(The following story by Jim Geraghty was published in the January 12 issue of the Boston Globe.)
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Amtrak supporters in the Senate are pushing for a $5.6 billion investment in railroad upgrades and in security. But such funding for passenger rail service is expected to be difficult to get this year.
Republicans controlling the House and Senate are hoping to complete 11 unfinished spending bills for this fiscal year, and to keep spending within limits that President Bush has set.
The current version of the transportation spending bill, which is apart from the $5.6 billion capital investment, would give Amtrak only about two-thirds of the $1.2 billion in federal subsidies that Democrats had sought.
The incoming Senate Appropriations Committee chairman, Ted Stevens, Republican of Alaska, says his panel may vote on the legislation as early as tomorrow.
Northeastern lawmakers on the Senate Transportation Committee, including Senators Olympia J. Snowe, Republican of Maine, and John F. Kerry, Democrat of Massachusetts, are pushing a bill that would authorize a little more than $1 billion in security improvements and that would invest $4.6 billion annually, beginning in fiscal 2004, to develop the railroad network.
”The nation continues to face two choices regarding Amtrak,” Kerry said. ”We can choose to reform Amtrak and give it the resources to build a forward-looking, national rail system – to do for the railroads what Eisenhower did for our highways.
”Or we can choose to deny countless communities … train service … when congested highways and long lines at airports make it clear Americans need more transportation alternatives.”
Snowe said that the popularity of Amtrak’s Downeaster service from Portland, Maine, to Boston, which was restored in December 2001 after a 30-year closure, shows that the rail system can be profitable. Maine officials are considering plans to upgrade the track.
”Amtrak has had successes and I believe its future can be bright if we give it the tools to succeed,” Snowe said. ”Amtrak has had to strive to maintain a national system without the federal support provided to every other major mode of transportation.”
To persuade other lawmakers, Snowe is touting a study by the Congressional Research Service that examined per capita federal spending on transportation. The study found that the government spends $79 per person on highways, $44 per person on subsidies for rural air service, and $27 per person for passenger rail service.
Republicans, including the House Transportation Committee chairman, Don Young of Alaska, and the Senate Transportation Committee chairman, John McCain of Arizona, want states to play a greater role in funding rail service. Both have criticized Amtrak’s performance and have expressed skepticism about its ability to manage billions more in aid.
In June, when Amtrak said that an immediate financial crisis could force it to shut down its entire system, McCain said that the administration and Congress should use the opportunity to make significant changes and ”address fiscal realities.”
”We cannot afford simply to throw billions of additional federal dollars at Amtrak and hope its problems will disappear, as some in Congress are advocating,” McCain wrote to the transportation secretary, Norm Mineta.
Still, Snowe voiced hope that McCain might be amenable to a bill authorizing Amtrak to make investments in improvements.