Another Look at Amtrak's Future

Tuesday, December 13, 2005

The Dec. 3 editorial "Amtrak's Future" said that the Amtrak board and the Bush administration may have a better argument concerning the railway's future than former Amtrak president David L. Gunn, who was fired for disagreeing with them.

However, the administration's vision of Amtrak would give ownership and management of the Northeast Corridor infrastructure to another entity, would end most if not all long-distance train service and would focus rail investment on a few disconnected regions.

The editorial suggested that long-distance trains are not needed and exist only because of entrenched political support. But such support exists because the trains provide essential mobility for hundreds of cities and communities that have few convenient or affordable transportation alternatives and because the trains keep the system national.

Federal funding for the trains is crucial and justified. Ownership and management of the Northeast Corridor should stay with Amtrak, which has an excellent safety record.

The administration's proposal to create a federal partnership with states for capital investments in regional rail corridors is good, but the federal share needs to be much higher. The Amtrak board also needs to be strengthened.

Congress shouldn't go along with the administration if it's taking the country to the wrong place.

HARRIET PARCELLS

Executive Director

American Passenger Rail Coalition

Washington

According to the Transportation Department's inspector general, Amtrak's long-distance trains require about $300 million a year in incremental funding and have higher passenger rates per train mile than many corridor-service trains. The rest of the losses -- about 60 to 75 percent -- are from the biggest financial turkey of them all: the Northeast Corridor. Include depreciation or annual capital subsidies (you choose), and the corridor is the biggest loser in the Amtrak system.

When Amtrak says that corridor is profitable, it always excludes capital costs and depreciation, which amount to about $1 billion a year. If we are going to shut something down, maybe we should start with the Northeast Corridor.

ROBERT MOEN

Minneapolis

The Dec. 3 editorial showed a typical Washington mind-set when the writer called for preserving and improving "the critical Northeast Corridor from Boston to Washington."

Is someone in a rural town with no airline service and no bus service who cannot drive a car chopped liver? Many older and disabled people depend on Amtrak to get them to medical care, stores, family visits, etc. The "critical Northeast Corridor" has great redundancy in travel options; rural America does not.

Your writer also might ask some West Coast folks how they would feel about losing Amtrak's Cascades, Coast Starlight or Empire Builder service.

OLE M. AMUNDSEN JR.

Port Clyde, Maine