Amtrak funding

[Anonymous]

Forget the concept of feeders, high speed rail is a line-haul form of transportation. Park and ride auto is its feeder mode, taxi and rental car is its distributor mode.

Eugen was added to get funding from State of Oregon, they didn't want just Portland to be their only poiint of service.

[Anonymous]

Maybe. How about DOT's plans to build a high speed rail line from Dallas to San Antonio, and from Dallas to Tulsa via Oklahoma City. Would you consider this one line or two? This corridor's total length is 580 miles.

Or how about DOT's plans to build a high speed rail line from Chicago to Saint Louis, and from Saint Louis to Kansas City. Would you consider this one line or two? This corridor's total length is 550 miles.

Why not connect the 240 miles between Kansas City and Tulsa?

I have also noticed on DOT's plans a high speed rail line from Houston to New Orleans (and beyond to Mobile), New Orleans to Washington DC thru Birmingham and Atlanta, Charlotte, and Raleigh. Would you consider this one line, two lines, or even three lines? This corridor's total length is 1500 miles.

SO MUCH FOR 300 MILES!

There are a few holes in DOT's planned high speed rail lines, politically motivated somehow. Why does the DOT not fill the holes between Dallas and Houston, Kansas City and Tulsa, Little Rock and Saint Louis, Mobile to Jacksonville, Jacksonville to Orlando, Pittsburgh and Cleveland, and Cleveland and Buffalo? Their plans make zero sense. Why build a line all the way south to Florida from Boston and not include the Jacksonville to Orlando corridor? Explain this please....

The DOT, FRA, and Amtrak do not have any plans to connect Dallas to Houston, or Houston to San Antonio, two thirds of the so called highly dense Texas triangle! Half of Texas' 20 million 2000 population lives in the metropolitan Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio, and does this without including Austin.

In my opinion it would be better to join the four major population centers east of the Rockies, Northeast, Midwest, Texas, and Florida with high speed rail, with an additional line between the Midwest and Florida. Four sides to the parrelegram, with a sla***hrough its shortest hubs. This would be better than anything FOT and the FRA have conjured up, i.e., incomplete corridors.

My hubs include the northeast corridor with enough population to have its high speed rail corridor built already, the Chicago Midwest is surely a large metropolitan area, take your pick of either Atlanta and Florida, plus Texas: Dallas and Houston both over 5 million in metropolitan area (it would be nice to connect the two so that you could include both as a hub).....DOT's plan misses these two cities big time......

[Anonymous]

Well, if Euegen was added to get state funds, then the joke's on Amtrak! I chcukeld when I read that. They didn't get squat out of the Legislature.

Maybe next time they make that kind of calculation, they'd better check with someone on the ground who knows these Jokers first!

As for you comments on feeders, I agree. One of the stupidest things that our local transit agency did on their new light rail route was not build long term lots to serve it- and this is a line meant to access an airport. What, do they expect us to only fly out for a couple hours, and return? Sheesh!

I've always though that Amtrak should've had a hand hold with a rental car agency, to make sure that wherever you deboard, you will be met by, say, the Enterprise guy with you Chrysler convertable or whatever. But what do you expect from an organization that closes their stations at 8 pm when the train is due in at 11?

[Anonymous]

300 miles is the length for which high speed rail can be competitive with airplanes and highways!

1 - Dallas is the regional financial hub for the southwest. A Dallas-Austin-San Antonio HSR and a Dallas-Oklahoma City-Tulsa as separate spokes to the hub. HSR would not be competetive with flying for the Tulsa/San Antonio endpoints.

2. - Some elements of the Fed's HSR plan for the Piedmont are justifiable. Atlanta-Charlotte should be the top prirority. But 1,500 long HSR routes are not practical. One of the major operating defieciencies of Amtrak's NE Coridor is their trying to operate it as one corridor. NE Directs and even Acela trains that lose time south of Phil. delay service to New England and vise versa. Operate the NE Corridor as Boston-Phil., southern Connecticut-DC and DC to Richmond.

