Why Trains Are Still The Future
On this week’s Real Time with Bill Maher, New York Times columnist Ross Douthat was on the panel, decrying Amtrak and how it is a government-funded waste of taxpayer dollars because the service is provides is so terrible. As an example, he brought up the terrible Acela service on the Northeast Corridor. For those not living on the East Coast, the Northeast Corridor is the busiest passenger rail line in the United States by ridership and service frequency. In 2004, this single train line handled 14% of all intercity trips between Northeast Corridor cities and its branches. The rest of these intercity trips are taken by airline, automobile, or coach.
New York City is served mainly by John F. Kennedy International Airport and LaGuardia International Airport. JFK now has some hours when airlines plan for as many as 100 flights, a number that nearly everyone agrees is more than the congested hub can handle, even in ideal weather. LGA is no better. Commuters can also fly into Newark International Airport and take either PATH mass transit into midtown Manhattan or take a towncar from EWR to Manhattan. Similarly, commuters can cab from Queens to Manhattan when flying into JFK or LGA. This is simply asinine.
The notion of the superiority of air travel over rail travel is so far removed from the facts literally on the ground as to be ludicrous. To get from DC to New York, one would drive to Reagan National Airport or Baltimore/Washington International Airport. Then spend 30 minutes going through security and waiting at the gate. Then spend 15 to 30 minutes waiting for takeoff. Then spend 1 hour of flight time. Then another 15 minutes taxing to the gate. And then 20 minutes to get from the gate to a cab. And then 45 to 60 minutes of traffic from the airport to midtown. At the end of it all, it is not quicker to go from DC to New York by air. The only difference is comfort.
By rail, the business commuter can spend the entire 3 hours of travel time working on the laptop without worrying about turbulence balancing a 15″ ThinkPad on a tray table built for a netbook. Amtrak has actual-factual outlets that your home AC adapter plugs right into. The only problem with Amtrak is that, technologically speaking, it is far behind the rest of the world – Europe in particular.
It’s been said before and I’ll say it again. This nation needs more government spending on the rail infrastructure. Mr. Douthat correctly noted that Amtrak is a government-subsidized rail line that typically runs at a loss. But this is not a reason to end Amtrak. In contrast, Europe’s famed TGV rail system is a government-subsidized rail line that typically runs at a loss. What people don’t realize is that rail is a valuable and indispensable technology – both for cargo and passenger travel. Without Amtrak, commuter travel on the East Coast would collapse. The airports don’t have the capacity and neither do the highways.
Instead of getting hung up on who is paying the bill for rail, we should look at how much it would cost to not have rail.
