor to Amazing Stories ;>) has proudly put forth a study pushing the idea of using the interstate median strips for separate, dedicated truck lanes, and triple-sized (quarter-million pound) trucks to run on them.

Doesn't seem to be on the Web site, so I can't give you a link.

Well, to be fair it is a perfectly logical idea (which any 6yr old could have come up with) if you have no use for freight movement by rail- or no use for rails at all like is apparently the ARC agenda.

What is really amazing is that the simpletons who run our railroads are no match for these people. While UP and the like get all holy over taxpayer infrastructure help the Asphalt lobby just keeps finding more reasons and places to run the 'dozers. They get this ball rolling and the only trains left in the US will be the little ones in our basement.

[Anonymous]

I am not familiar with Reason Magazine, which you imply is a libertarian publication. This does not sound like a libertarian idea, since they stand for minimal government. I sounds like a liberal Democrat idea since it is both a make work project and a massive intervention in the market for freight transportation. I don't doubt that there are lots of ignorant people, and more with an axe to grind, and bacon to fry who would think this a fine idea.

My question is this Are you sure this is a libertarian publication?

Mac

[jsanchez]

Railroad mangements really do need to wake up. Their is a growing push for truck only interstates and toll roads, by the trucking industry, Libertarians, and highway lobby. If the trucking industry had to pay for these they would make zero economic sense, but chances are the tab will be picked up by you and I the taxpayer. Also Union Pacific does need to stop their anti-government help stance, before its too late, if you can't beat them join them and get your slice of the pie.

[jsanchez]

The Libertarians are the biggest pushers of stopping spending on railroads and promoting highway spending. The biggest Libertarian pusher of more highways ,less rail is Wendell Cox, who makes a living lying about and trying to destroy the railroad industry in order to promote highway spending. If you don't believe me check out his misguided website www.publicpurpose.com. What is also a crime is that this guy is on the Amtrak reform council, it is like have the fox watch the hen house. To them railroads are an evil form of Socialism and highways a god given right. What I find hypocritcal is that these folks demand Amtrak be privitized and all lightrail and rail transit funding stopped, while never mentioning privatizing Interstate highways or other roads as is being done in other countries. You can basically read any Libertarian magazine or website and find the same philosphy. As a conservative myself I realize that utilizing rail more would actualy save tax dollars, relieve congestion and help the over all mobility of the U.S., I feel many others are realizing the same the thing, but the highway lobby is incredibly powerfull in the U.S. and it has been very easy for them to hijack the Libertarian party, the Republican Party and Democratic Party, all the above need lots of money to continue on....

[Anonymous]

A few thoughts:
Most of the libertarians I know are strong advocates of interstate privatization. I would also say that none of them have a problem with freight railroads,just Amtrak and publicly funded commuter rail.I would point out that I'm a moderate myself.
There are also proposals to run rail systems(monorail,maglev,lightweight conventional)down the interstate medians,for both freight and passenger service.
Privately funded truck only toll roads seem like a good idea(you still need trucks to get the intermodal to the customer,railfans who think boxcars are going to come back as a replacement for stacks and pigs are not grounded in reality),although I realize that you can't build a major road,especially like built up areas like the Northeast,without a lot of Public sector involvement. I also think public/private partnerships to promote rail capacity improvements (Texas Corridor initiative) are a good idea.
From what I've read UP resists public funding because they fear being forced into an open access situation.
I still don't buy the argument that freight rail is an endangered species. I would also point out that some of the problems the class 1's have had recently were self inflicted.

[KenRuben]

Hi:

I haven't been on Trains.com forums for a while but I noticed the "infamous" Wendell Cox mentioned and since I saw this article within the last two days, I thought I would share the article (link below) which covers the current Amtrak-David Gunn situation (from Wendell Cox's point of view):

http://www.heritage.org/shorts/20020606amtrak.html

Any further comments after reading the above article?

