Amtrak taken to task on Fox last night

[dn4192]

Well actually the Indiana toll road was one of the least used highways in IND, most drivers used the free interstate which covered the same area. Amtrak needs to upgrade equipment, provide quicker and more depenadable service.

If you came up with a viable proposal on how this will be done instead of talking in the abstract I'd take you more seriously

Well for Amtrak you remove unprofitable routes. You work on providing more dependable service to start out with. Instead of say 3 Cardinal routes you have now, you drop down to 2, increase your volume on those two routes making them more profitable. YOU work on removing delays to where your arrival time is within a reasonable (no more then 30 minutes late) time frame and begin upgrading your equipment slowly. Not going to happen overnight, but changes can be done where Amtrak can become less dependent on gov't monies and become a viable form of cross country transportation.

Still too abstract handwaving. How would one define profitability, and why is that the right measure to determine what is overall best for the society? What costs and benefits would be included in the computation? What do you do to remove delays? How much will that cost? What will be the corresponding benefits and how will their value be determined for inclusion in the equation? Still too much platitude and too little detail.

Profitbality can only be determined by those investing, what I might consider a good profit, someone else might not. This has nothing to do with what is "best" for society. Amtrak is a service, nothing more, a service that is not mandatory for life to continue. As for removing delays you just correct what is causing them. Again change only happens by motiviation, and like it or not, money motivates people to improve services.

 

[Ryan]

As for removing delays you just correct what is causing them.

I'll just whip out my magic wand and make that happen.

What do you think are causing the delays? What would you do to correct them? How much would it cost? How much more revenue would fixing the delays bring in? Would it be enough to make the improvements profitable?

 

[jis]

Profitbality can only be determined by those investing, what I might consider a good profit, someone else might not. This has nothing to do with what is "best" for society.

you are certainly entitled to your opinion. But do not think that they universally held because you believe in them

If what you say was really true then both all sorts of drugs and prostitution would be completely legal

 

[afigg]

Well for Amtrak you remove unprofitable routes. You work on providing more dependable service to start out with. Instead of say 3 Cardinal routes you have now, you drop down to 2, increase your volume on those two routes making them more profitable.

Dropping down to twice a weeks will reduce volume, not increase it. Does the phrase "death spiral" mean anything to you? Look northward to Via and see what's going on up there.

Yep, the 3 day a week trains have worked out so well for Amtrak. The Sunset Limited and the Cardinal have the poorest cost recovery of the LD trains. Guess what, they are the only 3 days a week LD trains Amtrak still runs. A 3 - or 2! - day a week train still has all the overhead, but sells a lot fewer tickets. If Amtrak could easily take the Cardinal and SL daily, they would have.

Oh boy, lots of bad ideas or ideas that have been tried before and failed in this thread.

 

[dn4192]

Roads care is different as is DOD and such. They are neccessities, Amtrak isn'. Amtrak is a business, the others are not.

In other words, the government should subsidize the things you think are necessary and nothing else. Got it.

Well for Amtrak you remove unprofitable routes. You work on providing more dependable service to start out with. Instead of say 3 Cardinal routes you have now, you drop down to 2, increase your volume on those two routes making them more profitable.

Dropping down to twice a weeks will reduce volume, not increase it. Does the phrase "death spiral" mean anything to you? Look northward to Via and see what's going on up there.

No. 1 job of the gov't is security, which is what the military does, everything else falls in line after it, so you spend whatever is needed to accomplish job 1, then all other things the gov't wants to do can be paid for if they have funds. Propping up Amtrak should be way down on that list.

Amtrak is way down on that list, and we spend FAR more on defense than we need to in order to guarantee our security. What enemy of ours warrants spending as much money on defense as we do?

If you droped that down to say maybe half or a little more then have like 17, I bet you could on average pick at least a couple of hours.

You'd lose that bet.

I would think most stops are at least of 15-30 minute range and that doesn't include the train having to slow down when approaching those stops and the time it takes to get back up to speed.

You would think wrong. Have you ever even been on an Amtrak train before?

Also Amtrak should have the tracks to make it from start to finish without having to pull over for "other" trains.

Also, this is impossible without massive amounts of money to build new tracks. Where is that money going to come from? (hint: If people with a real business plan thought that they could make a profit doing it, there's nothing to stop them from doing so right now)

Well they spoke last night of a rail system in Japan that is private and having postive cash flow and one in england. If the airline and bus systems can operate and be profitable, why can't trains?

That doesn't include capital costs. And the airline and bus systems can operate and be profitable on the back of what? GOVERNMENT INVESTMENT IN INFRASTRUCTURE!!! How about that?

