Gunn Speaks Out

[Junctionfan]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Lotus098

QUOTE: Originally posted by Junctionfan

You have a Bush fixation don't you? How.........why........you would have such a blind admiration for the Bush administration is very strange indeed.

Gunn was fired because he spoke against the administration's lack of positive action of Amtrak and he wanted to fix it. Plain and simple, those morons on the board wouldn't know how to run a railroad if their lives depended on it. If I'm not mistaken, the best way to do something is be honest which is what Jesse Ventura did-when asked about his platform he said he didn't know what should be done but he would hire folk who knew what they were doing-brilliant. Sounds like Bush needs to learn from Ventura.

Gunn, did nothing, and got fired. We got Gunn because he was supposed to know how to run a railroad, but he didn't do anything to fix the problems. If you listen what he was trying to stop, was to the destruction of Amtrak, but a reform to a flawed system. As Mineta said we shouldn't keep pumping money into a flawed system; but Gunn wouldn’t allow it to be changed. In the interview Gunn blames Bush for his firing. If Gunn is so great, what did he do that was saving Amtrak? Gunn clearly put it out in the interview money should just be kept being pumped into Amtrak, with no major changes. He must be very conceited to believe that he can make it work, when it hasn’t worked in about 30 years.

Well the airlines have major problems too but you don't hear down with the airlines.

Back to the railroad-if Amtrak needs money and Gunn couldn't get money, how is that Gunn's fault? What is the point in making meaningless reforms when all it will amount to is a meaningless gesture? If money was Amtrak's problem than they should have recieved money; they didn't give him a chance to see if he could have done a good job with the required resources.

[daveklepper]

I still say Mineta was not doing his job, and if he had been, Gunn would have known he could get support and he would have called Mineta and said: "That dumb mayor woun't let me evacuate the helpless on a 20 car train leaving New Orleans in a few hours" and Mineta would have called Bush who would have read the riot act to the mayor and lives would have been saved.

But if Mineta would really have been doing his job we would have the very necessary National Public Transportation System in place, ready to react to any kind of emergency like Katrina or 11.09.01 or whatever, and the Mayor would have been given a preplanned scnereo adapted specifically to New Orleans. And the buses and trains would have arrived and the school buses would have been used. This would be part of an INTELLIGENT national transportation policy that would make for a strong USA. I remember the A-cards and WWII rationing and the USAmust be prepared for that kind of situation again.

And don't forget, it is FACT that the private personal automobile the MOST SUBSIDIZED form of transportation because all taxes from highway and auto petroleum use have gone for highway purposes, a whole huge industry with most of its real estate not paying taxes into the general welfare. Starting about 1932. Quite a backlog! Railroad freight is the ONLY form of transportation not subsidized in the USA. And automobile transportation takes up more LAND per passenger mile than any other form of transportation, land that could earn income as farmland, offices, factories, residences, whatever.

Mineta has distorted thinking.

That having been said, I think the idea of private operation of a Milwaukee-Chicago-St, Louis-Kansas City Corridor is worth trying. It might work and would cause minimum disruption to the national Amtrak system. If done right it could also get the UP freight off the BNSF KC-Chicago.

[Anonymous]

Big Boy 4005,

I am not saying I know more about it than he does. I just would like to see some this "progress despite efforts to destroy Amtrak." Or see where Mineta (or anyone) has decided to try destroy Amtrak. Gunn, as you said, did not make the changes other thought were needed. Holding status quo, is hardly a turn around.

[Anonymous]

Amtrak's a political football. It might continue to exist, but I doubt that the future lies there.

[Big_Boy_4005]

James, what is so difficult to understand about Gunn's firing? He did not want to follow the plan set forth, and was fired for it. The plan is in black and white (as during the hearing Mr Gunn held up a printed copy) and contains a number of potentially distructive policies, as identified by Mr Gunn. I hope that you would agree that Mr Gunn qualifies as an expert in railroading, far more than you or I.

He didn't like all of parts of the plan. He followed the parts that he thought were reasonable based on his experience. He only had the best intentions and motives for preserving Amtrak in mind.

Do you think an airline exec or a lawyer knows more about railroading than a railroad man?