---"Ken" Ruben---

[Anonymous]

Personally, I applaud David Gunn for having the guts (and another, somewhat earthier portion of the anatomy) to, when forced to play chicken with Congress, play HARDBALL chicken.

What Wendell Cox refuses to admit (maybe even to himself) is that so long as airlines and interstate trucking continue to receive more government subsidies (both direct and indirect) in a typical year than Amtrak does in a typical decade, the playing field is far from level. If it were level, the railroads, because of the inherent fuel efficiency of steel wheels on steel rails, would still be dominating long-distance transportation.

--
James H. H. Lampert
Professional Dilettante

[Anonymous]

Fuel efficiency isn't everything,we live in a very time sensitive age. Many of the shipper complaints against the big freight railroads have nothing to do with government policy.
I'm pro Amtrak but I think we need to deal with reality. The only way that the US would get large numbers of people off of planes and out of cars and onto long distance intercity trains is by doing interventionist things like kicking up fuel taxes. I'm a moderate but I wouldn't support that.

[Anonymous]

You mention the idea of running commuter rails down the center of interstates. This was done in Chicago. When the Illinois DOT decided to build the Congress (now Eisenhower), Dan Ryan, and Stevenson expressways, they designed them with extra space in the medians for CTA "L" trains. Right now the CTA runs down the middle of the Eisenhower (Blue Line) and Ryan (Red Line), but they decided not to run the Orange Line down the middle of the Stevenson, instead choosing to use former rights-of-way from freight railroads. It would be interesting to have a freight rail run down the middle of I-80, but it probably won't happen. Too many towns along the current routes depend on the rails.

[Modelcar]

I don't think that is the only way the US can act to get people to utilize our rail system more...First we have to have a system that is realiable and with more coverage of the areas we travel to and from. It would take money to build, operate and maintain a better system, but surely a country such as ours can do better. We know all forms of transportation are subsized....Even in today's paper, William F. Buckley supports a better system and says it will cost us money and that this country can afford it.
Maintaining [really not maintaining],a system as we do now, it is no wonder not enough people care to use it as their transportation mode. Come on supporters in Government and private sector, lets figure out what can be done and get it done.

QM

[Anonymous]

Exactly.....The author of this thread evidently does not know what a libertarian is.....Libertarian believes would lead to fewer roads being built as they are governement ventures. This would help the railroads actually. I don't see the connection of libertarians being anti-railroad.

[Anonymous]

This is typical of so many these days...they are parrot-like,spewing what they hear from talk-types and web forums:Get an original thought.

[jsanchez]

Another advantage of railroads that hasn't been mentioned is that they are far less labor intensive than the other modes a two man crew hauling a 100 car train can do the work of 300 truck drivers.....

[Anonymous]

O yes and there will be 300 truck drivers out of work.

[sooblue]

except for direct delivery, the intermodel and container shipments still need to be delivered, so how many of those 300 drivers would go from long haul to short haul? It would be a benifit to the truck drivers to go short haul because they could be home with their families more often.
The railroads need truckers and the truckers could use the railroads to feed them short hauls.
a symbionic relationship.

[Anonymous]

Exactly, Mike. Better allocation of assets. One of the basic principles of business is to work efficiently.... and in this country, our labor force is a major asset.

By converting long haul truckers into short haul truckers, overall efficiency increases, AS DOES CAPACITY!!!! This is very important! Greater capacity=more volume=lower cots=more profit=etc etc etc.... a chain reaction.

Efficiency equating job loss is mostly a result of either a compacting industry which is struggling financially, or an industry in which a circle of attrition is still taking place, on the ultimate path to critical mass.. i.e.in the rail world monopoly or duopoly or whatever you would want to name "the ultimate" railroad.

Anyway, point is: don't aly off those truckers, use them differently, and both sides can win.

Alexander

[Anonymous]

I doubt they will do this the libertaruians also hate transit . in fact on e held a sign at a recent event saying "LIGHT RAIL KILLS BABIES". so i believe they are strange