Roads in the place where our in our society right now is a neccessaity, Amtrak isn't. Amtrak could stop operations tomorrow and our way of life wouldn't have any change to it. Remove or stop the upkeep of our roads where the majority of individuals travel and goods are moved, you have problems.

Does the present 3 Cardinal trips each week go at 100% full? I bet they don't, so you are operating with less then 100% capacity. If they are and in fact have overflow, then begin a 4th route, but I doubt that is the case.

Our gov't expenditures on the military are not even close to what they should be, the defense of this country is the no. 1 priority of our gov't.

So you are saying Amtrak trains stop and go at each stop within 10-15 minutes?

I have not said gov't shouldn't play a role, like the roads the gov't can be involved, but instead of wasting money supporting poor routes, why not invest in new track, new equipment and such.

 

[afigg]

So I can have my two little trains down here in Texas, the Sunset Ltd and the Eagle. lol. I don't believe Amtrak's loss numbers for the LD trains anyway. There is no way those 15 trains lose 530 million dollars a year. They are just loading them up with their bloated overhead to make the NEC and state operated trains look good. The LD trains, if operated and accounted for properly would cover their operating costs or even make a contribution to overhead. You could discontinue all 15 and most of those costs would not go away.

Rather sweeping claim. How much of Amtrak's fleet and personnel are used to run the LD trains? Almost all of the Superliners plus the 145 Amfleet IIs plus many of the P-42 locomotives. The equipment percentage allocation could be figured out.

The PRIIA act mandated an agreed to accounting cost allocation between Amtrak and the states. The cost allocation for the LD trains has to follow those rules as far as I know. I'm am not arguing against the LD trains. I think Amtrak needs to improve the LD train cost recovery percentages and, once they do, should restore or add several LD trains once they have enough equipment. But this argument that Amtrak is "loading them up" with overhead just to make the other trains looks good really does not make sense - unless you can back it up with documented facts.

 

[saxman]

So you're advocating the government stop spending money on all those roads that aren't profitable then, right?

How much profit does the DoD generate?

What about the police department? Fire department?

Roads care is different as is DOD and such. They are neccessities, Amtrak isn'. Amtrak is a business, the others are not.

Define necessity, please. Also, if you're using enumerated powers under the Constitution, explain how many of our wars are Constitutional under what I assume is a narrow reading of the Constitution, or why our Constitution allows us to have by far the largest military budget in the world.

A narrow reading of the Constitution is fine, but realize that most of the GOP talking points are only about limited government where they want limited government. Talk about drastically cutting the military, and most would consider that blasphemy.

No. 1 job of the gov't is security, which is what the military does, everything else falls in line after it, so you spend whatever is needed to accomplish job 1, then all other things the gov't wants to do can be paid for if they have funds. Propping up Amtrak should be way down on that list.

Removing one unprofitable route simply makes the other routes unprofitable and makes the situation worse. The rest of what you advocate is already being at Amtrak, or dealing with the freight railroads.

 

[Go Modern]

I'm tired of economic arguments for and against. Sometimes you buy things because they're make you feel good. AMTRAK is an American gem. When I travel by plane, I am basically are forced to sit in a tiny seat and look straight ahead (or out out of one of the few window at tiny things or the tops of clouds); Fellow traveler interaction is nil. When I drive the freeways across the country, I see pavement; Fellow traveler interaction is an occasional raised middle finger. If I take Greyhound... well, let's not go their, I want to keep my head.

But when I take the train for business or pleasure, I see America out of the window - city, country and everything in between. And I meet fellow Americans from all over the country, and from all walks of life. More often than not, by the end of a long distance (and even medium distance) rides, I feel a common bond with my 'local' group of passengers. Just like a visit to a national parks, after a train ride, I usually find myself much happier for the experience.

So, for my part, I am glad my tax dollar (and certainly it seems a very small percent of my tax dollar at that) goes to support Amtrak. Unlike other government expenditures (wasteful or not), at least I can see where my tax dollar in operation. And the amazing thing is: A ride on Amtrak is available to everyone. What a bargain!

 

[AlanB]

So you're advocating the government stop spending money on all those roads that aren't profitable then, right?

How much profit does the DoD generate?

What about the police department? Fire department?

Roads care is different as is DOD and such. They are neccessities, Amtrak isn'. Amtrak is a business, the others are not.

Much of the placement of cities west of the Appalachian Mountains are due to trains and passenger trains in particular, not because of roads. And even today, 40% of all freight moves by rail. Only 28% moves by roads. This country grew up around its railroads, not its roads.

