The Department of Transportation is sending California a $100 million grant to buy locomotives and passenger cars for two rail routes shared with freight railroads.
The action finalizes an award first made last October, and comes out of money set aside under the fiscal 2010 federal budget.
Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said the funds will go to buy U.S.-built equipment, part of the congressionally mandated Buy America requirement for developing the intercity passenger rail system. "Thanks to this investment in new, American-made cars and locomotives, Californians will continue to enjoy the congestion relief, economic growth and affordable travel provided by these popular rail lines," he said.
The grant will go for trains operating in the Pacific Surfliner and San Joaquin state-sponsored Amtrak corridors.....
Posted by sbalax (Member # 2801) on :
From my recent experiences on the Pacific Surfliners additional cars are certainly needed. The conductor on my Friday afternoon train SBA-LAUPT said that there are often as many as 100 standees from Los Angeles to San Diego on Fridays and Sundays.
I forgot to ask in my post for my last trip about the prototype new Business Class seats that were being tried out. Did that ever come to anything? There were to be a "pod" design like most Business Class seats on airliners. I remember seeing some pictures posted here.
Frank in sunny, warm and WINDY SBA
Posted by Geoff Mayo (Member # 153) on :
quote:Originally posted by Gilbert B Norman: U.S.-built equipment[...]American-made
I wonder how many people actually know how much of the $100m* actually ends up in the US, since the definition of "American-made" is so variable?
* How much did CA contribute? Given the 27 cars and two locos quoted, probably not much, if anything. Not criticizing, just theorizing.
Posted by Gilbert B Norman (Member # 1541) on :
Mr. Mayo, I think that the March tsunami and resulting nuclear incident was the "hello' moment for 'John Q" when he learned that the production of "American cars' was going to be disrupted as a result of reduced availability of Japanese made sub assemblies within his Chevy or Ford.
It's called 'globalization' lest we forget.
However, it will be interesting to see how in this instance the charade of "American made' plays out. It appears that the 'buy American" provisions for this equipment funded largely under ARRA '09 are stronger in word than such for other pending Amtrak equipment orders (electric locomotives, single level LD cars, Talgo sets). Possibly an outfit named ARCO (Left Coasters, I think gasoline is no longer marketed under that name) - American Rail Car COmpany, Inc. Never mind who owns the entity.
Oh and may I say you Brits sure know how to put on the "jolly good" show; I even had the 'Telly' (even though she left the UK now 22 years ago - after having resided there for 18 - that is what my Sister still calls the device) on at 5AM CT (or GMT -6) to watch.
While rail unrelated, here is quite a piece that appeared in this past Sunday's Times regarding the 'Royals" (don't they still have their own private train, or did that go the way of their yacht?):
quote:Originally posted by Gilbert B Norman: Mr. Mayo, I think that the March tsunami and resulting nuclear incident was the "hello' moment for 'John Q" when he learned that the production of "American cars' was going to be disrupted as a result of reduced availability of Japanese made sub assemblies within his Chevy or Ford.
It's called 'globalization' lest we forget.
Simply the practicalities of having something completely sourced and built within one country means the statement "Made in America" is pretty meaningless. And I'm sure Joe Public would be up in arms if he found out that to buy a 99.99% all-American car will now cost him thrice the price, now that cheap parts can't be imported from the Far East. So he now can't afford that car, like many others, and so the car plant and all its supporting businesses go under, losing hundreds or thousands of American jobs. And so the cycle continues.
"Made in the UK" is actually worse - it only means final assembly. With such a small nation we can't be expected to have all the raw materials. Even animals born, bred, and slaughtered abroad can be called British as long as they were sliced and diced and packaged in the UK. Bonkers, hence my cynicism.
quote:Originally posted by Gilbert B Norman: Oh and may I say you Brits sure know how to put on the "jolly good" show; I even had the 'Telly' (even though she left the UK now 22 years ago - after having resided there for 18 - that is what my Sister still calls the device) on at 5AM CT (or GMT -6) to watch.
Yes, quite the ceremony. Full pomp and pageantry but without being over the top or cheesy. A rousing rendition of "Jerusalem" always gets the patriotic heart thumping.
quote:Originally posted by Gilbert B Norman: (don't they still have their own private train, or did that go the way of their yacht?)
Yes, they do still have it, but only used by the Queen and Prince Charles (and their company) to keep costs down.
Posted by Gilbert B Norman (Member # 1541) on :
There have long been conditions in contracts involving public funds calling for a "percentage of US content". As Mr. Mayo immediately infers, this can be quite misleading at times. For example, take a product - and I'm thinking of the Talgo equipment currently abuilding for the Hiawatha and Cascade trains - in which all the components - running gear, electrical systems, HVAC equipment - are all unloaded from intermodal containers at the US plant. There they are added to carbody "shells' that were designed overseas yet for expedience, fabricated over here are now all assembled by "semi-skilled' workers. Now the units are complete and the "pol' shows up for the photo-op letting loose with plaudits about 'American skills, American jobs, American labor". Likely the "percentage of US content" for this product is quite low, but yet the US content is quite visible.
I think it safe to say the days of Amtrak procurement comprising "all-American' content such as the E-60's and SDP-40's are in the history books; but so are the ANF Turbos which were unglamorously offloaded from a ship at Baltimore. As near as I could tell, the only "US content' in this equipment was some English signage saying "Lavatory" pasted over those saying "WC".
Posted by sbalax (Member # 2801) on :
Here's a link to an article about this from the Ventura Star.
It's interesting that ten are replacement cars. I wonder which cars are being replaced. Perhaps the low level cars that are used for two of the Surfliners to SLO or perhaps the Superliner coaches will be taken out of the mix -- the so called "Dark Cars".
I have to agree that the whole event in London was beautifully done. Stunning is an overused word but the new Duchess of Cambridge is certainly that!
Frank in sunny and warm and finally calm SBA
Posted by Southwest Chief (Member # 1227) on :
From that Ventura Star article...
"The Pacific Surfliner should have the new cars by 2017"
2017! Holy moly. 6 years to build 19 cars. That's worse then the Superliners by Pullman.
Guess these are going to be all new car designs
Kind of stupid when the California Car design is fine as it is now. Sure may not be 100% American being Alstrom built. But why waste money and time when there is already a perfectly good design available. And then there's going to be the unpleasant mixing of dissimilar looking cars with new designs.
Could have been done a whole lot easier if they went with the basic California Car design.
Posted by George Harris (Member # 2077) on :
Here is a link to the specification. Warning: this is a 7.71MB 580 page document and is written in governmental specificationese.
The there is downloads.trasnportation.org/NextGenEquipmentComm/C21/Caltrans%20C21%20Specification/Spec%201-106,%20Operational%20&%20Environmental%20Conditions%20rev%20A.pdf
And, for dimensions, see capitalcorridor.org/included/docs/wifi/Question22.pdf
quote:Originally posted by Southwest Chief: 2017! Holy moly. 6 years to build 19 cars. That's worse then the Superliners by Pullman.
Maybe somebody's building them by hand in their garage?
Three years is a typical timeframe elsewhere in the world between signing an order and the first car rolling off the production line. Obviously that three years depends to a certain extent as to how much re-use there is. Round wheels anyone?
Posted by notelvis (Member # 3071) on :
I had an old friend who was building an airplane in a utility shed out behind his house but after 10 years that project never really took off.
He gave up on the flying machine and just brews his own beer now.
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