3 - If a route is longer than 300 miles it is courting potential disaster. For example, Chicago to Minneapolis is 400 miles via the present Amtrak route. Diverging to serve Madison WI adds another 50 miles. Diverging to serve Rochester MN adds another 50 miles. The interstate freeways in the Midwest (outside of the metropolitan centers) work very well, so the auto is much more of a competitor than it is in th Northeast.

Similarly no one would use the circuitous Chicago-Kansas City route via St. Louis, but develop them as two corridors and they could well be successful.

It could very well be that HSR should be developed as several unconnected hubs. Regional hubs that are hundreds or thousands of miles from each other are the province of the airplane. We can still have a national rail passenger network, but it would involve turning all the Superliner long hauls into autoveyer trains - cooperate with the motorist!

Many of the missing corridors don't have political sponsorship in Washington. On the other hand, the ones that are on the list that don't belong have sponsorship.

[Anonymous]

Good point on the "auto-veyer" concept. Auto Train is our only example of this, but it is actually a common setup in Australia. Now whether it pays for itself is another matter, but certainly it is an operating scheme that would work, especially on western trains, which are primarily tourist oriented. Certainly they could serve regional attractions better, by extending the reach and usefullness of the train routes that allready run.

[RudyRockvilleMD]

I thoriughly agree. The purpos of high speed trains is to provide an altenative mode of transportation that is competitive in time with air travel in 200-400 mile corridors.

[Anonymous]

I have to disagree about the length of high speed rail. As I have noted before, one cannot fly from Dallas to any of the Springfields. These stops add at least an hour to an airline fiight., probably more. It is not given that a connecting flight will leave in an hour.

Recently I checked American Airlines web site for the cheapest fare, and Amtraks web site for the fare between Dallas and Chicago. American Airlines with any number of one stop flights ran $525 round trip coach, while Amtrak ran $274 round trip coach. Yes, the one stop flight took 5 and a half hours, whereas Amtrak if it ran a 150 mph average TGV Thalys trainset on dedicated track could accompli***he journey in 6 hours, practically the same time. Amtrak would be competitive...the distance is 920 miles. Yes, for a price, one could fly non stop to Chicago and save three hours.

I am willing to accept as a trial building the north and east legs first. I expect a huge increase of ridership on the high speed trains from the midwest to the northeast and from the southeast to the northeast. So much so, that the trains would run practically full and with more frequency. For example its 870 miles from Atlanta to New York City, slighly less than Dallas to Chicago. Air fares and train fares are given. Is six hours too long for travelers to get to New York City? One thing is for sure, they could not drive it in 6 hours. People in the large cities with the major hub airports might be use to flying nonstop, but people living in the smaller cities as small as 100,000 in population are use to one stop and two stop flights, and the downtime of an hour or more making connecting flights.

Why is it too long to take a six hour train trip, and it is not too long to fly six hours to get to one's destination?

It is the dollar, not the time of the journey that reflect ones choice of travel.....

As I noted before, Amtrak runs 6 trainsets on the Eagle today. With 8 Thalys trainsets averaging 150 mph, Amtrak could run a frequency of every two hours between Dallas and Chicago....both regional centers of over 23 million plus.....

Let Amtrak run this long distance parrelegram, let the states run the locals from these centers..... We'll have a rail network worthy of being called American.....

[Anonymous]

Hate to burst your railfan bubble, but 300 miles is the effective range for HSR. Do you know of any 500+ mile routes in Europe or Japan? The enormous expense of building TGV-type ROW csn not be justified through thinly populated rural areas.

With NIMBY opposition, even 300 mile TGV corridors are going to be darn near impossible to implement. As a result, an evolutionary approach to HSR is what's going to happen in this country, and funding for this is scarce. No sense in doing any more day dreaming. Like it of not, there is a role for the airplane: travel markets of 400 miles plus.

