(The following article by Oren Dorell was posted on the USA Today website on November 29.)
WASHNGTON — Tighter airport security and higher gas prices appear to be boosting Amtrak ridership in the Northeast, the South and Midwest.
Trains in North Carolina, Pennsylvania and New England saw double-digit jumps in ridership. Routes in the West saw the smallest increases, and trains in the Louisiana area had drops because of Hurricane Katrina.
Amtrak, which serves a daily average of 69,000 riders on 300 trains, saw total ridership increase just over 1% in fiscal year 2006, which ended Sept. 30.
“We believe that some of the security concerns, people having some difficulty with flying, have sent some people to the train,” says Amtrak spokeswoman Karina Romero. “Gas prices probably also had an impact.”
Ridership on the Acela/Metroliner, the busiest trains of all running from Washington, D.C., to Boston, grew by 8.8%. The line had 2,668,174 riders in 2006, or 589 more passengers a day.
The greatest growth rates occurred among the 23 short-distance routes where states contribute money to Amtrak and dictate routes.
Ridership on long routes dropped 1.3% mostly because of “less-than-acceptable on-time performance,” Romero said. Worst was the Sunset Limited, from Orlando to Los Angeles, with a 36% drop after damages from Katrina and Rita.
Robert Mann, an airline industry analyst, says airlines drove passengers to the train by reducing the number of seats available for shorter trips and raising the “walk-up price” of tickets on their shuttles.
“The result is Amtrak becomes more convenient,” Mann says. “You don’t get the level of screening, if at all, in a train station compared to an airport.”
Ronald Utt, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation, a think tank in Washington, D.C., says the increased ridership probably has more to do with Amtrak’s continued use of taxpayer money to keep fares down on certain routes.
“People are willing to take a state-subsidized train as opposed to an unsubsidized bus,” Utt says.
In fiscal year 2005, Amtrak had revenues of $1.89 billion but expenses of $2.94 billion, requiring a $1.2 billion taxpayer subsidy from the U.S. government.
Barry Ginsberg of Deer Park, N.Y., boarded an Acela train after a meeting in Washington.
“It’s a lot less hassle and more comfortable,” Ginsberg says. “When you figure how much in advance you have to get to the airport, it’s a lot more convenient.”