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by co614

IMHO David Gunn was the first capable CEO since W.G.Claytor,Jr. What he and his team were able to accomplish in the last 3 years DESPITE an Administration dedicated to destroying Amtrak,was truly remarkable. Therein lies his doom.
Had he been another bungler like Warrington he'd still be there. His successes were ruining the Administrations game plan to implode the Company, and they feared that further progress would surely end any chance of getting rid of it.
Firing Gunn however may yet prove a very stupid strategic move as it has substantially energized many in Congress who heretofore were not all that caring on this topic and has led several key members of Congress to put the Administration on notice that it expects 4 new nominees for the Amtrak BOD shortly after the Holidays and that they will be people with credentials in the field, and the recently approved enabling legislation is being "codified" with language insuring the continuance AND future expansion of the LDT's.
From the 5 years I served on the BOD(1982-87) I can tell you first hand that at the end of the day the game is decided in the halls of Congress, not in the White House nor the DOT.
The next few months should be very interesting to say the least!!
Ross Rowland

Anyways would some one be kind enough to find were this administration pledged Amtrak’s destruction? What did Gunn do? Why do all you guy talk about progress, with no facts? I am not saying he didn't make progress, but I haven't seen any. Why are we assuming Gunn is an angelic prophet, yet Mineta who has made clear his goal many times, is lying?

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Lotus098

QUOTE: Originally posted by Junctionfan

You have a Bush fixation don't you? How.........why........you would have such a blind admiration for the Bush administration is very strange indeed.

Gunn was fired because he spoke against the administration's lack of positive action of Amtrak and he wanted to fix it. Plain and simple, those morons on the board wouldn't know how to run a railroad if their lives depended on it. If I'm not mistaken, the best way to do something is be honest which is what Jesse Ventura did-when asked about his platform he said he didn't know what should be done but he would hire folk who knew what they were doing-brilliant. Sounds like Bush needs to learn from Ventura.

Gunn, did nothing, and got fired. We got Gunn because he was supposed to know how to run a railroad, but he didn't do anything to fix the problems. If you listen what he was trying to stop, was to the destruction of Amtrak, but a reform to a flawed system. As Mineta said we shouldn't keep pumping money into a flawed system; but Gunn wouldn’t allow it to be changed. In the interview Gunn blames Bush for his firing. If Gunn is so great, what did he do that was saving Amtrak? Gunn clearly put it out in the interview money should just be kept being pumped into Amtrak, with no major changes. He must be very conceited to believe that he can make it work, when it hasn’t worked in about 30 years.

M I S S O U R I

How ya doin?

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Junctionfan

You have a Bush fixation don't you? How.........why........you would have such a blind admiration for the Bush administration is very strange indeed.

Gunn was fired because he spoke against the administration's lack of positive action of Amtrak and he wanted to fix it. Plain and simple, those morons on the board wouldn't know how to run a railroad if their lives depended on it. If I'm not mistaken, the best way to do something is be honest which is what Jesse Ventura did-when asked about his platform he said he didn't know what should be done but he would hire folk who knew what they were doing-brilliant. Sounds like Bush needs to learn from Ventura.

Gunn, did nothing, and got fired. We got Gunn because he was supposed to know how to run a railroad, but he didn't do anything to fix the problems. If you listen what he was trying to stop, was to the destruction of Amtrak, but a reform to a flawed system. As Mineta said we shouldn't keep pumping money into a flawed system; but Gunn wouldn’t allow it to be changed. In the interview Gunn blames Bush for his firing. If Gunn is so great, what did he do that was saving Amtrak? Gunn clearly put it out in the interview money should just be kept being pumped into Amtrak, with no major changes. He must be very conceited to believe that he can make it work, when it hasn’t worked in about 30 years.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by co614

IMHO David Gunn was the first capable CEO since W.G.Claytor,Jr. What he and his team were able to accomplish in the last 3 years DESPITE an Administration dedicated to destroying Amtrak,was truly remarkable. Therein lies his doom.
Had he been another bungler like Warrington he'd still be there. His successes were ruining the Administrations game plan to implode the Company, and they feared that further progress would surely end any chance of getting rid of it.

Firing Gunn however may yet prove a very stupid strategic move as it has substantially energized many in Congress who heretofore were not all that caring on this topic and has led several key members of Congress to put the Administration on notice that it expects 4 new nominees for the Amtrak BOD shortly after the Holidays and that they will be people with credentials in the field, and the recently approved enabling legislation is being "codified" with language insuring the continuance AND future expansion of the LDT's.

