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<p>[quote user="Paul Milenkovic"]</p> <p> </p> <blockquote> <div><img src="/TRCCS/Themes/trc/images/icon-quote.gif" /> <strong>conrailman:</strong></div> <div> <p> </p> <p>Why don't Congress give Amtrak 1 Billion Dollars from the Airlines and the Highway Trust Fund, so that 2 Billion in fresh money every year? Back in 1997 they was a bill to give Amtrak 1 cent of the gas tax, but it was ever Vote on or pass in Congress. If that pass in 1997 Amtrak would be rolling in the  money by Now 2011.<img alt="My 2 Cents" src="/TRCCS/emoticons/icon_smile_2cents.gif" /></p> <div style="clear:both;"></div> <p> </p> </div> </blockquote> <p> </p> <p>One can advance all manner of reasons of why "people hate trains" or all manner of conspiracy theories regarding "the death of Amtrak."  We have been at the conspiracy theory explanation for so many decades that I don't think that anyone advancing them should be taken seriously anymore.</p> <p>So, why don't we simply give more money to Amtrak and get more trains.  Why not indeed?  I think the real reason is that cars and planes give "more bang for the subsidy buck."</p> <p>The Vision Report, which is a document that is hailed as "why aren't we doing this" by the passenger train advocacy community, advocates a 10-fold increase in Amtrak funding to get a 10-fold increase in passenger miles, bringing Amtrak from 1/100 as much as the airlines to 1/10 as much.  Thus, spending about as much on trains as we do on the FAA would get us only one tenth the passenger miles of airlines.</p> <p>What about economy of scale, when we get more trains and more people riding them, won't it be cheaper per passenger mile.  No, not really, or at least if you believe the projections of the Vision Report, which is based on the experience in Europe where trains are at a much larger scale than in the U.S..</p> <p>That is why I believe that conspiracy-theory mongering and sitting around complaining that "Congress won't give us more money" is a profound misapplication of passenger advocacy resources, especially this late in the game as it were.  A better direction for advocacy efforts is a twin-pronged effort along 1) why are passenger trains as expensive as they are, and would could be done to make them more cost effective, and 2) to the extent that passenger trains are a high-cost way to supplying passenger miles, what routes and markets are there where the road or airline alternatives, especially adding incremental capacity, would be even more expensive?  [/quote]</p> <p>Spot on!  Good analysis!</p>
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