Hotline #190 - May 11, 2001

Transportation Secretary Norman Y. Mineta told a rail meeting May 10 that he expected Amtrak Chairman Tommy Thompson to step down soon from that post, "after many years of excellent service." Thompson is a former Wisconsin governor and now Secretary of Health and Human Services. Mineta told the National Corridors Initiative's "Making Multimodalism Work" conference in Washington that he expects to join the Amtrak board soon, perhaps within a week. Mineta added that Amtrak finances "do not look good at all ... On the other hand, we can't afford too have Amtrak go down, so it's going to require all of you to work hard." Mineta said he learned from Capitol Hill visits that some Senators took great pride in killing the High Speed Rail Investment Act last year. He said that when Amtrak doesn't get needed capital improvement, it hemorrhages on the operating side.

Mineta's prepared remarks to the NARP Board of Directors, April 27 in Washington, are now available on the DOT Public Affairs office web site.

Florida legislators have sent a bill, HB489, to Gov. Jeb Bush (R.) that for the first time gets the state's high-speed rail efforts past the planning stage. The bill is an attempt to show a good-faith effort at complying with the constitutional amendment approved by voters last fall. That amendment requires the state to begin construction of a high-speed rail system by November 2003 that would ultimately link Florida's five largest urban areas, traveling at least 120 mph. The High Speed Rail Authority Act provides $4.5 million for first-year funding for a high-speed rail authority and preliminary engineering and environmental assessment work. The first segment will be Tampa-Orlando (airport). A report is due January 1, 2002.

Construction would still require legislative approval under the bill, which passed the Senate May 8 (38-1) and the House May 3 (97-14). Under the bill, the authority would have nine members, three (each) appointed by the governor, the House speaker, and Senate president. Three is hope that Doc Dockery, whose personal efforts made the constitutional amendment possible, will be appointed. The Florida Times-Union said the governor was expected to sign the bill, but it had not been received at his office as of May 11.

The Capitol Corridor continues to enjoy record growth in ridership. April's ridership was 95,856, 37% above April 2000; both months had the same service levels. The corridor's 12-month ridership was 988,000. That figure is expected to surpass one million sometime in early June.

The Empire Builder resumed service over its entire route between St. Paul and Chicago today. Some delay is still possible, to the extent there are still lingering slow orders along the river between St. Paul and La Crosse. Amtrak has had to use substitute buses since April 13 due to flooding on the upper Mississippi River.

Due to a major tack work program, Amtrak will temporarily truncate the Sunset Limited east of New Orleans for a period of one week in mid-summer. Three trips in each direction will be affected -- train 2 that leaves Los Angeles June 29, July 1, July 4; train 1 that would have left Orlando July 1, 3, 5. People with reservations are being contacted and the space is blocked in the reservations system. No alternate transportation east of New Orleans will be provided. The track work is on CSX between New Orleans and Pensacola.

Amtrak had been planning to truncate the Sunset Limited at San Antonio for those three trips and not provide service to Houston and New Orleans. NARP urged Amtrak to continue running to New Orleans during that week, which will now be the case.

As is well known, Amtrak's operating-finance situation is very tight for fiscal 2001, which ends September 30 (a little more than five months from now). In order to achieve its ambitious business plan targets -- and stay in operation -- Amtrak has looked for ways to increase revenues and cut costs wherever possible. Many ideas have been proposed within Amtrak, though not all of them will get carried out. Nevertheless, some individual ideas make it into the "rumor mill" and are spread about as fact. One such idea-turned-rumor this week was that Amtrak would ban coach passengers from long-distance-train dining cars as a way to cut down on staff and inventory. This is being considered -- along with perhaps hundreds of other ideas -- but, in fact, nothing has been decided and this particular change is not imminent.

MetroLink opened a 17.4-mile extension in Illinois of its light-rail line from downtown East St. Louis to Belleville Area College, on May 5. Seven new stations were opened. Part of the line is built on abandoned CSX railroad right-of-way (once part of Louisville & Nashville's route from St. Louis to Evansville, Ind.). An extension northeast from Belleville Area College to Shiloh-Scott station is expected to open in spring 2003; with further extension east to MidAmerica Airport proposed.

The Valley Transportation Agency will open an extension of San Jose's Tasman East light-rail line on May 18, from Baypointe (N. 1st St.) to I-880 (1.9 miles).