Should we add railroads to the list of Passenger Rail enemies?

A lot of HSR stuff in the news.  It’s no secret that Obama’s vision for a national High Speed Rail network is under attack.  Many newly elected officials are far from passenger rail fans.  Everyone’s heard about what’s happened in New Jersey, Wisconsin, and Ohio.  Meanwhile, what should have been a milestone event in Illinois turns out to have simply added more fuel to the anti-rail fire. 

While I do not buy in wholesale to the premise of the article, it brings up some very practical and real issues with the implementation of the Obama Administration’s implementation of HSR and with expansion of our passenger rail network in general.  The biggest and most interesting, in my mind, is the buy-in of the host railroad.  The article surmises among other things that Union Pacific may have “driven a hard bargain” to Illinois and Missouri in exchange for their cooperation with the project.  To me, when they say “hard bargain” they mean $$$.  By money I have a feeling they mean state contribution for upgrades to infrastructure including track and signaling equipment.    

I understand Union Pacific, like all freight railroads want to protect their profitability.  They make their money by moving freight, after all.  However, it’s disconcerting to see they are willing to accept negative effects to our national transportation infrastructure so they don’t see a reduction in their margins. 

The freight railroads, for the most part know they have a captive audience.  Most operating rights of way in this country are private and are owned by corporations.  Any public agency or partnership that wishes to expand service must cooperate with the freight railroads and basically must submit to whatever conditions the carrier lays out, or risk outright refusal to cooperate.  There are legal means to get around this refusal, but a profitable freight railroad is much better equipped to handle a potentially protracted court battle than a coalition using funding which is tight to begin with.  Also, let’s face it, a lot of transportation projects, especially rail projects often face significant opposition, and a public legal battle would not help the situation. 

We’ve seen similar issues here in Pennsylvania.  Look no further than the Keystone Corridor which on paper extends from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh.  In reality, the section from Harrisburg to Pittsburgh is little more than a line on a map.  Between Harrisburg and Philadelphia multiple electric powered trains per day whiz back and forth at maximum speeds up to 110 mph.  West of Harrisburg, a lone diesel powered daily train takes riders to Pittsburgh.  While the line from Philadelphia to Harrisburg sees only local freight service and is owned by the state, the line west of Harrisburg is one of two major rail arteries between New York and Chicago, and is owned by a private company (NS).  Even though there is room to expand (the line was once 3-4 tracks for its whole length, and is now 2-3) NS has gone on record saying that it will require significant investment from public sources for NS to buy in on any service expansion to Pittsburgh. 

Another example is the ongoing Commuter rail saga here in Pittsburgh.  This time last year, it seemed almost a foregone conclusion that Pittsburgh would be gaining two rail lines; one to New Kensington/Arnold via the AVR, and one to Greensburg via the NS.  By July however, NS’s tune apparently changed, as they became “highly unlikely to allow commuter trains on their tracks”.  As a result, we’ve gone from a dual line heavy commuter “system” to a single line light rail system.  While it’s impossible to know what changed, clearly something did. 

Freight railroad's lack of cooperation in allowing passenger operations on their rails is understandable but detrimental to our nation transportation network.  The only real way to get them to help is to force them to.  Unfortunately, that is a thorny subject.  A lot of people in this country don’t like when the Government tells companies what to do.  Additionally, just like every other lobby, there’s a lot of money behind the railroad lobby and any legislation forcing railroad compliance would have to fight not only political will, but good old fashioned money. 

I have to wonder what the answer is.  I for one don’t know.  It’s hard to see our national rail network ever expanding if railroads themselves will make it cost prohibitive.   

High Speed Fallout

There’s been a ton of talk about the changes in the political winds and how it’s going to affect transportation Western Pennsylvania.  Those winds have also been felt on the national level.  The shift to the right in other states has brought some potentially huge impacts to Obama’s national HSR plan and will impact the Pittsburgh region.

