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National Association of Railroad Passengers: www.narprail.org
Hotline #447Amtrak’s 35th birthday is on Monday. Celebrations are planned in cities across the Amtrak system, including all the stations in Iowa and Meridian, MS. This is a great opportunity to write a Letter to the Editor of your local newspaper supporting National passenger rail service. The U.S. Rail Capacity Crunch was explored at length before a House Railroads Subcommittee hearing on April 26. Key witnesses were Federal Railroad Administrator Joseph Boardman, Wisconsin DOT Secretary Frank Busalacchi (who also chairs States for Passenger Rail Coalition), BNSF Chairman/President/CEO Matthew Rose, APTA President William Millar, MIT Senior Research Associate and Lecturer Carl Martland, and UPS Vice President—Transportation Burt Wallace. The full written statements of all 11 witnesses and Chairman Steve LaTourette’s (R-OH) opening statement are on the Subcommittee’s website. Busalacchi said “75-80% of my [state transportation] budget is spent on highways. I don’t think we need to do that any more.” Throughout the hearing, monitors in the room showed a map clearly indicating multiple-track mainlines. It was a revelation to many that so much of the U.S. rail network is single-track, including virtually everything outside of Chicago-to-the-Northeast except for most of the BNSF 1,800-mile Chicago-Los Angeles mainline (where Rose testified single-track mileage will be down to 50 by the end of this year) and Soo Line Chicago-Twin Cities and much of the UP Chicago-Bay Area line. LaTourette said it’s “a little bit like having an Interstate highway that goes one way at a time.” Rep. Gary G. Miller (R-CA) said, “We don’t have the capacity on our freeways to load up more containers on trucks. If we can’t put that freight on rail, we’ll just overload the highways. We don’t have enough trucks to do that. At some point the government has to be part of the solution.” UPS’s Wallace testified that velocity has increased for trucking, air freight and maritime, but has slowed on the railroads. He said, “The railroad transit in time picture puts at risk our nation’s worldwide competitiveness. This is underscored by the fact that a month ago UPS initiated a new ‘fast lane’ service for truck transportation, between key city pairs throughout the country, to meet the demand for time sensitive shipments that had previously been sent over the rails.” Freight shippers offered testimony showing that facilities served by a single railroad paid higher rates than those with railroad choices. But BNSF and Association of American Railroad witnesses argued that, while a government trust fund to address public needs such as passenger rail would be acceptable, a trust fund to address rail freight issues would not. The freight railroads feel that a trust fund based on a tax on rail freight tariffs is a case of “taking money from us to give it back to us.” BNSF’s Rose said, “Who will be the master planner of where that [rail freight trust fund] money goes? We fear it would lead to non-market-based investments.” The rail freight industry is proposing a 25% investment tax credit to encourage railroad infrastructure investment. Under questioning, AAR President Ed Hamberger said the Bush Administration has the proposal “under consideration, they have not made a decision yet” as to whether to support the tax credit proposal. Asked about Amtrak’s on-time performance problems, AAR’s Hamberger referred to a meeting with Amtrak earlier this week in which the major freight railroads “reaffirmed they are abiding by the law [which gives Amtrak trains priority]. We’re trying to improve operating procedures.” Gas prices continue to rise; oil reached as much as $78 a barrel this week. The Washington Post yesterday had an excellent lead editorial entitled “Phony War on Gas” (regarding what the federal response should be). Several newspaper articles this week have documented sharp increases in transit ridership. One great quote in the Associated Press jumped out, “‘Look at the gas prices,’ (Dale) Birdsong said at Union Station in Los Angeles. ‘I just got a new bike. I’m thinking of riding it to the train station instead of driving my car there,’ she said.” On the local level, the State of Wisconsin earlier this year suspended automatic increases of the gas tax. Rep. Tom Petri (R-WI) said that this puts the State in jeopardy of losing federal matching dollars for highway projects—as much as $1.8 billion—and avoids the real issue of paying for highway projects (the common premise in Washington being that the federal highway trust fund may be bankrupt as early as 2008). The effort was spearheaded by talk show hosts and bloggers in the Milwaukee area; Petri told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that it was “unfortunate that state lawmakers ended automatic gas tax indexing to keep a couple of talk show guys happy.” All Aboard Ohio held its second annual Legislative Summit on Wednesday. Attendees heard from gubernatorial candidates and then attended meetings with their state legislators that were arranged by All Aboard Ohio staff. The main focus of the event was to spur support for the Ohio Hub Plan. The NARP Board of Directors is meeting in Washington, D.C. Last night, at the Association’s Annual Congressional Reception, Senator Trent Lott and Robert Byrd and Representatives Steve LaTourette and Corrine Brown were honored with the Association’s Golden Spike Award. NARP and the Burch family also honored Dr. Lanny F. Wilson of Hinsdale, Illinois with the Dr. Gary Burch Memorial Safety Award. Read the news releases issued on this occasion and also the program for the evening’s reception. Today, the Board welcomed Amtrak’s Acting CEO David Hughes as its lunch speaker and elected a new slate of officers, At-Large Directors and Executive Committee members for the 2006-2008 term. Tomorrow, the Board will hear a presentation from Crawfordsville, Indiana high school students who refurbished their train station and Tom Hall, Amtrak Senior Director of Commissaries and Contract Food and Beverage Service. |