I could not agree more with the first paragraph. [;)]

I would very much like to see improved service and expansion of the long distance trains. We need a LDT running East/West in the middle of the country. Right now, we have none. If I want to go east or west, I first have to trave north or south to Chicago or San Antonio, then I can go east or west. [:(!] With the leg from New Orleans to Florida cut that takes out part of that run. [:(]

We have many railroad beds in this country that don't have trains running on them. We also have rails to trails that could be reclaimed for passenger trains. I have worked on airplanes before, I would much rather take the train these days. It sure would be nice to have that opportunity.

[Big_Boy_4005]

QUOTE: Originally posted by rrnut282

After reading through this topic, I had to scroll back to the header to remember what the subject was.[#offtopic] I shouldn't be surprised. Its hard to find a topic that stayed on track for two pages on this forum.
Again I'll ask, since Gunn was ousted, who is waiting in the wings to take over? Is there a latter day Claytor out there? I'm afraid we'll get stuck with another clueless political hack collecting a paycheck.

Sorry to have gone off topic with "housekeeping". It happens.

The answer to your question seems to be nobody with railroad experience. I heard somewhere some former airline exec was being considered. I would say that your fears are well founded.

Jim, while the dmensions of your photo were a little large, it's the file size that really matters.

[Junctionfan]

You have a Bush fixation don't you? How.........why........you would have such a blind admiration for the Bush administration is very strange indeed.

Gunn was fired because he spoke against the administration's lack of positive action of Amtrak and he wanted to fix it. Plain and simple, those morons on the board wouldn't know how to run a railroad if their lives depended on it. If I'm not mistaken, the best way to do something is be honest which is what Jesse Ventura did-when asked about his platform he said he didn't know what should be done but he would hire folk who knew what they were doing-brilliant. Sounds like Bush needs to learn from Ventura.

[Anonymous]

What was Gunn, he didn't do squat either. I thought he was a real railroader turns out in his clip he thinks he can pull a fast one, but not on people who know about railroads. When he talks about the privatization of the line he compares it to a highway, bad analogy. He says you can't get 2 companies to run on the same tracks for getting this is a common occurrence of freight railroads. He clearly is just upset over losing his job, since he was stopping any reform. As to who takes over you will just hear the same Bush bashing jokes. Me, however, I don't know and am wondering.

[co614]

IMHO David Gunn was the first capable CEO since W.G.Claytor,Jr. What he and his team were able to accomplish in the last 3 years DESPITE an Administration dedicated to destroying Amtrak,was truly remarkable. Therein lies his doom.
Had he been another bungler like Warrington he'd still be there. His successes were ruining the Administrations game plan to implode the Company, and they feared that further progress would surely end any chance of getting rid of it.
Firing Gunn however may yet prove a very stupid strategic move as it has substantially energized many in Congress who heretofore were not all that caring on this topic and has led several key members of Congress to put the Administration on notice that it expects 4 new nominees for the Amtrak BOD shortly after the Holidays and that they will be people with credentials in the field, and the recently approved enabling legislation is being "codified" with language insuring the continuance AND future expansion of the LDT's.
From the 5 years I served on the BOD(1982-87) I can tell you first hand that at the end of the day the game is decided in the halls of Congress, not in the White House nor the DOT.
The next few months should be very interesting to say the least!!
Ross Rowland

[Anonymous]

BB and Anti [8D]

It was suggested to me a while back to downsize my photo in my sig line. I just got rid of it for now. I might bring it back later but much smaller. I have dial up so I did this in consideration of others who have dial up. It takes a while to upload images and pages and it is a source of frustration to wait as long as it takes sometimes.

A G, your image was good and interesting, might I suggest you just downsize it and keep it. It was cool, where did you find it anyway?

Many websites have a limit on images. If your image is oversized the website automatically resizes it to the max allowable. Maybe this site should do that. That way, those of us who are not computer geeks would not offend others who are.

[rrnut282]

After reading through this topic, I had to scroll back to the header to remember what the subject was.[#offtopic] I shouldn't be surprised. Its hard to find a topic that stayed on track for two pages on this forum.
Again I'll ask, since Gunn was ousted, who is waiting in the wings to take over? Is there a latter day Claytor out there? I'm afraid we'll get stuck with another clueless political hack collecting a paycheck.

[Big_Boy_4005]

Sorry AG, but we have been through this A LOT on all the forums here. It hasn't come up here on Trains Magazine as much as on MR. Bergie has mentioned signature image size as being a troublesome issue. Think of all the people with slow connections.

A good rule of thumb is to make sure that a signature image is no larger than 50K, 100K is pushing it. By the way, mine is like 21K.

