(The following editorial appeared on the Newton Kansan website on June 4.)
NEWTON, Kan. — From the Amtrak station in Newton, you can take the Southwest Chief train east to Chicago or Kansas City, or you can hop the train westward to Los Angeles and points in-between.
But if you want to travel north or south in Kansas by rail, you’re out of luck.
The Kansas Department of Transportation has the opportunity to change all that.
Amtrak would like the state of Kansas to sponsor — a nice word for “pay for” — running a new route between Kansas City, Mo., and Oklahoma City, Okla., via Newton.
Starting this summer, KDOT will fund a study, costing between $150,000 to $200,000, to determine whether adding the route would be feasible and sustainable. The state hopes to have the study finished by the third quarter of 2009.
The new route would include a connection in Newton between the Southwest Chief and the Heartland Flyer, which runs daily between Oklahoma City and Fort Worth, Texas. The state transportation departments in Oklahoma and Texas help financially support the Flyer.
During fiscal year 2007, Amtrak had more than 25.8 million passengers. It was the fifth straight year of record ridership, according to the company’s official Web site at www.amtrak.com.
More than 70,000 passengers on average ride Amtrak trains daily.
Fourteen states contract with Amtrak to provide supplemental routes. The states pay most of the costs of these services. Kansas isn’t one of those states.
The Southwest Chief, in fiscal 2007, saw the following number of riders board or get off Amtrak trains at the following Kansas locals:
• Newton — 14,126
• Topeka — 6,937
• Garden City — 6,166
• Dodge City — 4,063
• Hutchinson — 4,056
• Lawrence — 3,732
In 2006, 12,772 riders used the Newton Amtrak station. Wichita has not had passenger rail service since it was discontinued in 1979.
Clearly, Newton is a key cog in the Kansas equation for Amtrak. And it continues to grow.
And the Oklahoma City and Kansas City Amtrak lines also continue to grow.
In fiscal 2007, the Oklahoma City station saw 43,293 passengers board or alight from Amtrak trains. That’s up from 2006, when 39,572 riders used the station.
In Kansas City, the station last year had 117,155 use the rails, up from 110,029.
As the price of gas escalates, public transportation will become more important for the state of Kansas and its residents.
The U.S. Department of Energy found Amtrak trains, which run on diesel fuel, to be 18 percent more energy efficient per passenger mile than airlines and more energy efficient than automobiles.
The study being conducted by KDOT will look at possible schedules, train availability, how much it would cost to update rail lines for passenger service, passenger capacities and start-up costs.
Several Kansas city governments and Chambers of Commerce have come out in support of the expansion, including the city of Newton and the Newton Area Chamber of Commerce.
They made the right decision.
Linking Kansas to its neighbors to the south would be a great service, both for Sunflower State residents and tourists passing through who have a dollar or two to spend in Newton. We think it would be money well-spent.