Amtrak's Dallas-Chicago fare reflects the trade-off of the longer trip time. HSR will command a premium a la Acela. Six trainsets working Chicago-St.Louis can make more round trips and would not have the airplane for competition.

Direct NY-Atlanta flights (the kind the most people choose) can do the trip in three hours max.

Let Amtrak be abolished and an organizational off-shoot of Metra run the Midwest hub, with similar such groups for the Northeast, California, Texas, Florida, and the Piedmont corridor of Georgia-North Carolina. The freight railroads or cruise-type frims (AOE or Montana Daylight) should run the long-haul inter-regional autoveyer trains.

[Anonymous]

TGV's orange train goes all the way to Marseilles now from Paris. The TGV Thalys train runs north of Paris to Calais and thru the Chunnel to London. The British have started and will be finished in two years upgrading its track to the Chunnel with high speed rail.

There are huge benefits to such a high speed rail system, I once took a train from Paris to Marseilles, which is a distance of 600 miles. The journey took about 4 hours, giving rise to an average speed of a whopping 150 mph including many stops. I have known people who have decided to drive the whole way needing to make an over-night stop half way. Hence France doesn't have too much traffic problems. Naturally there are environmental considerations. Because of the high-tech low friction design of the train, once it is running, it needs very little energy to keep it going. At 165 mph the engines can be switched off, and the deceleration is not even noticeable.

The excellent track laying techniques of French engineers mean the train is as smooth as an aircraft in clear skies, and there are no vibrations at all, and so quiet you could hear someone whispering at the other end of the carriage.

Oh yes, overall this is a very remarkable train and is rightly the envy of the world.

By Oliver Keating
check out his web site at
http://o-keating.com/hsr

SO MUCH FOR 300 MILES, SO MUCH FOR 250 MILES......you do not have to beat the airliner, just get there today, before the sun sets! DO YOU HAVE A ROCK FOR A BRAIN?

[Anonymous]

As I have said before, Amtrak should be a national system, not local. Amtrak should have the vision to build the long runs between NEC, Midwest, Texas, and Florida. To keep the west coast happy, between the Bay area and LA.

The only trains Amtrak should be operating today are the trains routes scheduled for upgrading to high speed rail. The rest should be killed. The longest leg in America I suggested will be around 900 miles. On every leg there are cities larger than 1 million in population. On every leg there are hub cities with at least 5 million in metropolitan population. Look at the census, look at the maps, this is the future.....

Get this, our DOT spent last year $7 billion for local rail and bus systems, and will again this year. Isn't it about time DOT spent $7 billion a year for a high speed rail Amtrak network I suggest?

[Anonymous]

Elvis,

Sorry for the delay. I got kinda busy. I'm sure you know how it goes. Your math looks OK based on our assumptions, mainly that an express train has to earn $320k or more to 'earn its keep.' Your conclusion that sleeper service might make it and that coach probably can't is right along with what I have been saying all along. The economic conditions necessary to support passenger rail don't exist in the US right now.

Another fellow is proclaiming that an HSR network with the real fast trainset can make money, at least enough to cover the operating costs (what is that BTW, the fuel, crew, and engine maintanence?). I don't think so because it assumes there are enough people wanting to go to the same destination from the same point of origin and they all want to leave at about the same time. I don't think this is valid. The reason I think this is because the airlines can't fill a plane (in most cases) to go from one point to another and a plane holds far fewer people. That is why they use the 'hub system'. A plane load of Delta passengers leaves one location to go to a hub where they are placed on another flight to their destination. Both planes fly at near capacity. It is the ability of the airlines to shuffle passengers at the hub that allows them to make a profit. FedEx does the same thing.

