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[quote]For the fiscal year ended September 30, 2007, Amtrak's passengers received an average subsidy of $40.68 or 18.6 cents a passenger mile based on a federal subsidy of $1.051 billion to cover its operating loss. [/quote]False!  For FY2006 (that ended September 30, 2007) Amtrak received the total of $1.315 million.  Here is NARP's report from Nov.18,2005 (as the appropriation for FY2006 was finally enacted):[quote]The bill shows the following breakdown: $495 million operations, of which $5 million is to be used for development of a "managerial cost accounting system" (from Senate bill) $780 million for capital and debt service payments, with no more than $280 million for debt service and thus no less than $500 million for capital. $ 40 million "for a new Efficiency Incentive Grant program." These funds are to be used at the discretion of the Secretary and may be used at any time during the fiscal year to make additional operating assistance available to Amtrak if the Secretary determines such assistance is necessary to maintain the operation of existing Amtrak routes...[or] for Amtrak to stay out of bankruptcy and the Secretary and Inspector General have certified that an emergency situation exists." Any funds not spent by September 1, 2006, the Secretary should use "for capital grants to Amtrak for investments that will have a direct and measurable short-term impact on operating efficiencies." [/quote]This disproves Samantha's statement about 1.05 billion operating subsidy.  [quote]My point is this; passenger train advocates tend to present only the information that helps make their case, i.e. increase in number of riders and revenues without mentioning the costs or the loss per passenger mile; comparing gross numbers, i.e. federal spend on highways vs. federal spend on Amtrak without breaking it down to passenger seat miles or vehicle miles traveled, which is the honest way to compare the spends.[/quote]Okay, anybody who wants to prove himself right would quote data that is "fitting" the most.  So, NARP is not an exception.  Who can deny the increase in ridership?  Nobody.  Who can deny that overall spendings on highway and aviation are substantially higher than spending on railroads?  Nobody.  As far as breakdown, that's another issue.  The fact is that railroad transportation does not receive even close to the amount of capital received by other modes.  So, before any claim against operating subsidies could be made, the real issue is to establish adequate capital funding source.  I don't think NARP would disagree with that.[quote]What they did not mention is that a Sunset passenger traveling from Los Angles to New Orleans gets a federal subsidy of nearly $1,000 or that a passenger traveling from Los Angles to anywhere on the Sunset route gets a subsidy of 48.5 cents a passenger mile before interest and depreciation.  This data is verifiable.  [/quote]Where is the link to the source?[quote]It was not able to prevent the discontinuance of the Three Rivers.  It has not been able to force Amtrak to restore the Sunset Limited between New Orleans and Orlando.  And it has not been able to get Amtrak to restore the Coast Starlight between Sacramento and Portland as quickly as it wants.[/quote]Closing the Three Rivers was the decision of Amtrak (not Congress or Administration).  True, NARP discouraged Amtrak from this action and, unfortunately, Amtrak did it anyway.  What can I say about this?  Some things are easier to promote than others.  And, I suspect, it's easier for NARP to influence the elected officials than to influence Amtrak itself.  As for resuming the Sunset Limited east of New Orleans, the discontinuance is not official, at least now.  Apparently, Amtrak is not in a rush to restore it, for one reason or another.  But the official discontinuance notices has never been issued!  Which means, the discontinuance is still deemed "temporary".  Time will show what will come out of it.  Meanwhile, both NARP and local officials are fighting for restoring the service.  But the bottomline is, again, at this point this is under Amtrak's (not the government's) control.  As for Coast Starlight, there are technical issues that neither NARP, nor Amtrak, nor government, is in control of.  This is not a good example because Coast Starlight is much more likely to be shortly restored than both Three Rivers and the eastern portion of Sunset Limited.  [quote]But long distance trains do not make any sense, as suggested by the amount of the subsidy per passenger mile that they require and the tiny percentage of the public that uses them.[/quote]So, why do they make sense in Russia or China or India?  True, overthere much more people are riding them.  But why?  Because those countrues don't hesitate to provide generous funds (both operating and capital) for these trains.  Nobody questions their necessity and viability.  If U.S. government decided to inject huge funds to LD trains, more and more people would ride them, possibly even to the extent of reducing the necessity of operating grants.  Of course, this pattern would be much easier to establish 50 years ago than it is now.  It is always easier to protect something that is intact than to rebuild something that is damaged or partially destroyed.  So, now that the LD trains are running, the first step in providing the ground for future expanding passenger rail network is to preserve them as an essential national asset.    [quote]Riding a train overnight from New York to Cleveland does not make sense, especially for time constrained business persons.  There is very little market for it.  The railroads learned this lesson decades ago.  [/quote]It's a fallacy.  Nobody learned any "lesson".  Getting from New York to Cleveland on the existing Lake Shore Limited does not seem marketable primarily because of the schedule.  The train serves Cleveland in a non-passenger-friendly hour.  In fact, most of the Lake Shore Limited passengers travel either to Chicago itself, or to transfer to other LD trains serving the points west (and it runs full, proving that people [b]do[/b] ride long-distance trains).  If there was another overnight train - between New York and Cleveland only - departing at 7pm and arriving at 7am, it would be marketable.  Simiarly to overnight flights, or to European overnight trains, or to some bus companies that offer overnight service (e.g. New York to Toronto).  I don't believe the U.S. is in any way different from Europe, Russia, or China, as far as intercity transportation demand is concerned.  The reason why most Americans rely on airlines rather than trains is that highway and aviation lobbyists did a "good" job convincing Americans in superiority of highway and air transportation.  You may ask, why Amtrak is not realizing the marketability of 12-hour overnight travel (and not running this type of service).  I don't know why.  This is one of Amtrak's weaknesses.  In fact, I never heard this idea from NARP.  I'll try to bring up this idea and see what they think of it.  [quote]Small blurb in the paper yesterday - McCain rode Amtrak from DC to Philly on Friday.[/quote]That's nice of him.  At least it shows that he is trying to make Amtrak riders believe he's on their side (even if he's not).  If so, it means that he, at least, realizes that Amtrak makes a difference for some people.  But the gesture would be more significant if McCain rode from DC not to Philly but all the way to his home state.
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