(The following editorial by Vincent T. Owens was posted on the News Journal website on October 24.)
WILMINGTON, Del. — Overall, a recent editorial on the Sept. 22 secret vote by Amtrak’s board of directors to split off the railroads’ Northeast Corridor as a new entity and require states to spend billions to modernize and rebuild much of Amtrak’s dilapidated infrastructure was insightful. Congress must approve the board’s plan and Amtrak funding shall soon be voted on by the Senate.
As a 29-year employee of Amtrak, long-time International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers representative and negotiator, I would like to debunk a few myths about the carrier.
President Bush appointed he four-member Amtrak board of directors; none has any experience running a railroad. This same board was censured for noncompliance of a federal law requiring it to provide Congress with fiscal 2006 Amtrak subsidy needs.
In a scathing letter in February from Senate Transportation Committee members Patty Murray and Daniel K. Inouye to board Chairman David M. Laney — a Dallas lawyer and Bush campaign donor — the board was accused of undermining Congress’ ability to assess Amtrak’s needs. The senators added: “This year’s report as submitted by a largely new board deliberately evades the question of the railroad’s subsidy needs and instead praises the president’s irresponsible proposal to bankrupt Amtrak as the right message.”
In the Northeast Corridor, Amtrak provides service between New York and Washington to more passengers than the airline shuttles. This lends credence to the myth that the corridor can be profitable. It is not and never will be profitable because of the extreme cost to maintain it.
The Northeast Corridor would only be bought by a private enterprise if the federal government guaranteed big capital subsidies. It is well-documented that no national rail passenger system in the world shows a profit. In fact, there is no passenger rail system in the United States that can survive without public subsidy.
Shortly after Hurricane Katrina and Rita battered the Gulf Coast’s oil rigs and refineries, gas prices spiraled upward, fuel shortages were predicted and President Bush implored everyone to drive less and use public transportation. This sage advice comes from a president whose 2006 federal budget provides zero dollars to Amtrak, whose administration had no qualms providing billions to airlines to prevent bankruptcy.
The next time you shell out to gas your car, ponder this. If ridership of all forms of public transportation increased only 10 percent above present levels, in one year American consumption of oil would decrease 40 percent. That’s as much as our yearly oil imports from Saudi Arabia.
A very unpleasant consequence of Amtrak’s demise would be having most of the 25 million passengers it carries each year choose highway travel — with more pollution, gridlock, vehicle expenses and human toll from increased accidents. Department of Transportation statistics show that for every 100 million passenger-vehicle miles traveled on highways, there is one fatality.
Each year at this time, 20,000 Amtrak employees, nearly 1,000 of them working in Delaware, fear for their jobs should Congress fail to appropriate adequate funding. Two out of every three organized labor members at Amtrak have been working without a new contract for more than six years as prices skyrocketed. Their earning power has deteriorated and many Amtrak workers now face serious financial problems.
There is more at stake than the Bush administration satisfying its conservative base. Lives and jobs are at risk. Everyone, especially our nation’s leaders and lawmakers, has to accept there never will be a free ride.
Vincent T. Owens of Bear is president and business manager of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 2270.