If you translate that into the rail model, you can never get costs and travel times down where they are attractive. The result is that you have to only provide service on the prime routes. This leaves out a vast majority of the country. And this is why I object to the funding comming from the Federal Government. The system that operates at a near break even level provides service to a fraction of the citizens. The system that provides service to everyone loses money hand over fist. And this proposal still wants to take the cost of the roadbed off the books.

This is why I think the people who benifit from a successful Amtrak should bear the costs. It appears to me that it may be able to work in the NEC where commuter service can be provided and the cars will run with plenty of passengers. And if the NEC states want to form a regional authority to work this out with Amtrak then I can live with that. But I don't think it is wise or moral to waste money operating Amtrak at a loss. If it is moral to waste money like this in one industry, why not others? I'm not saying that money isn't being wasted in other industries, I'm just saying it isn't right. And Amtrak appears to be among the worste.

Nice chatting with you. - Roy

[Anonymous]

Amtrak is a failure because of its NE-centric management - it can't see the national picture.
The tremendous upsurge of intercity train ridership in California over the past few years was accomplished without any input from Amtrak and, in the early years, the opposition of the Penn Central refugees in Philadelphia HQ.

I also think you should look at the census and distances between metro areas. There are only six metropolitan areas with over 5 million population: NYC, LA, Chi., Bay Area, Phil. and Boston.

The USA had a better passenger rail system when we had many carriers. For that matter, we had a better air line network than we do with the obviously coming United/American monopoly.

A national system of many carriers and having HSR and long haul autoveyer trains serving particularized markets is just what the USA needs.

[Anonymous]

The USA will not settle for getting there before dark. It has to equal the airplane's time.

Drawing lines on a map is not transporation planning. If it were, any kindergardener with coloring crayons, or for that matter, any resident of a mental institution with a dull pencil could also plan a TGV system.

[Anonymous]

Mr.Clark, Sounds great a train coasting along on its own momentum but not possible.I worked AMTK for 11yrs as a engineer and to maintain high speed it takes constant powering of the traction motors.Sure you can coast down a slight grade as long as that grade continues but eventually you'll have to level off or go up hill.If the grade is to great you'll have to use dynamic brakes.Even in Nebraska where it looks flat on a map.And what about the train traveling in the opposite direction? Whats down hill going east is up hill going west.As long as you use steel wheels on steel rails this will never change.Laws of physics.Takes energy to maintain momentum.Or have the French invented a perpetual motion machine?

[Anonymous]

Anthony,Don't let the ones with rocks for brains throw you,they live in glass houses.I for one think you're absolutly correct.Until this country is forced into a alternate mode of transportation or falls out of love with their automobile, HSR will never come to be.

[Anonymous]

Roy:

Perfectly understand your objections on "moral" (perhaps that should be ethical?) grounds. I feel much the same way- part of why if states have more say it becomes fairer, as states, (at least Oregon does!) have petition intititive systems. So if the people of Oregon want to tax themselves to support rail transit, fine by me. I'll vote no because it's not economical, but I'd respect the deicision if it turned out the other way.

Whereas I cannot respect the decisions made by Congress thousands of miles away which are political and not based on the needs and desires of a community, much less whether it functions at all....

Elvis

[Anonymous]

Elvis,

The problem with the US congress is that it is further removed from accountability. The purpose of your local representative to congress is to go and bring back more pork than you paid for. What we need is a president who will say, 'This is an interesting idea, I think we should see how it goes in a few states first before we force the whole country to do this.' Not going to happen!

BTW, you may have to give up the 'Elvis' if this thing keeps its legs. I never thought I would cross 100 because I thought it was pretty much talked out when you had yours up. This is a major topic. I wish I could summarize the different proposals so people could formulate their arguments in support or against each proposal. I regret that some people would only say, 'This is how I want it', or 'That's what they do in Europe'. But the one I can't stand is the 'But the government builds the highways, why can't we get them to pay for a railroad network for Amtrak.' If they put the new railroad tax on the ticket price then it would be comparable but many of these other folks don't see it that way.

