http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41021318/ns/business/
The only change I see in this plan is the separation of capital improvements and maintaining the present routes. If and that is a big if those two items can remain separate then the maintaing of "in service" facilities is very important. All of our posters has noted before how AMTRAK has not had enough capital to remain in a state of good repair. If it had not been for the one time grant to make many necessary repairs under ARRA I would suspect that AMTRAK would have a much lower on time performance record and would not be carrying record number of passengers.
Comments?
Seems like some of the newly elected govenors are a little gun-shy of the Administration's desire to give away billions (or millions) to facilitate their dream of HSR.
From an Associated Press story dated 02/16/2011 on Fox News' website:
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/02/16/florida-gov-scott-cancels-tampa-orlando-high-speed-train/
FTL: "...Scott said he believes that ridership and revenue projections tend to be too optimistic and would likely require ongoing state government subsidies. Finally, Scott noted, that if the project went belly-up, Florida would be required to refund the federal government's investment in the project. "
"...Gov. Scott said he informed U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood of his decision earlier Wednesday. Republican governors in Ohio and Wisconsin have also rejected high-speed rail plans..."
Looks like the Federal Gov. which lays the golden eggs for these big projects is being found to have unintended consequences in their gifts. When the Feds move on it is left to the individual states to finish said projects and then keep them maintained and running when the Federal Dollars dry up. The NJ/NY ARC project recently cancelled by NJ Gov. Christie is another example of the Feds giving and then taking back when the States figure out what they got when they asked for Federal assistance is not exactly what they were expecting or hoping for.
Even as we speak, NC has temporarily suspended the noon Piedmont between Charlotte and Raleigh because they are using the daylight hours to upgrade the ROW, crossings, and signals for higher speeds. The project began 2/14 and is schedule to be completed by 4/21.
http://www.bytrain.org/docs/RemindertrackWork21011.pdf
We are continuing to build ours but that is probably because ... oh never mind.
Dave
Lackawanna Route of the Phoebe Snow
Also interesting:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/13/AR2011021302203.html
The "global" argument against HSR. Heard before many places - a bit better thought out an explained than most.
This is not to say there aren't niches where passenger rail, HSR in particular, wouldn't work, but the "inherent goodness" just ain't there.
-Don (Random stuff, mostly about trains - what else? http://blerfblog.blogspot.com/)
samfp1943 Seems like some of the newly elected govenors are a little gun-shy of the Administration's desire to give away billions (or millions) to facilitate their dream of HSR....[snip]
Seems like some of the newly elected govenors are a little gun-shy of the Administration's desire to give away billions (or millions) to facilitate their dream of HSR....[snip]
oltmannd Also interesting: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/13/AR2011021302203.html The "global" argument against HSR. Heard before many places - a bit better thought out an explained than most. This is not to say there aren't niches where passenger rail, HSR in particular, wouldn't work, but the "inherent goodness" just ain't there.
Interesting, though an article that cites Randal O'Toole of the extremist Cato Foundation might be less than objective.
C&NW, CA&E, MILW, CGW and IC fan
Our community is FREE to join. To participate you must either login or register for an account.