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Any word on an eventual national rail transportaiton policy from the White House? What it would look like? When is it expected to pass? Why is it getting delayed again and again? Why don't we hear about it?
Is the Bush administraiton currently too busy planning bandit-state-like nuclear attacks, implementing protectionnist commercial measures to protect itself from big bad foreigners, and bailing out his wealthy friends, therefore being unable to think about the incoming transportation crisis in his own country and to act accordingly?
Meanwhile, despite Amtrak's increasing market share and record ridership, March 29th is approaching fast, the rail NEC infrastructure is deteriorating, the highway system is clogged and in a state of disrepair, and still not turning a profit(!},freight operators complain about the lack of capacity because they hapilly ripped it off in the 80s, and the dependence on oil resources of the country is worsening(and any plan to attack Iraq or Iran or whatever else will undoubtedly result in disruption of the local oil production...how inconvenient).
When he was nominated, everyone seemed to praise Mineta and his vision of a balanced transportation infrastructure. Now I wonder, how useful can a vision be if you can't do anything with it, or if his narrow-short-term-minded boss won't let him do it anyway?
MPALMER Member # 125
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Kinda heavy on the political rhetoric there!
But I think you are correct the leadership is preoccupied with terrorist threats etc so I don't know if they'll make much progress with the Transportation policy. Mineta's priorities have been changed by all this.
I don't foresee anything major happening soon. We'll continue to suffer ever-increasing congestion on the highways.
As for Amtrak, how much of its worsening financial condition was due to the large number of vouchers issued? Judging by some of the other posts there are some "frequent voucher riders" out there.
disgusted Member # 1373
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Hearing rumors that we got the 1.2 billion we discovered we needed to keep running.
Eric Member # 674
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"Hearing rumors that we got the 1.2 billion we discovered we needed to keep running." Really?
mechtech Member # 1459
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I suggest the highest priority should be to invest in commuter rail traffic (subways, heavy rail and light rail) and seperate bus lanes to keep the big cities and agglomerations functioning. Also the worst sections in the highway network should be upgraded to decrease congestion, for traffic safety reasons and because not all traffic can go by rail.
Mr. Toy Member # 311
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Both Senate and House commmittees have expressed frustration with the Bush Administrations' lack of policy on this.
I watched Allan Rutter, head of the Federal Railroad Administration on C-SPAN a few weeks ago, and it wasn't encouraging. He was testifying before a House committee. I forget the name of the committee, but it was the one headed by Jack Quinn, who is a big Amtrak supporter. John "kill all of Amtrak except the NEC and my state's Auto Train" Mica of Florida was also on the Committee.
The committee asked Rutter a number of policy questions, like "Should we have long distance trains?" "Where can we get the money to pay for this stuff?" and important questions like that. All Rutter could say was "We're stll studying that" and "We are not sure yet" and "We are still looking into that." The committee was obviously very frustrated. In the end the committee requested that a plan outline be delivered to the committee no later than April 11. It was my impression that the "request" was more than a mere desire to see a plan, but something more akin to a legally imposed deadline.
Reports of a Senate Commerce Committee hearing (the one with John McCain) indicate that a similar story played out on the Senate side of the Capitol.
------------------ Trust God, love your neighbor, and never mistake opinion for truth. -Mr. Toy
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