Roads today are only a necessity because government threw Trillions of dollars at them to make them so. And as others have pointed out, government interfered in the Free Market by subsidizing driving & planes. But for the fact that we've so badly gutted our trains, if government removed all subsidies tomorrow, we'd all be back riding trains again.

 

[AlanB]

Right now the Cardinal has 30 stops between Chicago and NYC. If you droped that down to say maybe half or a little more then have like 17, I bet you could on average pick at least a couple of hours. I would think most stops are at least of 15-30 minute range and that doesn't include the train having to slow down when approaching those stops and the time it takes to get back up to speed. Also Amtrak should have the tracks to make it from start to finish without having to pull over for "other" trains. Again non of this is easy, but can be done if the motivation of profit is there to encourage it.

While there are a few longer stops, most stops that the Cardinal and other similar trains make take maybe 5 - 6 minutes. And that includes slowing down to a stop and accelerating back to track speed.

 

[AlanB]

Well they spoke last night of a rail system in Japan that is private and having postive cash flow and one in england. If the airline and bus systems can operate and be profitable, why can't trains?

Let's see, Greyhound over the last 5 years cut about 1/2 the number of buses that it used to run. And they run on our subsidized roads, meaning that if they were actually paying more, they'd probably be out of business. Trailways as a company is largely out of business. Small operators using that name still exist, but the parent company is gone.

As for the airlines, collectively over the last 40 years they've lost about $10 Billion. And that's despite subsidies to them.

 

[AlanB]

Profitbality can only be determined by those investing, what I might consider a good profit, someone else might not. This has nothing to do with what is "best" for society. Amtrak is a service, nothing more, a service that is not mandatory for life to continue. As for removing delays you just correct what is causing them. Again change only happens by motiviation, and like it or not, money motivates people to improve services.

It may not be mandatory for your life to continue, but for some people it is. The State of Montana several years ago commissioned a study on Amtrak to see if it benefited or hurt the state. The study found that Montana gets far more back in dollars than it sends to DC for Amtrak when considering all factors.

That study also found that many people up there along the hi-line depend on the Empire Builder to get from where they live to a larger city for medical treatment. They found that Amtrak carries people back home to their final rest. They found that without Amtrak people would have to drive several hours in the dead of winter on icy roads to reach any other form of transit if Amtrak didn't exit.

In other words, for some people, Amtrak is at a minimum extremely import to life, if not mandatory.

 

[AlanB]

Roads in the place where our in our society right now is a neccessaity, Amtrak isn't. Amtrak could stop operations tomorrow and our way of life wouldn't have any change to it. Remove or stop the upkeep of our roads where the majority of individuals travel and goods are moved, you have problems.

If you stopped Amtrak tomorrow people would notice. Maybe you wouldn't depending on just where you live. But people in California, the Chicago area, and along the NEC would immediately notice the surge in traffic on our roads & highways. And flights would be strained beyond their ability to carry the load along the NEC.

And again, the majority of goods is moved by train; 40% of all freight moves by rail, 28% by truck.

 

[Ryan]

Roads in the place where our in our society right now is a neccessaity, Amtrak isn't. Amtrak could stop operations tomorrow and our way of life wouldn't have any change to it. Remove or stop the upkeep of our roads where the majority of individuals travel and goods are moved, you have problems.

Actually, quite a few people depend on Amtrak for routine transportation needs. But you don't, so go ahead and give it the axe.

Does the present 3 Cardinal trips each week go at 100% full? I bet they don't, so you are operating with less then 100% capacity. If they are and in fact have overflow, then begin a 4th route, but I doubt that is the case.

First off, it's "frequencies" you're talking about, not "routes". There is only one route that the Cardinal takes. And Amtrak's ridership figures are available, so go do the research. Interestingly enough, they're right by the on time numbers that you also kept on ignoring in the other thread. People aren't going to take trains if they can only travel on certain days. Amtrak should be going the other way and taking the Cardinal and Sunset daily and watch the ridership explode when they actually become useful.

Our gov't expenditures on the military are not even close to what they should be, the defense of this country is the no. 1 priority of our gov't.

Aren't even close? Please expand. What enemy? What systems should we be spending more money on?

So you are saying Amtrak trains stop and go at each stop within 10-15 minutes?

Alan already covered that. Cut 12 stations and congrats, you saved an hour and destroyed what ridership was left after you took the train to twice a week.

I have not said gov't shouldn't play a role, like the roads the gov't can be involved, but instead of wasting money supporting poor routes, why not invest in new track, new equipment and such.

