(The Poughkeepsie Journal posted the following article by Michael Valkys on its website on February 27.)
POUGHKEEPSIE, N.Y. — Mario Mino has been riding Amtrak for 10 years from the Rhinecliff station to Penn Station in Manhattan, where the Rhinebeck resident works.
Mino said he likes the service because he does not have to go to Poughkeepsie by car to catch a Metro-North train.
”It’s close to where I live,” Mino said. ”It would take 40 minutes to drive to Poughkeepsie.”
But, he said, Amtrak does have its drawbacks.
”Being on time,” Mino said, when asked how Amtrak could improve. ”Lately it’s even worse.”
Service and funding issues have plagued Amtrak over the years, but most travelers and local officials agree the railroad is critical to the region and the nation.
”A lot of people depend on the railroad,” Mino said.
Terrorism has effect
Ridership on Amtrak has declined over the years, although the railroad’s Northeast Corridor be-tween Washington and Boston continues to be the most traveled route in the nation.
Boardings in Poughkeepsie and Rhinecliff, the two Amtrak stops in the area, have declined slightly, a decrease railroad officials attribute to a tough economy and the national trend of less travel in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
”There has been an overall decline in the travel industry,” Amtrak spokes-man Dan Stessel said. ”People are taking fewer trips of long distances.”
Financial problems have also plagued the railroad.
Amtrak came close to shutting down in July because of a budget crisis averted by a $100 million loan guarantee from the U.S. Department of Transportation and a $205 million appropriation from Congress that brought the total support to about $1.1 billion.
President Bush and House Republicans want Amtrak to wean itself from federal subsidies by paring money-losing routes and by forcing cities and states to pick up the tab for passenger rail.
Senate supporters say Amtrak’s service is vital and that nowhere in the world does passenger rail turn a profit.
The railroad received a re-prieve earlier this year when Congress authorized a $1.05 billion operating and capital grant for fiscal year 2003. Repayment of a $100 million loan from the federal DOT was also deferred.
Stessel said the money means Amtrak will continue to operate, which was not a guarantee in recent months.
”Things are stable for this year,” Stessel said. ”It will be very tight, but we’ll work with it.”
$1.8 billion sought
Amtrak is seeking $1.8 billion for the next fiscal year. From 1997 to this year, the average federal support was $1.1 billion. Amtrak officials said that funding level has resulted in equipment and infrastructure deterioration.
Officials also said increased borrowing has led to debt service that has jumped to $250 million per year.
”Amtrak’s past practice of borrowing money and deferring capital investment to make payroll cannot be sustained,” Amtrak president David Gunn said in a statement last week. ”We must address the deteriorated assets, and over the next several years, return our equipment and infrastructure to a state of good repair if operation is to continue.”
The head of a rail passenger group said the funding is just enough for Amtrak to get by.
”It’s doable, but it may leave them with a zero balance at the end of the fiscal year,” said Ross Capon, executive director of the National Association of Railroad Passengers in Washington.
Air travel substitute
Capon said Amtrak is the travel equivalent of the airlines, offering a needed service across the nation. As the only national long-distance train service, it must improve.
”What is needed is for Amtrak to continue to reform itself,” Capon said.
He said the passenger group has lobbied for the railroad to give up ownership of infrastructure across the nation, but with Amtrak still running the day-to-day aspects of the line.
The railroad serves more than 500 communities in 46 states over a 22,000-mile system.
About 65,000 people ride Amtrak trains each day, roughly half in Amtrak’s busy Boston-New York-Washington corridor.
Mino said the number of commuters from northern Dutchess County who use Amtrak to get to Manhattan is growing.
”We used to be a few, a few years back,” Mino said. ”Now it’s a lot.”
He said local residents will continue to use Amtrak.
”I don’t think they have any choice,” Mino said.
Gunn, Amtrak’s leader, said more can be done to improve the railroad despite the tight financial picture.
”No passenger rail service in the world is profitable on an operating and capital basis, and Amtrak is not the exception,” Gunn said last week. ”What we can do, however, is reestablish stability and run the system more efficiently.”