(The following editorial appeared on the Scranton Times-Tribune website on October 13.)
SCRANTON, Pa. — As the effort continues to finally re-establish passenger rail service between Scranton and the New York City area, advocates should be heartened by Amtrak’s annual report on ridership. Americans, prompted by high fuel prices and congested road and air traffic, have rediscovered trains.
For the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, Amtrak reported a record 28.7 million passengers, an 11.1 percent increase over the previous fiscal year and the sixth consecutive year in which ridership increased. And ridership was up on every Amtrak route throughout its 21,000-mile system.
Ticket revenue was $1.7 billion, a $200 million increase over the previous year.
Amtrak’s experience illustrates that a feasibility study conducted for the Scranton-New York service low-balled its projections for ridership from Scranton. The study, conducted five years ago, projected just 40 riders a day in 2030. It did not account for westward expansion of the New York exurbs into Scranton, and it could not have anticipated the vast increase in fuel prices that has occurred since then.
Furthermore, “corridor service” like that envisioned from here to New York experienced some of Amtrak’s highest ridership gains. The Keystone service, from Harrisburg to Philadelphia and on to New York, saw a 20 percent increase in riders, to 1.2 million. The Hiawatha service between Chicago and Milwaukee experienced a 26 percent increase in passengers, to 750,000. Several other routes inside Ilinois also had double-digit ridership increases. Ridership on the Downeaster, between Portland, Maine, and Boston, increased by 31 percent to 474,000.
Beyond local and national economic conditions that favor a resurgence of rail service, Amtrak’s new reauthorization law includes a further incentive. It provides $1.9 billion in grants to states to help expand passenger rail services, and additional money to Amtrak to join in federal-state partnerships.
Americans with access to each of the 500 places served by Amtrak have found rail service to be a workable alternative. There is no reason to believe that residents in this region will not embrace it when it becomes available.
Since the restoration plan was announced here, advocates in New York have raised the idea of expanding the plan, with Amtrak, to restore the service from New York City all the way to Syracuse, N.Y.
That, of course, once was the route of the heavily traveled main passenger line of the Erie-Lackawanna and its predecessors. It’s an idea whose time has returned.