We had a recent topic on MR about this, I'll try and find the link. Thanks for your cooperation, and Happy Thanksgiving to you too.

Here are a couple of topics.

http://www.trains.com/community/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=48751
http://www.trains.com/community/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=47243

I didn't mean to come across as pushy. I would have emailed you rather than bringing it up in public, but your's isn't listed.

[Anonymous]

Oh, and "Happy thanksgiving" to you to...

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Big_Boy_4005

Anti Gates, sorry man but you've got to remove that cool GIF from your signature. It is a bandwidth pig at over 600K. I have cable, and it is bogging down my connection. What you may not realize is, that image in your signature goes to every post you have ever made in the past.

I suppose it could be viewed as a metaphore for the "wheels of progress".[swg]

wow dude, You are kinda 'pushy' yanno?

I'll take town the graphic, but as far as you telling me what I gotta do,..I don't see forum admin designation next to your name, and you sure are no authority figure in my life, so why don't you go buy yourself a dog if you wanna go ordering somebody around?

And your telling me how sig files propagate to every post I've ever made, is just plain straight up condescending.

Have you tried clearing your cache? Perhaps you have spy ware hogging your bandwidth, or maybe your PC has a virus, have you drefragged your disks lately? How about a corrupt registry, have you looked at that possibility? That could be slowing your pc down. Have you called your cable provider to see if they are having network difficulty first, or did you simply wake up to a slow connection and assume somebody else is to blame? Do you like being told what to do any more than I do? gee, well go figure.

[Modelcar]

...After recent firing of Gunn it's not even worth thinking of how it might be made to operate and serve better....As for Pres. Bush and problems....He is being compensated at the rate of one half mil per year to solve problems so he can find time to deal with this one too......

[jeaton]

I am not putting this problem on Bush. If he has spent more than 5 minutes on this subject since he has had his job, I would be surprised. He has much bigger things to deal with.

If you and Redneck can suggest a way to go that would "fix" Amtrak, take your best shot.

[Modelcar]

...I mean not to get in the middle of above discussion re: Mineta and his job in N O....But for Mineta doing his job overall regarding Transportation...specifically Amtrak is a sad record. Simply a yes man for an Adminstration that {is common knowledge}, wanted to bankrupt our passenger rail system...Amtrak....and on that managed to do a pretty good job....and all the while telling "us"....in most speeches that his goal was to enhance and provide a better system, etc...etc.....all a bunch of bunk.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by daveklepper

It also doesn't have a plan to cope with emergencies like Katrina and a plan with Amtrak as the key would have saved at least 1000 lives.

Mineta's response to Katrina is like GM's immediate response to 11 Sept. 01, to get people to buy more SUV's and fewer smaller cars.

Dave need I remind you of the facts again. http://www.trains.com/community/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=49853
It is the job of local government to write plans that would involve trains, in the recent hurricane you are referring to a train was there, empty, ready to evacuate people; but Ray Nagin would not let them. Mineta has done his job. Having the trains in the plan would have done no good as Mayor Nagin abandoned his plan at the last minute. Why do you insist on using Mineta as the scape-goat for others incompetence?

[Anonymous]

Yep, I am.

[Anonymous]

Lotus098, are you agreeing with me or not.

[Anonymous]

All right, I thought I was the only guy out there that thought this. As far as I heard Gunn was fired because he wouldn't make the changes and reform needed to ever make Amtrak worth-while; for being such a savior, I haven't heard of him doing anything but trying to hold status quo, which as Mineta said is not good enough. (A new topic of leftist Bu***hrashing every three days is not "right".)

[Anonymous]

I know that I will **** off some people with this but shut your yap. Gunn got fired becuase he obviously wasn't the best choice. This is like Lionel vs. MTH,
it is really starting to tick me off.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Modelcar

Uptrain.....Just listened to the Mr. Gunn recording.....Very interesting. Thanks for sharing.

I just listened to it again. He (Mr. Gunn) certainly makes sense. Something the current administration has never done.

[Modelcar]

Uptrain.....Just listened to the Mr. Gunn recording.....Very interesting. Thanks for sharing.

[rrnut282]

I haven't heard of any savior waiting in the wings to save Amtrak. As far as separating infrastructure from operations, I don't think the U.K. is happy with the results now that they tried it.

[BaltACD]

Gunn statements were simple, direct and accurate; something that the Amtrak Board and Minetta inparticular have no grasp or understanding of....expecially the accurate part.