(The News Journal posted the following article by Patrick Jackson and Murali Balaji on its website on February 17.)
WILMINGTON, Del. — A plan for states to start chipping in to keep Amtrak trains running or lose the rail service has raised the ire of passengers and lawmakers, who predict the Bush administration strategy won’t leave the station but could lead to future talks about the rail lines.
Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta told reporters that Amtrak trains wouldn’t stop at stations in states that did not help fund the system. Mineta has been traveling the country to push the plan to set up multistate partnerships that would run the system, which has been a federal responsibility since 1970.
Last year, 13 of 46 states that Amtrak serves, including Pennsylvania, kicked in about $130 million total for local service. Federal taxpayers have provided about $29 billion since Amtrak was created 34 years ago, including $1.2 billion for the current year.
Bush’s budget currently contains no money for Amtrak, but members of the state’s congressional delegation predict that won’t hold up as Congress rewrites the budget.
“Quite frankly, they’re going to get the money,” U.S. Rep. Mike Castle, R-Del., said in a phone interview from Washington’s Union Station. “I don’t have the numbers in front of me, but I would submit to you that the [Transportation Security Agency] spends more on airport security than we’re spending on Amtrak. … I think we are willing to sit down and talk about ideas to make Amtrak work better, but so far no one from the administration has been willing to do that.”
As part of its plan, the administration wants to restructure rail service by opening routes to private competition, letting a separate entity handle track repairs and force states to pick up more of the train service costs. A similar plan went nowhere in Congress when it was first floated in 2003, but President Bush’s decision not to include any subsidy for Amtrak in his 2006 budget proposal last week has given the issue more urgency.
Under the plan, states that subsidize Amtrak would get service and be eligible for matching federal grants.
“Localities, whether they be states or local governments, do know what are the best transportation answers for the problems they face,” Mineta said. “They do that in highways, they do that in airport planning, they do that in transit and that’s the same model we’re trying to use in this Amtrak approach.”
Amtrak’s Northeast corridor, which includes Wilmington and Newark, holds its own as do some of its other intercity lines in other parts of the country. Sen. Tom Carper, D-Del., said the railroad loses money heavily on its cross-country routes.
Carper, a member of Amtrak’s board of directors, said something needs to be done because the rail system’s tight federal support has limited it to all but the most vital capital improvements. Though he said he is willing to talk to Mineta about making the system work better, Carper was cool to the current plan.
“Right now Amtrak is limping along,” he said. “We need to see if there isn’t a third way to make this work.”
Delaware Transportation Secretary Nathan Hayward III said he hasn’t seen the federal plan, but said he has concerns about the notion of forcing states to pay to keep the trains rolling.
“In every other civilized country in the world, the national government subsidizes rail service,” he said. “The last time I looked at the Constitution, interstate commerce was largely a federal responsibility, and this is certainly a form of interstate commerce.
“I’m not familiar with the details of this plan,” he said. “But the idea has been proposed before and gone nowhere, and I would expect this will do the same.”
At the Amtrak station in Wilmington, riders expressed concerns about the future of their rail commute if Bush’s plan is approved.
Anand Raghuraman, a New York-based business consultant who works in Wilmington, said he relies on Amtrak for travel along the Northeast corridor.
Raghuraman said he and other business travelers have used the trains more extensively since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
“It would be a huge nuisance for people if they have to switch their commute from the trains,” he said.
Wilmington Mayor James Baker blasted the plan as an attempt by the Bush administration to shift focus from the mounting costs of military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. But Baker, who has lobbied hard for the rail service, said he has concern about the plan succeeding.
The cuts wouldn’t just affect Wilmington commuters. Newark Mayor Vance A. Funk said he was opposed to Bush’s plan and would try to work with the delegation to prevent cuts.
“Our commuter volume has been increasing, and it’s been a very successful partnership for us,” Funk said, referring to Amtrak’s use of the Newark station off Del. 896.
Gregory Patterson, a spokesman for Gov. Ruth Ann Minner, also said the state would work closely with the delegation against the plan.
“It’s just another effort on the part of this administration to pass the cost of what had been federal programs off onto the states,” he said.