There’s a really interesting battle going on in Wisconsin right now.  The Governor-elect has pledged to end the HSR project and has asked the DOT to allow the state to re-appropriate the funds.  Additionally, TALGO had set up a manufacturing plant to build HSR equipment for Wisconsin and other states.  It appears that they stand to lose the manufacturer and the money ($810 million) if the governor follows through with his plans.  

Of a more immediate impact to the Pittsburgh region is the election of a new Governor in Ohio, John Kasich.  Part of his platform from the start was to kill the 3C Corridor.  He has pledged to keep this promise and end the project.  This is a much bigger blow to Western Pennsylvania than other HSR developments, as the next step after completion of the primary corridor was a connection from Pittsburgh to both Cleveland and to Columbus, creating a triangle of passenger service in Ohio.  For the last few years, Ohio has seemed more intent on getting better rail service to Pittsburgh than Pennsylvania was, and now that seems to have flown out the window as well.  As with Wisconsin, DOT Secretary Ray LaHood has vowed to take back all funding given to Ohio, to the tune of $400 million and put it back in the national HSR pot. 

This is immediately bad for Western Pennsylvania.  Our local transit system appears to be taking a huge nosedive, and it looks like our regional connections will remain status quo, at best for the foreseeable future.  Pennsylvania’s HSR grant this summer in relation to Pittsburgh was miniscule ($800K) and was only to do some very preliminary studies on the NS’s route from Harrisburg west to Pittsburgh. 

With our emerging ally to the west seemingly switching sides, and a further shift in our state government to the right (a traditionally un-friendly group towards transportation other than the automobile) it’s not looking good for the home team. 

Our one bright spot, at this point, is that the money appears to be going back into the pot.  It will take time to re-receive applications for appropriations and to go through the approval process.  While Pennsylvania does not have any “shovel ready” projects, perhaps we can use this bought time to advance our cause. 

Knowing our state government, I’m not holding my breath, but it’s a chance.  

Really? You're using this?

Poor, poor NSC.  It’s been the regional whipping boy for years now.  It’s taken the leap to the national political stage.  Here’s the article.

I’m no NSC cheerleader, but realize that it’s already near complete and will provide value to the region.  Check out this post for a more detailed opinion.

This is absolutely ridiculous.  Don’t use the NSC as your political pawn to validate your political agenda.  The NSC is not representative of the bailout, and the way in which it is presented is just plain misleading. 

The NSC is such a tiny piece of the overall stimulus package ($62.5 million out of $ 800 odd BILLION dollars).  I could probably find just as many examples of the Stimulus program helping to stimulate job growth as you could find examples like the NSC, but that is not the point of this post.

People constantly argue that the NSC should not have been built, but it was.  If they would have had to stop the project, the 4000 or so jobs related to this project would have been prematurely ended (while the economy was at its worst) and the Port Authority would have inherited tunnels that it could not use but still had to pay for.  You could argue that the cost per rider will be expensive, and it will, but PAT will at least re-coop at least some money through ridership.  If no one is using the tunnels because they could not be completed, then no money is being re-cooped and the tunnels and other related infrastructure would just be sitting there, unused and eating up dwindling Port Authority funding (it still costs money to maintain infrastructure, even if its not in use, especially tunnels that could collapse if not maintained). 

Finally, and here’s the biggest issue I have with this.  You want to blame an administration for the NSC?  Fine, blame the Bush Administration.*  That administration approved the project and funded it to the tune of $348 million (80% of the projected cost at the time of approval).  I could argue that had the Bush administration not agreed to award the money, then the project would not have to be bailed out because it was over budget due to inflation.  I could say that this is another example of the Obama administration having to “bailout” a decision made by the Bush administration.  If you want to look strictly at the numbers of how much each administration has spent on the NSC; the Bush administration spent a lot more on the project than the Obama administration has.  