The routes are poor because of the lack of investment in them. Spend the money and see what happens with the ridership.

So I can have my two little trains down here in Texas, the Sunset Ltd and the Eagle. lol. I don't believe Amtrak's loss numbers for the LD trains anyway. There is no way those 15 trains lose 530 million dollars a year. They are just loading them up with their bloated overhead to make the NEC and state operated trains look good. The LD trains, if operated and accounted for properly would cover their operating costs or even make a contribution to overhead. You could discontinue all 15 and most of those costs would not go away.

Rather sweeping claim. How much of Amtrak's fleet and personnel are used to run the LD trains? Almost all of the Superliners plus the 145 Amfleet IIs plus many of the P-42 locomotives. The equipment percentage allocation could be figured out.

The PRIIA act mandated an agreed to accounting cost allocation between Amtrak and the states. The cost allocation for the LD trains has to follow those rules as far as I know. I'm am not arguing against the LD trains. I think Amtrak needs to improve the LD train cost recovery percentages and, once they do, should restore or add several LD trains once they have enough equipment. But this argument that Amtrak is "loading them up" with overhead just to make the other trains looks good really does not make sense - unless you can back it up with documented facts.

We had that thread, and Henry came up empty.

There's a beautiful irony in both posters that are long on criticism and completely devoid of realistic, concrete suggestions for improvement in here.

 

[amamba]

Roads care is different as is DOD and such. They are neccessities, Amtrak isn'. Amtrak is a business, the others are not.

In other words, the government should subsidize the things you think are necessary and nothing else. Got it.

Well for Amtrak you remove unprofitable routes. You work on providing more dependable service to start out with. Instead of say 3 Cardinal routes you have now, you drop down to 2, increase your volume on those two routes making them more profitable.

Dropping down to twice a weeks will reduce volume, not increase it. Does the phrase "death spiral" mean anything to you? Look northward to Via and see what's going on up there.

No. 1 job of the gov't is security, which is what the military does, everything else falls in line after it, so you spend whatever is needed to accomplish job 1, then all other things the gov't wants to do can be paid for if they have funds. Propping up Amtrak should be way down on that list.

Amtrak is way down on that list, and we spend FAR more on defense than we need to in order to guarantee our security. What enemy of ours warrants spending as much money on defense as we do?

If you droped that down to say maybe half or a little more then have like 17, I bet you could on average pick at least a couple of hours.

You'd lose that bet.

I would think most stops are at least of 15-30 minute range and that doesn't include the train having to slow down when approaching those stops and the time it takes to get back up to speed.

You would think wrong. Have you ever even been on an Amtrak train before?

Also Amtrak should have the tracks to make it from start to finish without having to pull over for "other" trains.

Also, this is impossible without massive amounts of money to build new tracks. Where is that money going to come from? (hint: If people with a real business plan thought that they could make a profit doing it, there's nothing to stop them from doing so right now)

Well they spoke last night of a rail system in Japan that is private and having postive cash flow and one in england. If the airline and bus systems can operate and be profitable, why can't trains?

That doesn't include capital costs. And the airline and bus systems can operate and be profitable on the back of what? GOVERNMENT INVESTMENT IN INFRASTRUCTURE!!! How about that?

Roads in the place where our in our society right now is a neccessaity, Amtrak isn't. Amtrak could stop operations tomorrow and our way of life wouldn't have any change to it. Remove or stop the upkeep of our roads where the majority of individuals travel and goods are moved, you have problems.

Amtrak is absolutely a necessity for travel for the thousands of people that use it to commute to work on a daily basis. My husband is one of them, and there is a decent group of people that board his train every day for the same commute.

 

[dn4192]

Roads care is different as is DOD and such. They are neccessities, Amtrak isn'. Amtrak is a business, the others are not.

In other words, the government should subsidize the things you think are necessary and nothing else. Got it.

Well for Amtrak you remove unprofitable routes. You work on providing more dependable service to start out with. Instead of say 3 Cardinal routes you have now, you drop down to 2, increase your volume on those two routes making them more profitable.

Dropping down to twice a weeks will reduce volume, not increase it. Does the phrase "death spiral" mean anything to you? Look northward to Via and see what's going on up there.

No. 1 job of the gov't is security, which is what the military does, everything else falls in line after it, so you spend whatever is needed to accomplish job 1, then all other things the gov't wants to do can be paid for if they have funds. Propping up Amtrak should be way down on that list.

