A McIntosh2. Would a consortium of corporations like Disney and Marriot assume a reprivatized Auto Train operation?
How about Disney and Marriot as on-board service providers and terminal operators? Amtrak operates and maintains equipment and nothing more. Solves a lot of problems (like current food service cost issue) and creates opportunities, like vacation package deals, tie-ins, etc.
A McIntosh3. Would the states that fund corridor services stay with Amtrak to run these trains, or go to another contract operator that currently operate commuter trains?
I guess they could, but there are all sorts of issues around freight railroads not really wanting to deal with multiple entities and whether rights owned by Amtrak are transferrable to others.
A McIntosh4. How many eastern LD trains would be left? Would Amtrak provide operating crews and leave on board services to be provided by someone like Ed Ellis's Pullman Rail?
Or, flip and cut eastern LD routes into "corridor" day trains. Cut FL routes at Jacksonville and turn service south of there into corridor service for intra-state travel. FL is 4th largest state with lots and lots of folk who don't (or shouldn't!) drive much. Cut the Crescent at Atlanta and make it part of the Piedmont/NEC corridor extension. Cut the LSL and Capitol at Cleveland. Reconfigure into Cleveland-Chicago Corridor. Turn eastern half of Capitol into Cleveland -DC via Phila. Extend Pennsylvanian to Cleveland. Eastern half of LSL becomes extension of Empire Service.
-Don (Random stuff, mostly about trains - what else? http://blerfblog.blogspot.com/)
This could almost be a separate thread, but here goes. Suppose that a doomsday scenario takes place in which Congress and the administration agree to defund Amtrak, with possible exception to publically owned track maintenance like the NEC and the Michigan line. What, if anything, would survive?
1. Would portions of the western LD trains continue as a seasonal Rocky Mountaineer type operation?
2. Would a consortium of corporations like Disney and Marriot assume a reprivatized Auto Train operation?
3. Would the states that fund corridor services stay with Amtrak to run these trains, or go to another contract operator that currently operate commuter trains?
4. How many eastern LD trains would be left? Would Amtrak provide operating crews and leave on board services to be provided by someone like Ed Ellis's Pullman Rail?
I don't know, V.P.; if Boardman did overstate the need, and Congress provided less, wouldn't that make it easier for Amtrak to avoid ruinous service cuts?
In other words, maybe Boardman is giving LD some negotiating room -- as when, putting your house on the market, you ask more for it than you have to have and can live with.
"it will be too easy for Congress to simply cut the requested dollars for LD"...
I think Mr. Boardman got himself into a trap with this one as he quoted the Fully Allocated Cost of the LD trains as the $618 million number that needs to be provided, or by inference could be cut.
But that number allocates a good amount of system overhead to the routes, by route mileage and revenue as far as I can tell. It seems like groups such as RailPAC ( check the reference to the letter to the Senator) and URPA agree. When you look at the disagreement between the FRA and Amtrak around 2000 over the "FRA Defined Cost" and now over the Long-Term Avoidable Operating Loss numbers that the 2008 PRIIA law required but still cannot be produced uhmmm... "Data for tables 1 and 3 will not be available until the avoidable costing methodology for the Amtrak Performance Tracking (APT) System has been completed" it appears the FRA agrees as well.
As far as I can tell the Long-Term Avoidable Operating Loss on LD service is $100-200 million at most to which you would add whatever equipment capital with a discount rate applied to get a true Long-Term Avoidable Total Loss. If you expanded the train consists the number would improve markedly.
The problem is that the system overhead will be difficult to cut as most of it is needed for the core NEC operations. Up to about $260 million a year can easily be defended for the LD network, as a comparable revenue shortage exists on a per passenger mile basis on the Interstate system.
I wish Mr. Boardman had just come clean on the need for $400 million, maybe $600 million with recapitalization, in infrastructure support for commuter operations by others over the NEC instead of blaming it on the LD trains. He could have just said that this is logically a FTA responsibility that Amtrak inherited, we will continue to fund it, but Congress should fully fund the commuter infrastructure responsibility, through the FTA.
BTW, the Highway Trust Fund is going to need $16 Billion a year just to stay afloat in the coming years, even should we increase the fuel tax to cover that gap, the leveraging from taxes on City roads not funded by the HTF to the HTF would mean that users would go from paying 14% to 18% of the Interstate costs incrementally through the fuel tax.
I can't fault Boardman's argument, even as it puts the LD trains at risk. The NEC is a special case, is of unique importance to the country, and deserves to be able to put its operating profits to work on its own line, which needs them badly.
At the same time, Boardman was careful, I think, to make the case for the LD trains, and in eloquent terms, which I appreciate.
What I'm afraid of is that it will be too easy for Congress to simply cut the requested dollars for LD, and when Amtrak has to make some painful choices, be able to say, "Hey, we didn't tell them they had to cut the Empire Builder (or Chief or Cardinal)."
Something for everyone. Putting LD services as separate from the rest of Amtrak, with its own subsidy and capital budget makes sense.
C&NW, CA&E, MILW, CGW and IC fan
It's a different ballgame now. The critics used to point to the Federal Highway Program as self-sustaining and add, "Why can't you do that?" The HIghway Trust Fund has been insolvent for the last 4-5 years. ALL Federal transportation schemes now depend on the General Fund to pay for upgrades and maintenance. The change came but not at Amtrak.
Editor Emeritus, This Week at Amtrak
http://www.amtrak.com/ccurl/412/537/Amtrak-FY2015-Federal-Budget-Request-ATK-14-028,0.pdf
I think Boardman is being very astute. He's cutting Amtrak's critics off at the knees by not letting them point at the Sunset as the argument for selling the NEC. Brilliant!
He puts the ball for funding the LD trains squarely in Congress's court.
Our community is FREE to join. To participate you must either login or register for an account.