I am not actually trying to make that statement, but it’s about as accurate as someone saying “look at the NSC, it's bad, it got bailed out by Obama's bailout, Obama’s bailout is bad.”  The point is, the project needed to get finished, and no matter who is in the oval office now, the money probably would have been spent to finish the project.  The funding also just happened to come from Stimulus funding.  If that would not have been available, it probably would have come from somewhere else.

Politics in this country is disgusting.  Nothing can be taken at face value, because nothing is ever presented at face value.  Every “fact” is tilted, twisted and wrung out until it matches an ideology. 

*Blaming the Bush Administration for DOT’s approval of the NSC is just as foolish as directly blaming the Obama Administration for the use of bailout money on the NSC.  I would wager that neither President had direct knowledge of the physical approval for either instance.

A Perfect Storm for Public Transportation in the United States?

The Good

The last two years have been an exciting time if you are an advocate of public transportation in the United States. Among other things, we have seen a major spike in gasoline prices, and although they seem to have stabilized somewhat have pushed people away from their personal automobiles and towards alternate means of transportation in record numbers. Case in point: Amtrak saw a 14% increase in ridership between July 2007 and July 2008. The poor economy has eroded some that increase, but ridership is still higher than it was at this point in 2007. It's also important to keep in mind that this is with a smaller system than Amtrak has ever had along with stagnant funding. Check out the master list vs. what service is in place today.

Ridership on public transit is up. Way up. In 2008, transit ridership was the highest since 1956! That's big. That's 52 years of highway dominance, out the window in one year.

Additionally, the winner of the 2008 Presidential campaign brought even greater hope by promising to invest in our long neglected transportation system along with our national infrastructure. This promise was highlighted by the symbolic train ride that the President-Elect and Vice President-Elect took from Philadelphia to the inauguration in Washington, D.C.

Things sure are good in the transportation world aren't they? Not so fast. Some big issues in America right now are forming together with the record success of transit to form a perfect storm of sorts that threatens to hamstring transportation development in this country, if not set cause a massive setback.

The Bad

While transit use is up, which is great, funding remains flat. Check out an article here in the Post gazette that touches on the issue. Local transit authorities are faced with increased demands on their infrastructure and calls for service expansion all while dealing with the same funding levels that they dealt with 5 years ago. In some cases, because of the hard economic times funding has even been cut, again, while ridership increased. The system is broken, that's not news. The Gas Tax hasn't increased in 16 years and the Highway Trust fund is broke. You can't get better transit if you don't have the money to pay for it.

The Ugly

The healthcare debate, among others swirling around Washington seem to have caused enough strife to further the notion that our current funding strategy will suffice for another 18 months. The Post Gazette covers it here . It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that if the funding system doesn't work now, it will continue to not work for another 18 months. Things will stay about the way they are now. Ridership looks to stay high, and funding will be inadequate which will cause further cutbacks and potential fare increases.

Hope isn't completely lost for a new funding package before the September 30 deadline of the current deal, but an 18 month delay could cause a permanent halt to a funding overhaul and renewed emphasis on transit.

The political tides seem to be shifting. The tremendous support that the Obama administration and their policies enjoyed may be at least wavering. The Senate Committee charged with appropriating the initial $4 billion dollars of HSR funds decided only to appropriate $1.8 billion. While this is not the end of the discussion, the figures initially discussed are already being paired down. This does not bode well for future HSR funding. The same can be said of transit funding. If support for HSR is still high and the money is being cut, imagine what happens when the support dies down, or gas prices come down.

I don't want to be a Negative Nancy here, but in my mind, we as a nation are at a crossroads. The demand for transit is there (and hopefully will continue to rise). What is missing is political will. If we put transportation in the back seat and don't fund it now and fund it properly, our best case scenario is we will have what we have now. Aging infrastructure, too many roads, and not enough alternate forms of transportation. That's the BEST case scenario.

The link between Healthcare and Transportation

While relationships between healthcare and transportation may not seem immediately clear (except for the fact that the people who work for and operate transportation companies/agencies/authorities all generally have healthcare) there are similarities in the debates between the various camps on either side of the issues.

