(The following article by Larry Higgs was posted on the Asbury Park Press website on December 6.)
NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. — Amtrak board Chairman David M. Laney said Tuesday he expects results of an independent report into the May 25 Northeast Corridor power outage, which disrupted the travel of thousands of passengers, to be released in two weeks to a month.
Speaking at Rutgers University’s Voorhees Transportation Institute on Tuesday afternoon, Laney said the report will provide details about the outage, which disrupted travel between Washington, D.C., and Boston. He also spoke about a Voorhees proposal for the federal government and eight states to run the Northeast Corridor line, and about the overall challenges facing the national rail carrier.
Laney said the outage was not “a product of old equipment . . ., an aged power system nor a lack of capacity in our power system.”
New equipment has been ordered for the corridor’s electrical infrastructure, he said. However, it will not be online for at least five to seven years because it has to come from overseas and requires a type of steel not readily available, Laney said.
“The issue of power upgrades on the Northeast Corridor is critical,” he said.
Laney cautioned that not everything about the outage will be revealed. Information that applies to security will not be released.
Laney spent the first part of his talk addressing Amtrak’s future. That looks brighter because of the Democratic majority in Congress and outside developments, such as rising gasoline prices and a possible regulation on motor vehicles and aircraft pollution, which could mean a bigger role for Amtrak’s trains.
Amtrak’s first jobs, he said, are dealing with internal issues such as organizational and fiscal efficiency and operating reliably. Then it will deal with labor issues and freight railroads.
“The most important thing is to renew our credibility in the eyes of (officials in) Washington, travelers and the states,” Laney said. “Many continue to view Amtrak through the smudged windshield of failure.”
A recent report by the U.S. Department of Transportation’s inspector general found Amtrak is performing better. It reduced operating losses by $120 million, debt by $400 million and operating expenses by $60 million last year, he said. Ridership increased to 24.3 million passengers annually.
Laney also commented on Voorhees Northeast Corridor action plan, which was released last week. That plan proposes having the federal government own the rail line, which passes through eight states, and starting a public benefit corporation to run it, controlled equally by the states and the federal DOT.
Amtrak would be hired as a contractor to run inter-city trains. The plan calls for federal funding of major upgrades to get the corridor in a state of good repair and proposes an 80-20 split of major capital projects between the federal and state governments after that.
He questioned having the federal government own the corridor and whether the eight states could come to an agreement. But Laney said the plan is worth discussing and provides a blueprint for other intercity rail corridors in the nation.
“It’s difficult to work with the federal DOT now. We’re trying to make the company more flexible,” Laney said. “I’m concerned that more involvement by the federal government is not the way to go.”
He also announced that a Northeast Corridor advisory panel will be formed early next year, which will involve representatives from all states on the corridor line.
He also cautioned that corridor funding has to be balanced with needs of the other states. Amtrak serves 46 of the lower 48 states, some of which are studying high-speed intercity corridors.
Martin Robins, executive director of Voorhees and co-author of the plan, said if it can work on the Northeast Corridor, it can work anywhere, but it should be tried here first.
“The plan is workable, given a chance,” he said.
Robins said that the corridor advisory committee Amtrak is starting can be dissolved by it, making the case for establishing it under the action plan.