(The following column by Steve Hymon appeared on the Los Angeles Times website on October 8.)
LOS ANGELES — I posted last week when the Senate voted to approve the rail safety and Amtrak bill by a 74-to-24 margin. But I neglected to inform readers how individual senators voted, which I should have done given that two of them are running for president.
Barack Obama voted for the bill, and John McCain voted against it. You can see the vote tallies at the U.S. Senate website. All 24 “no” votes came from Republicans, although 25 Republicans voted for it. Not voting were Sen. Joe Biden, a Democrat who says he’s a frequent Amtrak rider, and Sen. Edward Kennedy, who has been ill.
The rail safety portion of the bill (HR 2095, the Railroad Safety Enhancement Act of 2008) requires that passenger trains and some freight trains install positive train controls by 2015 to help prevent collisions. The bill also limits the number of hours that freight train crews can work and requires the Federal Railroad Administration to draw up a similar rule for passenger train crews.
The positive train control aspect of the bill was made tougher after the Sept. 12 head-on collision between a Metrolink train and a Union Pacific freight train in Chatsworth that killed 25 people aboard the Metrolink train.
The Amtrak part of the bill was more contentious because it provides more than $12 billion in funding to the rail carrier. Some members of Congress — including McCain — have decried the subsidies for Amtrak for years, trying to push the railroad toward self-sufficiency.
The Wall Street Journal ran a story last week looking at how each senator voted. An excerpt:
“With the financial situation facing our nation, this multibillion-dollar commitment of taxpayers’ dollars could be dedicated to addressing far more important national priorities,” a McCain spokesman said in an e-mail Thursday.
The spokesman also singled out an earmark in the bill that would steer $1.5 billion over 10 years to the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, which operates bus and rail service in the nation’s capital.
After casting his vote Wednesday night, Obama issued a statement in keeping with his broader calls to invest in roads, bridges and other transportation infrastructure.
“American businesses and families deserve to have safe, reliable and efficient transportation options,” he said. “For far too long, our nation’s lack of investment in too many aspects of our infrastructure has undermined that important goal.”
McCain and Obama had their second debate last night, but the subject of transportation was not broached in any direct manner. Neither candidate uttered the words “transportation,” “mass transit,” “rail safety” or “Amtrak.” The closest they came were discussions about oil and the need for clean energy.