First, let me say that the point of this is not to shout my opinions about Obama's healthcare plan, there are plenty of other blogs where you can find people's opinions about Government healthcare. When reading an article, found by way of The Radical Middle yesterday, I was shocked by some of the ridiculous arguments being made, by both sides on the medical debate. The far left view was that anyone who oposes their idea of Government healthcare is basically a heartless fascist who is just a puppet of big business, while the far right view was that Government healthcare was tantamount to communism and would force poor granny to go in front of a "death panel" that would decide her medical fate.

Both arguments are downright ridiculous, and the people who further these types of arguments should be ashamed of themselves. They turn important policy debate into a turd flinging contest. Their intent is also not to compromise and create the best course of action for everyone but to demean the opposition through the spreading of ridiculous lies and insults.
Where am I going with this you ask? After all, this is not Shadyside Hospital Blog, it's East Busway Blog. My point in this is the same ridiculous, emotional attacks that are clouding the healthcare debate are always present in the transit world, and it's a problem.

When lies, misconceptions and anecdotal arguments are allowed to influence public policy, the outcome is a dumbed down, half-assed version of an ideal policy. A perfect example in Pittsburgh is the hated Allegheny County drink tax. I have made it well known that I support the tax, because I looked at it rationally and to me it makes sense. You've got plenty of drinkers in Allegheny County, and the proceeds from the tax would serve a worthy cause, transit. However, the opposition to the tax was immediate and just plain angry. From radio ads by the owner of the Church Brew Works invoking Abraham Lincoln, to a gentleman who wanted to challenge Dan Onorato to a boxing match because of a tax on his beloved beer.

Most of the opposition was rooted in the fact that people just didn't want to pay more for alcohol, there wasn't a whole lot of rationality to their argument beyond that. The closest thing I saw to a coherent argument was that the tax would cause such an outrage that people would abandon drinking at bars in Allegheny County and flock to neighboring counties (which has happened to an extent, how much however, is not all that significant) which would cause bars to go out of business. However, even that argument which was rooted in rationality was taken to the extreme. Supposedly, the drop in business would lead to some mass bankruptcy in the bar industry, causing huge losses in jobs and revenues.

As it turns out, the "losses" have been minimal. The decrease in drinking at bars has been negligible, and I don't believe there is any quantifiable evidence that the drink tax has caused any bar or restaurant to close and the tax exceeded expectations for revenue. (Check out one of my favorite comment strings from way back on a "discussion" about the effects of the drink tax). My friend "anonymous" may have some valid points, but they are clouded by his insults and condescending tone.

The HSR debate is another example. There are logical arguments why HSR would not or could not work that could be made by reasonable people, and then there are people like this guy. (check out comment number 5). This quote came from Trains for America, and they seem to get more than their fair share of ridiculous, emotion based polarized arguments. You don't like trains? Fine, don't belittle rational discussion with regurgitated garbage you probably picked up off your favorite political radio talk show host.

I know that you find whackos anywhere, and two examples in a blog does not an argument make. However, go onto a news website and look at the comments that follow and article or opinion piece or watch a town hall meeting. It's frightening, not so much what people are saying, but how many people are saying the same crazy things, meaning the lunacy is widespread.

Why this polarized thinking has become so prevalent is another topic for another blog, but it certainly is present in transportation/transit policy debate, and it's damaging our infrastructure and de-railing (pun intended) our future.

Our Neighbor to the Nor...err I mean West

Usually, most of the energy we Western Pennsylvanians focus on Ohio has to do with their terrible NFL football teams. When it comes to planning a new HSR SYSTEM, however, they are light years ahead of us. I talked a little bit yesterday about where various other HSR corridors stand, and because Ohio is our neighbor to the west, I wanted to focus a little more exclusively on them.

You could argue that Pennsylvania already has HSR (or at least a version of it) both on the NEC (Northeast Corridor) and the Keystone Corridor from Philadelphia to Harrisburg. However, we as a state seem to be pretty satisfied with that and have therefore become complacent (insert your favorite Harrisburg loves Philadelphia, hates Pittsburgh comment here).

