Hotline #987 - June 20, 1997

The Senate Finance Committee approved the Amtrak gas-tax half cent today as part of its larger reconciliation bill. The bill includes offsets to permit spending on Amtrak capital of $2.3 billion over three-and-one-half years. The bill may be on the Senate floor on June 24. An attempt may be made to shift Senator Roth's Amtrak offsets to highways. Ask your Senator to oppose any modification or deletion of the Intercity Passenger Rail Fund from the reconciliation bill. Votes on amendments could come as early as June 25.

A House-Senate conference on the tax package is planned the week of July 7. To that end, Representatives Franks (N.J.) and Cardin (Md.) are planning a "dear colleague" letter to Ways and Means members urging them to accept the Intercity Passenger Rail Fund in conference. Ask your Representative to co-sign the Franks-Cardin letter, as well as the half-cent bill itself, H.R.1437. The more co-sponsors we have by then, the more likely the Senate half-cent language can prevail. H.R.1437 has 51 sponsors now, the latest being McIntyre (N.C.), Walsh (N.Y.), Pascrell (N.J.), and Andrews (N.J.).

Even if the Senate's Amtrak tax provision is enacted, Amtrak still needs a regular appropriation consistent with the budget resolution, which assumes $789 million for Amtrak. The House Appropriations Committee on June 13 released tentative budget allocations for subcommittees. Amtrak President Tom Downs wrote to Chairman Wolf yesterday making the case for the full $789 million for 1998, with special emphasis on the $245 million operating grant request.

Today, Downs wrote Wolf again to explain why Downs believes the General Accounting Office's latest report on Amtrak is too bleak. Downs said the GAO looked more at the past than at the future, ignoring Amtrak's aggressive new approach to mail and express. Downs also emphasized that the GAO agreed that increased capital investment will help increase Amtrak's revenues.

The Senate Commerce Committee now expects to mark up the Amtrak authorization bill, S.738, on June 26.

The National Transportation Safety Board released on June 17 its final findings in the Silver Spring, Md., accident of February 1996. The report blamed the MARC engineer, who was an employee of CSX, for forgetting the aspect of the last signal he had passed. CSX and the State of Maryland were blamed for removing a signal that would have helped the engineer, and emergency crews were faulted for their state of preparedness. Since all three MARC crew members died in the wreck, the NTSB is recommending that voice recorders be put in all railroad locomotives. A Federal Railroad Administration spokesman said that would cost tens of millions of dollars, but that the FRA would look at it.

The Wisconsin and Illinois DOT's this week released a study they have been working on for a few years. The study says that 110-mph passenger service between Chicago and Milwaukee was feasible and could knock the travel time down to an hour.

NARP President John R. Martin and NARP Executive Director Ross Capon met with several Amtrak Intercity and Northeast officers, including Intercity President Mark Cane, in Chicago, on June 18.

Two new Thruway buses connecting with the Southwest Chief start June 23. One has been mentioned here before, connecting Denver, Colorado Springs, and Pueblo at Raton to and from the west -- note, however, that the connection originally was to be at Trinidad. The second Thruway bus will go from El Paso to Albuquerque, connecting with the Chief to and from the west.

A third Thruway apparently has been running since May 11 but never publicized. It connects Laramie, Cheyenne, Fort Collins, and Boulder to the California Zephyr in both directions at Denver Union Terminal.

Amtrak West starts San Diegan service at Carpinteria, 11 miles east of Santa Barbara, on June 22. There will be a community celebration on July 12.