(The International Herald Tribune posted the following article to its website on June 26.)
ELKTON, Md. — Screeching, clattering and thumping its way along just south of Wilmington, Delaware, the Amtrak machine lifted and spread the rails, scooped up the rotting wooden ties beneath, plowed away the gravel, plunked down perfect new concrete ties, gently laid the rails back down, and moved on, leaving tracks on which trains will travel at 125 miles per hour, up from 80 miles per hour.
The recent revival of the machine, which had been mothballed for the last few years, is a sign of confidence in the future of the railroad that goes beyond faster trains, lower maintenance costs and longer-lasting railroad ties.
This is the first summer in the last three that Amtrak will not be threatened with bankruptcy. Last year it came within weeks of shutting down before Congress came through with an emergency bailout, and in 2001 it mortgaged Penn Station in New York, one of its last remaining unencumbered assets.
But these are also highly uncertain times. Congress will probably begin debating a reauthorization bill soon for the railroad, and even its friends are planning a version that could offer some of its routes to competing companies.
In April the railroad submitted a plan to return itself to a state of good physical repair and said it would need about $2 billion a year for the next few years, but Congress has not shown much movement and the Bush administration is proposing about $900 million for the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1.
“The problems at Amtrak simply will not go away with a more liberal application of federal funds,” said Michael Jackson, deputy secretary of transportation, testifying before the transportation subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee in April. “The status quo – how Amtrak operates, how we incentivize the railroads, how we manage the intercity passenger rail delivery – simply has to be changed,” he said. He said that some routes take a subsidy of more than 25 cents a mile traveled by each passenger. Amtrak argues that cutting the routes would save little.
Allan Rutter, the federal railroad administrator, said that decisions on trains should be made “closer to the customers,” by the states, which would have to decide whether to help pay for them. Some Amtrak supporters assert that this position is inherently hostile to the railroad, because the states are in worse fiscal condition than the federal government.
“They don’t want to kill Amtrak, but they don’t want to fund it either,” a congressional aide said.
The transportation appropriations bills are likely to come up late in the budget process this year, said Ross Capon, executive director of the National Association of Rail Passengers, adding, “Predictions at this stage of the game would be wildly and rashly premature.” David Gunn, who took over as president of Amtrak a year ago, is credited with improving the railroad’s accounting and general management. He has emphasized some activities needed for the long haul, including making renovations on the tracks from Washington to Boston, which Amtrak owns, to prevent having to lower the speed limits.