Amtrak is way down on that list, and we spend FAR more on defense than we need to in order to guarantee our security. What enemy of ours warrants spending as much money on defense as we do?

If you droped that down to say maybe half or a little more then have like 17, I bet you could on average pick at least a couple of hours.

You'd lose that bet.

I would think most stops are at least of 15-30 minute range and that doesn't include the train having to slow down when approaching those stops and the time it takes to get back up to speed.

You would think wrong. Have you ever even been on an Amtrak train before?

Also Amtrak should have the tracks to make it from start to finish without having to pull over for "other" trains.

Also, this is impossible without massive amounts of money to build new tracks. Where is that money going to come from? (hint: If people with a real business plan thought that they could make a profit doing it, there's nothing to stop them from doing so right now)

Well they spoke last night of a rail system in Japan that is private and having postive cash flow and one in england. If the airline and bus systems can operate and be profitable, why can't trains?

That doesn't include capital costs. And the airline and bus systems can operate and be profitable on the back of what? GOVERNMENT INVESTMENT IN INFRASTRUCTURE!!! How about that?

Roads in the place where our in our society right now is a neccessaity, Amtrak isn't. Amtrak could stop operations tomorrow and our way of life wouldn't have any change to it. Remove or stop the upkeep of our roads where the majority of individuals travel and goods are moved, you have problems.

Amtrak is absolutely a necessity for travel for the thousands of people that use it to commute to work on a daily basis. My husband is one of them, and there is a decent group of people that board his train every day for the same commute.

And if Amtrak went away, something else would replace. Travelers would fly, drive or take a bus.

 

[amamba]

Commuters would fly to work?! That sounds expensive. And the roads are already crammed - that is why he takes the train.

 

[Ryan]

I'm going to need to get on a train to keep up with these moving goalposts.

The government subsidized Essential Air Service suggests that you're still wrong.

 

[EB_OBS]

I believe that a reliable, modern, quick train service like is available in many modern countries could be successful here.

Does any passenger rail system anywhere make a profit under generally accepted accounting principles? Including capital costs?

Absolutely not! There isn't a profitable, self-sustaining passenger rail service in existence anywhere on the planet.

 

[EB_OBS]

Profitbality can only be determined by those investing, what I might consider a good profit, someone else might not. This has nothing to do with what is "best" for society. Amtrak is a service, nothing more, a service that is not mandatory for life to continue. As for removing delays you just correct what is causing them. Again change only happens by motiviation, and like it or not, money motivates people to improve services.

It may not be mandatory for your life to continue, but for some people it is. The State of Montana several years ago commissioned a study on Amtrak to see if it benefited or hurt the state. The study found that Montana gets far more back in dollars than it sends to DC for Amtrak when considering all factors.

That study also found that many people up there along the hi-line depend on the Empire Builder to get from where they live to a larger city for medical treatment. They found that Amtrak carries people back home to their final rest. They found that without Amtrak people would have to drive several hours in the dead of winter on icy roads to reach any other form of transit if Amtrak didn't exit.

In other words, for some people, Amtrak is at a minimum extremely import to life, if not mandatory.

I've read that study and I've witnessed first-hand almost every single aspect of it in my short experience working on-board the Empire Builder for five years and as a supervisor for the last three years. Every city and town along the High-Line depends upon Amtrak and passenger rail service to a great degree.

 

[EB_OBS]

And if Amtrak went away, something else would replace. Travelers would fly, drive or take a bus.

Sure they would, and with one less option, any of the those remaining options would also likely increase in cost. Let's not even consider that fact that many locations the train serves are 200 to 300 miles from the nearest airport.

 

[dn4192]

Commuters would fly to work?! That sounds expensive. And the roads are already crammed - that is why he takes the train.

Well actually yes there are some commuters who do fly and yes the roads are crammed, but that wouldn't stop more people from driving. Also you can remove amtrak trains and still offer train service through other sources regionally.

 

[dn4192]

I'm going to need to get on a train to keep up with these moving goalposts.

The government subsidized Essential Air Service suggests that you're still wrong.

Again I am not against gov't assistance, what I am against is wasteful gov't assistance. Keeping train service of a poor used route makes no sense. The gov't assistance can be better used if a private company had a motive to do so, and right now Amtrak is not very motivated to improve its' overall service.

 

[Ryan]

More assertions with no proof to back them up.

Just like Faux "News".

 

[Texan Eagle]

I do not wish to jump in the mud with more arguments, the folks in here are doing a great job already, but I'd say this is one of the most entertaining threads I've seen on this forum

Do you think if this forum was instead run by a private company, the quality would be much better?