Nice chatting with you. - Roy (for now)

[Anonymous]

Anthony:

Right! But there are a few obsticles. For one, the freight roads aren't really happy at the idea of mutliple operating companies on their tracks....

I once advanced, and still somewhat like, the idea of turning the running of these trains back over to the freight roads. That would not provide "multiple" companies, only two, accross the west, but that is one more than we have now!

Basically think of it like this: there could be multiple "train companies" that handle bookings, financing equipment, etc... but they would contract for crews, power, and dispatching with the host road. Additionally the host road could run it's own trains if it likes. All trains would receive a certain ammount in subsidy from the Feds for capital costs based on ridership- money for infrastructure like signals, capacity, etc... perhaps for cars.. but not for personell, supplies, fuel, etc.. these would come from ticket costs.

So how about that idea? I have no idea if it'd work, but it seems at first glance to be reasonable, and since the loco crews and control would still be in the hands of the RR, there wouldn't be additional safety & communication problems.

Oh, and stations & their upkeep? That belongs to the city they serve, much like airports belong to the local port districts. No station? No stop!

[Anonymous]

Don,

Why don't you take your idea to some investment bankers and go for it?

Ed

[RudyRockvilleMD]

I agree the long distance routes should be abolished, but realistically I am half resigned to the fact that won't happen; nevertheless when the Amtrak reauthorization bill comes up in the 108th Congress some very hard decisions will have to be made.

Yaou may be interested to know France extended its TGV southeast high speed line clear to Marseille which is nearly 486 miles from Paris. Travel time on a non-stop TGV between Paris and Marseille is 3 hours, while the travel time for TGV's that make stops is 3 hours and 20 minutes.

[Anonymous]

Hey, I just copied and pasted Oliver Keatings words. He did say the train would decelerate. Yet, steel wheels on steel rails have less resistance than rubber on concrete. And yes, trains use a lot less energy than jet aircraft.

More from Oliver Keating:
You would think aircraft could compete with ticket prices in Europe. This is very difficult. Aircraft are very expensive to build and maintain, much more than trains. The most expensive train in the world is the Eurostar at $40,000 a seat. Most aircraft by comparison are $200,000 per seat! Trains do have costs such as paying for the railway lines which are expensive, then again, so are airports, and airlines have to pay airports a lot of money. (Landing charges). Also there is energy, aircraft consume a hidious amount of fuel when compared to trains, which has to be paid for. As a result operating costs for airlines two to three times higher than for trains. Offering a cheap and cheerful service isn't possible.

Trains do have air resistance, but the faster you go the more air resistance you face. As a result the faster you travel the more energy you consume between two points since energy=force x distance. Now one advantage of aircraft is they climb to where the air is thinner, so air resistance is 40% less. But because they go 300% faster than trains, its not a benefit. Also the design of aircraft makes them more prone to air resistance… they rely on air resistance to stay in the air. Aircraft use a lot of fuel to climb about 10km or 7 miles (30,000ft) into the air.

The Jet engine is always going to be innefficient too, because it relies on blasting burnt fuel out of the rear. This means that the vast majority of energy goes speeding up the air. It doesn't divide 50/50 because kinetic energy is a function of the square of velocity (double speed quadruple energy). So most of the energy is used to make a huge hurricane with a little left for the actual aircraft. Another reason why it is innefficient is because it relies heat… so you get a hot hurricane! Not only that but because there are so many moving parts there is a huge amount of noise. In short, noise, heat, wind come out of the jet engine as wasted energy, meaning only about 10% left goes into making the aircraft go.

Electric trains on the other hand don't make noise greater than conversation volume even at full power, although motors get hot they don't reach thousands of degrees, and they don't produce 1,000 mph winds. As a result power efficiency is very high, in the 40%-60% of the energy goes into making the train go.

