(The following story by Jim DeBrosse appeared on the Dayton Daily News website on April 4, 2010.)
RIVERSIDE, Ohio — Excitement has been building for months about the planned train station across the street from the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force and within walking distance of the Air Force Research Laboratory at Wright Patterson Air Force Base.
With $428,000 in federal funds and $100,000 from Montgomery County, along with the hired help of one of the nation’s top commercial development firms, Forest City Enterprises Inc., Riverside officials are developing a master plan to turn the area into a tourism and transportation center as well as a new eastern gateway for Montgomery County.
Eight passenger trains a day between Cleveland and Cincinnati would run through Riverside with the potential of bringing thousands of tourists and schoolchildren to the Air Force Museum, said Riverside economic development director Bob Murray.
“The station will be a cash importer for the whole Dayton region,” he said. “We’re the plus factor in this whole train system.”
But plans for the 3-C Corridor rail service could soon come to a screeching halt if Republican members of the state controlling board vote to turn down the $400 million awarded to the project from President Obama’s federal stimulus program. In a compromise between Democrats and Republicans during last year’s state budget negotiations, Ohio legislators agreed a supermajority of the controlling board — five of its seven votes — would be needed to approve funding for the rail project.
If the board rejects the plan, the $400 million in stimulus money will be returned to the federal government to be used by some other state for passenger rail service. No date has been set for the vote.
Dems need one GOP member to vote yes
Democrats hold four of the board’s seven votes; the Republicans three. At least one Republican would have to vote in favor of the project to secure the federal funding. Two of the Republican board members have said they will vote in line with the Senate GOP Caucus, whose members have been loud in their criticism of the rail project. A third board member, State Rep. Jay Hottinger, R-Newark, said he is still undecided.
Senate Majority Leader Jon Husted, R-Kettering, has made it clear where he stands on the rail project, calling it “the biggest waste of taxpayer money in the state’s history.”
Husted said this week he doubted the rail plan has wheels.
“At this point, (advocates) haven’t been able to answer any of the questions that it is financially viable,” he said.
Passenger rail advocates say they have studies from the best experts in the country, as well as the recent double-digit growth in train ridership in all 15 states with Amtrak service, to show it will work. Details of the 3-C timetable and fares are still being worked out, but they would include stops in both downtown Dayton and Riverside. Fares would be about $7 for the trip from Dayton to Cincinnati and about $10.50 one-way to Columbus.
The earliest that service could begin is 2012.
To help with the route’s planning and design work, Ohio has been awarded $25 million in federal stimulus money that will not have to be paid back even if the controlling board rejects the larger $400 million federal offer.
Governor says plan would bring jobs
Amtrak released a study last year projecting ridership on the route at 478,000 during the first year of operations. About six million people live along the Cleveland to Cincinnati corridor, making it one of the most heavily populated corridors without rail service in the Midwest.
Currently, 128,000 Ohioans board national Amtrak trains in Cleveland and Cincinnati between the hours of midnight and 7 a.m. — a 10 percent increase in ridership in just the last year, Amtrak officials said.
The Strickland administration has defended the rail plan as a sure-fire way to create thousands of new jobs. In a speech to the Columbus Metropolitan Club in March, Jolene Molitoris, director of the Ohio Department of Transportation, cited examples in states where passenger rail projects sparked the development of condos, restaurants and other businesses around train stations.
In Saco, Maine, a developer is spending $110 million to turn an old mill into condos and an office park next to a new Amtrak station that picks up travelers along a rail corridor that runs to Boston, she said.
In its early years of operation, Amtrak estimates the 3-C Corridor would cost $29 million a year to operate. Of that cost, an estimated $12 million would be recovered in fares but the other $17 million would have to be recouped from the state budget or other revenue source. Federal stimulus money would cover 80 percent of the $17 million gap for the first three years of operation.
Even so, the subsidy troubles Republicans, who say the state can’t afford to add to its debt at a time when it is facing an estimated $8 billion shortfall.
“This is not a state that is flush with cash where we can subsidize things that don’t work,” Husted said.
Husted said the Amtrak study is “not comprehensive” and that he believes the ridership figures are inflated. He and other Republicans have criticized the speed of the conventional train service, saying the average of 45 miles per hour is slower than motorists can drive between Ohio cities.
Husted said the limited hours of train service won’t appeal to tourists, either.
“You can’t even leave to watch a Reds’ game (in Cincinnati) and get back in the same day,” he said.
Plan a step toward high-speed rail
Rail advocates admit the 3-C Corridor plan is only a start-up that would need to be upgraded in coming years to a high-speed service of 110 miles per hour or more if it’s going to appeal to commuters. But they argue that every high-speed train system in the world began as a conventional service.
“We call it learning to walk before you run,” said Ken Prendergast, executive director of All Aboard Ohio, a grassroots advocacy organization. “Ohio hasn’t had train service in 40 years.”
Murray believes that even a limited, conventional train system will work into the Dayton area’s vision of drawing more visitors here.
“Tourists won’t care how long it takes — they’re on vacation,” he said. “And they will be on vacation the moment they step into the train car. They’re going to enjoy the trip as part of their vacation.”