They have become so complacent tht when I searched PENNDOT's website for "High Speed Rail" I got this message in reply. When I search for Ohio HSR, I found several websites, including All Aboard Ohio, which is a non-profit rail advocacy group which is very involved in making HSR a reality. Additionally, unlike PENNDOT, ODOT has an entire website devoted to their plan. Here's a summary of their accomplishments found on the "Ohio Hub" website*.

-Funding Requests have been completed and submitted for all four phases of the project
-A full report has been completed and includes:

• Feasibility estimates
• Capital and Engineering Costs
• Operating strategies and operation costs
• Ridership forecasts
• Fleet Requirements
• A number of appendices that tackle many of the practical issues including freight integration, funding and scheduling

Here's a quick summary of what Pennsylvania has done to secure funding to extend the Keystone Corridor to Pittsburgh:

• Jason Altmire has said we need to begin work to secure funding to extend the Keystone Corridor or connect Pittsburgh to Cleveland
• That's all

We may be better at football, but I sure am envious of what Ohio has done to position themselves towards the head of the line for HSR funding.

Pennsylvania is either happy with what it's got already or is completely distracted by the budget fight going on in Harrisburg. Ohio seems to want to include Pittsburgh in its plans but we have to assume that the State of Pennsylvania will have to involve themselves in some way shape or form. We, as a state can't sit here and think that Ohio is going to take care of everything for us. The Pittsburgh to Cleveland connection is phase 4 of the 4 in the project. I couldn't even estimate how long Phase 1 will take, let alone phase 4.

The last thing Pittsburgh needs is to be an isolated backwater to a budding HSR network.


*You could spend hours on this website, it has maps of the four phases, an archive of project related documents and reports, along with news concerning the project, and other info about HSR

Standing on the Platform Watching the High Speed Train go by

The Pittsburgh blog scene has been on fire with posts concerning the flurry of train related news that has popped up in Pittsburgh's media. It's exciting to see all this sudden attention focused both on local commuter rail and on Pittsburgh's piece in the HSR puzzle.

Much has been said about where to go first, Cleveland, Harrisburg, or Washington D.C.? They each bring up good points. (For my two cents, Cleveland would be the easiest first step, and since we're already behind the 8 ball, we should be looking for easy right now).

Where we should go first is not the point of this post however. The purpose of this post is draw attention to the fact that we are, indeed, behind the 8 ball when it comes to HSR. Here's a brief synopsis of where some other programs stand in comparison to the extended "Keystone Corridor"

-California: In addition to having a pretty sweet website, California is first in line for $$$ so says Joe Biden. This surely has to do with the bond issue for $10 billion with a B that was approved last year.

-Florida: The sunshine state has developed a comprehensive rail plan which you can see here. Additionally, they are well ahead of the curve for the myriad of studies that must be undertaken. Several studies including a ridership and cost study were undertaken in 2003 and would just need to be updated. Their application to receive federal funding is also nearly complete.

-Ohio: Ohio has already dedicated $7 million to study HSR. Additionally, they have banded together with 8 other Midwestern states that would have Chicago as a hub in the hopes to increase their chances of securing funding. Multi-state cooperation is said to increase the likelihood of funding.

This is not an all inclusive list, but from this brief list it's easy to see who the front runners are for the money. It doesn't help that apparently the state of Pennsylvania has done....absolutely nothing. Until Mr. Altmire's speech about extending the Keystone Corridor or connecting to Cleveland, no one was so much as speaking about HSR involving Pittsburgh. With an application deadline of August 24th, we are fast running out of time to take advantage of this round of funding. Another $50 billion is slated for further down the road, but the winds of politics could change by the time that money is to be appropriated.

A failure to capitalize on this opportunity would be a failure by the leaders of our region and state. While our local leaders should do all they can to promote and build our transit infrastructure, it is our State and Federal representatives who need to push this forward. So far Jason Altmire is the only one who truly seems committed to making this happen (all while pushing commuter rail in parallel).