[Anonymous]

Don't have to. My plan is actually less than DOT's plans. DOT plans do have gaps, but do we really need two lines out of Dallas going north, and two lines in the Carolinas going south? Wouldn't it be better to concentrate on one line and filling in the gaps? See this web page of a map of high speed rail corridor designations and extensions at
http://www.fra.dot/rdv/hsgt/index.htm

And I still think the Europeans are correct about this too. I wish DOT saw it their way. It is UNSAFE to operate high speed trains running 180 mph on track with freight trains running 30 mph. It would be a nightmare for the dispatchers! Or do you suggest we stop a passenger train going 180 mph for 20 minutes to allow a slow freight to pass the siding? Why bother to go fast if you are going to stop for so long?

[Anonymous]

Actually wasn't it George and Paul and Ringo and etc... who kicked Elvis off the charts? Cut your hair!

I know what you mean about the Europe thing, if you recall that was in my introductory gripe. That thread was my attempt to inject logic into this whole debate.

Looks like we've got another like minded soul in the guise of Anthony "Sharpshooter". Talk about blunt!

Yes, on subsidies, everyone says trucks are subsidized, but they never want to discuss how they are subsidized, ie by infrastructure and not by operations, and so their proposals for Amtrak always fall flat on that battle cry of "level the playing feild, (but also pay for our gas!)".

(And their crews, and their water, and their locomotives, and their..... etc etc...)

Course, AAR isn't much better, did you hear them the other day? AAR head was testifying in Congress about how trucks need to pay their fair share. As if the weight mile tax was skewed in their favor?!?!?!?

Raise those taxes and there goes 1/3 of our freight capacity, as it'll drive the independents out of biz- great for Hunt though as they'll be booming with business and be able to pick up used semis really cheap.

Oops, off topic again!

The King has left the forum.

[Anonymous]

Obviously you have not looked at the 2000 Census. The Dallas Fort Worth metropolitan area (the so called Metroplex) of their two counties and the counties around them equals 5 million. I shall list them: Dallas 2218899, Tarrant 1446219, Collin 491675, Denton 432976, Wise 48793, Parker 88495, Johnson 126811, Ellis 111360, Kaufman 71313, Rockwell 43080. The total population of Dallas Metroplex is 5,378,621. More than two-thirds of the people living in the counties around Dallas and Tarrant counties compute to work there.

Since I said Houston was 5 million too, I shall list its counties too. Harris 3400578, Montgomery 293768, Liberty 70154, Chambers 26031, Jefferson 252051, Orange 84966, Brazoria 241767, Galveston 250158, Fort Bend 354542, Waller 32663, Grimes 23552. Total Houston metropolitan area population is 5030230. People living in the Houston area think nothing of going to the beach in Galveston. There is a 6 lane freeway all the way, most of the time it is stop and go.

In the thirty years I have lived in Texas, Texas' population has almost doubled. These same counties only added up to 2 and a half million in 1970. Looking into the future, Texas is expecting to double its population again in thirty years. Like Amtrak, you are thinking in the past, 1970s vintage.

To show that Atlanta isn't anywhere near its Fulton county population, lets list its counties. Fulton 816006, Cobb 607751, Dekalb 665865, Gwinnett 588448, Rockdale 70111, Clayton 236517, Fayette 91263, Douglas 92174, Cherokee 141903. Total for the Atlanta area is 3310038. Not quite as large as Dallas and Houston, but not that small either. Since many rail passengers would more than likely head further south to Florida, Atlanta is the major city of the deep south, it will be big enough.

Yes, when we forced the railroads to lose money on passengers, we had a better system. However, I dare suggest if we followed my plan, or something like it, and move on to high speed rail, while we might not have as many depots and routes, we would have a better system moving passengers between the major population centers east of the Rockies and with more frequency....

My plan would cost at least $84 billion to build, DOT's plan would cost at least $59 billion, if you filled in their gaps it would cost at least $120 billion. If I were riding the train to Florida, I would expect to get further south than Jacksonville.....on high speed rails.

