Saving Amtrak

[Save Our Trains Michigan]

Here is a story on saving Amtrak.

Story

 

[AmtrakWPK]

He does make some interesting points, one of which was that if Amtrak were actually "privatized" it would lose access to all non-Amtrak rail systems, or at least would have no priority, and then presumably on all of the freight railroads' routes except for UP, Amtrak's OTP would drop to what it currently is on UP rails, and on UP rails, Sunset would take roughly one month to get from LA to NOL. It seems to me, though, that the sheer vastness of the funding that would be required to (1) purchase all that rolling stock to be leased, and (2) do the nationwide infrastructure upgrade that would be required to actually make a substantial increase in capacity, probably to double track everywhere it's single, and maybe triple track where it's double now, boggles the mind. New equipment seemed one of his primary areas of focus, and he didn't go into infrastructure that much after saying that roads and airports got much more favorable treatment. Roads aren't privately owned like the rails are. Of course, the rolling stock and infrastructure (rail) improvements would still probably be cheaper than the final bill for Iraq will be.

The other thing I'm having trouble with, though, is his idea of selling everything and leasing it back. Fine, ok, selling assets like stations and maintenance depots will bring some money in. Not very much, I would think, as most of them are rather old, aren't they? So you wouldn't get much for them, and then you have to start paying leasing fees, so your expenses just jumped higher. And of course whoever bought the building wants a decent profit, so the lease won't be particularly attractive, I wouldn't think, for Amtrak. After all, in a particular town or city, that station is THE station. It's not like buying a house, where there are hundreds on the market in any given city. There's just that one house. And they have to have THAT house if they want to have a station stop there. So they'd have Amtrak over a barrel on the leases.

It just seems like suddenly there are a lot of other people getting a profit from Amtrak operations, but those profits are going through Amtrak's hands and into the pockets of third parties. And the only place that money can come from is the passenger who buys a ticket, so the ticket prices have to go way up. Now, if Amtrak leases something, do they also then get the deduction for depreciation of a capital asset? I wouldn't think so.

And how are you going to sufficiently persuade some venture capitalist in the first place to put those billions into passenger rail infrustructure? How are you going to convince them that this scheme is suddenly going to make gobs of money, so that his investment in all that rolling stock will pay off? Who's going to take all that rolling stock off his hands if the venture fails? Am I missing something here, or are we just playing another hide-the-marble shell game.

 

[saxman]

Its true he has interesting things to say. But you can't just all in one swooping motion make Amtrak a public/private sector, like he says, "Congress should not give another dollar until Amtrak does this." will not work. I remember not long ago, there was talk about making air traffic control private, but that never came to be. I'm not sure who would pay for it, if it did become private. I know there a few airports who do have private ATC though. Its only about less than 3 or 4 i believe. This plan may work slowly though, as far as Amtrak is concearned. But I'm affraid, this will lead to competitive routes which could lead to more cut services because they are "unprofitable." But I don't know alot about economics. I don't know however, there are so many numbers and stats you can throw around, to make something look good or bad. I never know where the "right way" to measure the success or failure of an investment such as rail travel or highways and airways.

 

[Amtrak OBS Employee]

In my opinion, SIMPLY PUT! Privatization is not gonna work! If it would and the companies involved could profit, then the major railroads would have NEVER abandoned their passenger services in the first place! Then Amtrak would never have been created!

If Congress is stupid enough to withhold any future subsidy, then Amtrak will shut down! Mr Gunn will see to it! He has nothing to lose!

If Amtrak management is stupid enough to allow mass privatization in every area of this railroad, then they will cause the railroad to shut down in the long run IMO!

Personally, I wouldn't wanna be the head of a company getting on the bandwagon of privatizing Amtrak! I would be affraid that I would appear as a stupid individual when/if (I put the "if" for a little optimism here) it actually finally fails in the long run.

Congress SHOULD continue to fund this operation to its fullest abilty. And they should also continue to make Amtrak show how it uses the subsidies by holding the company accountable for its actions! I feel Mr Gunn is doing just that! That is just basic business sense! Oh well, once again I am just a lowly OBS employee!!! LOL... :lol: OBS....

 

[DerailmentSurvivor1995]

I wouldnt ride on Amtrak again if you paid me millions of $$$$$ !!!

NOT after nearly losing my life in the derailment of 1995 on

THE SUNSET LIMITED......HYDER ARIZONA

I would rather walk !!!

 

[Guest]

Count your blessings! If you're able to send this message, you should be grateful that you're alive and breathing! You need to redirect your anger! Accidents happen, and you blame Amtrak rather than the vandals that caused the disaster! I was in accident once because someone placed a piece of metal in the middle of the road. Did I blame Chrysler? Of course not! You could have more easily been killed or injured in a car accident trying to get where you were going. Fate would have it that you were on the train. So why do you blame Amtrak? Especially when you should be glad that you're even able to have this conversation!

 

[Viewliner]

I wouldnt ride on Amtrak again if you paid me millions of $$$$$ !!!
NOT after nearly losing my life in the derailment of 1995 on

THE SUNSET LIMITED......HYDER ARIZONA

I would rather walk !!!

Once again, we feel sympathy for you, but please don't belittle our happy little forum with the same Amtrak bashing post, you've stated you're opinion and your unfortunate tale, but please unless you have somthing more to add, leave it at that. What happened to you is unfortunate, there's very little that we can to do to make it any easier, and theres nothing we can do to change what happened. Amtrak is not really at fault, what happened was out of its hands, the blame goes to the people who deliberately caused this derailment.

Again, this forum is meant to be a place to post a variety of opinions and Amtrak, like anything else in our nation is open to criticism, however the same post made repeatedly is excessive, and in some cases may hurt an individuals image if they only post one idea repeatedly. I'm saddened by what you've been through, your story is an important one and I'm sorry this act of sabotage has taken an innocent life, and scarred many emotionally. Your contribution was a valuable one, but like currency a post loses value when its continually printed with no additional backing.