Pittsburgh has failed so many other times when we had a chance to better our transportation assets. This time the responsibility does not fall squarely on Pittsburgh's shoulders. It falls on the State and Federal representatives . We do not need to be standing on the platform as Obama's HSR Express flies through without stopping

A red-headed stepchild no longer? Good for Pittsburgh?

Then President Elect Obama's train ride from Philadelphia to Washington D.C. for the inauguration was meant to be a symbolic gesture to his political hero Abraham Lincoln, I am hoping it is also symbolic of things to come in America. A re-birth for passenger rail. A counter revolution to the explosion of automobile ownership and use, that helped nearly push American railroads over the edge after World War II. Many railroads were pushed past the point of no return and fell into bankruptcy, and those that remained abandoned moving people and re-trenched in moving things.

The unenviable task of moving the few people left that still utilized movement by rail fell to Amtrak. They inherited broken equipment, and poorly maintained infrastructure. So far (since 1971) they have managed to survive, but never thrive. Basically, Amtrak was the son from a previous marriage to the Federal Government, while the airlines and interstates were the favorite kids. The government didn't want anything to do with Amtrak, but couldn't just abandon it, so they put as little effort (money) into Amtrak as possible. There are lots of debates as to why this is, but that is another blog for another time.

President Obama has pledged to change that, and has paid alot of lip service to what will happen with Amtrak. Now is a great time to increase our rail movement options. Gas is slowly but steadily climbing higher (again), and airline options out of Pittsburgh seem to be dwindling every day, and are not an inexpensive option.

Included in his remarks are talk about a high speed inter-city rail network, similar to Amtrak's already operating Northeast Corridor. Post Gazette has jumped on the bandwagon, and has reminded us all NOT TO FORGET PITTSBURGH!

I agree, don't forget Pittsburgh, but let's take a step back first. Before we try and get schnazzy electric powered trains running between Pittsburgh and points east and west, let's get some decent service that won't require billions more in stimulus money to come our way.

Here's a really easy solution: better choices i.e. more trains. As it stands right now, if you are conducting business in Harrisburg or Philly, you would have to leave a day early ( @ 7:20 AM from Pittsburgh) if you wanted to be in either place at the beginning of the business day the following day. Otherwise, if you leave the day of your business, you would not arrive in Harrisburg until 12:45 PM, or Philly until 2:50 PM.

If you arrived in Harrisburg @ 12:45 PM, you would have approximately 2 hours to conduct your business before you would have to catch a train at 2:26 PM back to Pittsburgh. If you are in Philly, forget it, you are stuck until the next day at noon.

If you want to go to Chicago, drink your coffee! You have to catch a train at midnight. This train at least would get you into Chicago at a manageable time (8:40 AM). On the way back, your train would leave Chi-town at 7:05 PM and get you into Pittsburgh bright and early at 5:30 AM.

Here's an idea, add a couple trains, one that leaves around 7 AM, but skips all the stops in the middle except Harrisburg and Philly. Then add one more from Philly that leaves at, say 5 PM and gets into Pittsburgh around 10 or 11. That way, business people can at least get their business in, and have the trip be somewhat practical. Additionally, add a couple of trains to and from Chicago as well. Instead of having a through train that stops in Pittsburgh, have a train that starts in Pittsburgh and travels to Chicago. Schedule it leave in the morning, from both locations. That would put the trains in their respective destinations around mid afternoon. Again, the point is to give people options. If you don't give people viable options, they won't choose to use different forms of transportation aside from their own cars.

These ideas are by no means an in-depth plan, just some ideas that came off the top of my head. One thing I do know is that the market is there. The new luxury bus service between Pittsburgh and Harrisburg is doing well (well enough to add additional service after only a few months of operation). I certainly support this service, but wouldn't mind seeing the Federal Government begin to properly subsidize additional forms of transportation other than highways.