[Anonymous]

However, we are not Europe. Our major population centers of the Notheast, Midwest, Texas and Florida are 800 to 900 miles apart. However, a train averaging 150 mph can accompli***hese journey in 6 hours. Is 6 hours too long for a train ride? I have been know to drive to Fort Worth in an hour, Waco in two hours, Austin in four hours, San Antonio in five hours, and to Corpus Christi in seven hours. Heck, it takes 6 hours to drive to Memphis from Dallas, and 6 hours to drive to Kansas City. The drive from Dallas to Houston is four hours, and five hours to Galveston. Wouldn't it be nice to get to Houston in less than 2 hours from Dallas on a high speed train? Or for that matter, to get to Atlanta or Chicago in 6 hours?

[Anonymous]

You would still have to get from Chicago to the West Coast. Certaibly, between Chicago and Denver, I would imagine that 150 mph average would be possible; maybe a bit higher. In 10 hours you would cover 1500 miles.

You would either have to climb over the Rockies or cut a very long tunnel.

However, for the immediate period, it would be useful if someone would be willing to put a few million Amtrak's way to repair the wreck-damaged cars. This is a classic case of 'sweating the assests'; something BR had to do in the UK for many years. Howevwer, in the long-term it is counter-productive as the remaining units are overworked.

Jason.

[Anonymous]

Anthony,

Thanks for injecting a little 'hard reality' into the conversation. I am afraid many of these folks just want the government to provide them with a train to ride on when they fancy a little trip. They don't care how much it costs or how much money is wasted as long as they don't have to bear the weight of it. Your comment about 'Drawing lines on a map is a poor substitute for transportation planning' was great. I work as a civil engineer and these guys don't understand what their proposal would cost. Keep it up - Ed

[Anonymous]

Don,

I think your proposal falls short on several points. The most significant is that your plan doesn't do anything for the folks out west. You won't get that through congress. I also don't think you are going to get from Chicago to Atlanta for $20 million a mile.

Could you tell me what are the operating limits for this high speed train? What is the steepest grade and sharpest curve allowed in the alignment?

Also, I don't think the track in the NEC will permit the speeds you want to see. So they would be stuck with their 'old fashioned' service which isn't going to go over well in congress. Another obstacle is that in order for your trains to make good time, they have to keep moving. Very few stops will be allowed. This cuts out so many of the people in this country. One reason people drive is so they have use of their car when they get on the other end. I know many people think this is just a competition between airlines and Amtrak, but that is not accurate. True the airlines are on one end of the spectrum but on the other end are buses and cars.

I just don't think your proposal is reasonable. - Ed

[Anonymous]

My road atlas says its 1011 miles from Denver to Chicago. It is also 780 miles from Denver to Dallas. Denver is a fast growing city. Colorado has a lot of ski resorts, which would make a nice destination in the winter. Of course, this route is not on DOTs plans, but it should. Adding another 1000 miles at $20 million per mile adds up to another $20 billion. I am for it.

But over or through the Rockies, Denver is a very poor location. The passes are the highest there, it would be much easier to get over the Rockies in either Montana (GN) or New Mexico (SP). But there aren't any large cities along these other routes like Denver. More than likely the cost to build at any of these routes would cost as much as the rest of the network.....By the time we got to Oakland, we would have to have a sleeper, something I'm attempting to avoid....

Yes, it would be nice to get the +100 cars back into service. They don't generate any revenue in Indianapolis... But we should also address why they are there. We are operating passenger trains on freight railroad tracks. With so many derailments one wonders whether the freight companies are keeping their tracks up to snuff.....

[Anonymous]

Looks like in California they will lose their love of the automobile in 10 years. To meet their new pollution legislation, they will be selling golf carts as automobiles. If the rest of the country follows, everyone would have a choice of driving a golf cart to get about. Forget about speed! Good luck!