(The following article by David A. Michaels was posted on the Bergen Record website on November 29.)
NEWARK, N.J. — A compact of states and the federal government could make a bid to take over Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor rail line, a group of state transportation and business leaders said Tuesday.
The proposal, which supporters said would boost funding and service on the decaying line, would strip Amtrak of its ownership of the Northeast Corridor, but still rely on the company to manage the line.
It would grant more authority to northeastern states, which in the past have balked at exclusively taking over the line but now suffer with delays when the line fails. NJ Transit relies on the Northeast Corridor to get virtually all of its rail commuters, including those from Bergen, Morris and Essex counties, into Manhattan.
“Amtrak really has veto power over whatever goes on,” said Martin E. Robins, the director of the Alan M. Voorhees Transportation Center at Rutgers University and the report’s principal author. “This monopoly stifles change.”
Amtrak immediately poured cold water on the plan, which was funded by the Newark Regional Business Partnership. The passenger railroad’s chief spokesman said Amtrak would do better by continuing to rely on Congress for funding.
“A change in ownership won’t change the underlying funding needs for the corridor or the process to obtain that funding — it just sidesteps the issue,” Amtrak spokesman Cliff Black said.
Robins, a former top official at NJ Transit, said Amtrak would not be able to kill the proposal.
It would succeed or fail, he said, based on the support of governors, who would have to agree to fund at least 20 percent of costs on the line. The federal government would fund the remaining 80 percent and assume Amtrak’s $3.8 billion in debt, some of it obtained at interest rates as high as 9.5 percent, Robins said. The plan also calls for the federal government to pay at least $5 billion to bring the corridor up to a state of good repair.
The 363-mile corridor owned by Amtrak stretches from Washington, D.C., to New York and include parts of track in Connecticut and Rhode Island. More trains travel between Trenton and New York Penn Station — about 600 every week — than on any other segment of the corridor.
Over the past five years, the corridor has become increasingly important to business travelers, the report concluded. In 2003, 68 percent of corridor trips were conducted for business, up from 45 percent in 2001, according to Amtrak data.
“We have to make sure we make a case for this to [Governor Corzine],” said Chip Hallock, president of the Regional Business Partnership.
Congress is scheduled to consider Amtrak’s funding in 2007. Rep. Bill Pascrell Jr., D-Paterson, a member of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, said Tuesday he would consider the proposal, called the Northeast Corridor Action Plan.
NJ Transit also suggested Tuesday that it likes the plan. The agency contributes about $34.4 million a year to maintain the corridor.
“This proposal could be the basis for a discussion about addressing policy governance and accountability models for the corridor,” NJ Transit Executive Director George D. Warrington said.
The action plan would invest decision-making authority in a public corporation. The federal government would appoint half of its board of directors, and governors and the mayor of the District of Columbia would appoint the other half.
“I believe the federal government will be much more receptive to that idea than they would be simply giving the money over to Amtrak,” Robins said.
Two years ago, the White House proposed a budget with zero funding for Amtrak, which also meant no funding for corridor infrastructure. Some members of Congress also oppose subsidies for Amtrak, which relies on about $1.2 billion in annual federal funds to survive.
Robins and others said state involvement in the corridor would eventually give a lift to slow-moving plans to modernize and expand choke points in New Jersey.
When NJ Transit recently announced a contract to expand the two-track Portal Bridge, which Amtrak owns, it did so because it could not rely on Amtrak to undertake the work, Robins said.
“Amtrak did not play a particularly vital role in getting that project off the dime,” he said. “Amtrak, being as beleaguered as it is, can never promote these things.”