Edit post

Edit your reply below.

Post Body
Enter your post below.
 [quote user="MidlandMike"]Rather than ignore facts, Mr. Selden brings up the facts that many such as yourself seem to want to ignore, that is that the NEC is very expensive piece of infrastructure to maintain. The total economics overwhelm any profit from "above the rails" operation. So you "don't care much about the necessary investments into the NEC." That does not negate the fact that those capital costs are part of the costs needed to keep it running. The NEC is no more of an economic success than any other of Amtrak's product lines.[/quote] I think you can only compare the "above the rail" costs. Amtraks owns a large part of the NEC and is responsible for investment into and maintenance of that part of the line. The LD trains don't even pay the costs they cause to their hosts. Looking at the "above the rail" costs LD trains make a loss, NEC trains a profit. That Mr. Selden seems to ignore when he writes: Why any enterprise would try to eliminate its largest, most efficient and most successful division is a mystery. And: The supreme irony of Amtrak’s effort is that if it succeeds, all that traffic, free cash flow, return on invested capital and growth opportunity will be lost. Worse, its annual loss, and “need” for federal subsidy to sustain what remains, will grow by more than $400 million annually (according to Amtrak), pushing the total loss and subsidy up by that amount to a figure approaching $2 billion annually. I do not understand the following: How can free cash flow get lost when LD-trains make a loss? How can Amtrak's dept rise when the $500 million loss of the LD trains disappears? The maintenance and investment costs are the price Amtrak has to pay for owning the ROW. On the other hand it allows Amtrak and others to run around 40 trains per direction daily in some sections instead of one pair on host railroads. I don't know if subsidies for the NEC network are unfair when trucks and cars don't pay for the complete damage to roads they cause, or airline use an infrastructure provided at least in part by the government. I don't care in the sense that I accept the investment cost and that I think they are better used in the NEC than elsewhere in the system. Passenger-miles, load factor, and market share alone don't tell anything about the profitability. Regards, Volker <div> </div>
Tags (Optional)
Tags are keywords that get attached to your post. They are used to categorize your submission and make it easier to search for. To add tags to your post type a tag into the box below and click the "Add Tag" button.
Add Tag