Bush Warned to Be Speedy on Amtrak Funding
The chairman of the Senate Appropriations subcommittee on transportation said today the Bush administration must quickly ask for enough money to keep Amtrak running through the rest of the fiscal year or “be prepared to explain to the American people why it will allow Amtrak to go bankrupt in the middle of the summer travel season.”
Maybe Amtrak will go bankrupt in the middle of the holiday season because “Congress has given Amtrak just enough money to struggle along year after year while ordering the corporation to operate trains that had no chance of covering their costs.”
I agree with John Tierny: Amtrak Must Die.
The Acela hits its peak speed of 150 m.p.h. for only 18 miles between New York and Boston. While European countries have been laying new high-speed tracks, Amtrak is deferring maintenance on tracks in the Northeast Corridor to subsidize long-distance trains elsewhere.
That’s with the caveat, that Northeast Corridor service is maintained and improved. It is the most convenient way to travel from New York to Boston or Washington.
