THE RAIL ENTHUSIAST IN THE WHITE HOUSE?

Railfan reports a campaign promise.  "Amtrak’s Best Days Are Still Ahead."  There was a bit of a pep rally and family reunion in Philadelphia, and Sleepy Joe is fortunate that multiple trains run on the Northeast Corridor.  "Biden recalled that he saw 30th Street Station a few times when he was coming back from Washington and missed his stop at Wilmington because he had fallen asleep."  He also touted additional sections of "high speed" rail where diesel trains with free rein to 125 might be the better bet.  "Outside the Northeast, Biden mentioned higher-speed rail between such city pairs as Atlanta-Charlotte and Los Angeles-Las Vegas, as well as new destinations like Allentown and Scranton, Pa. (his home town)."

There are ambitious plans.  There is also a lot of process and politics in the way.

Amtrak’s expansion plans generally focus on the short-distance, state-supported corridors that Amtrak began promoting as its future under previous CEO Richard Anderson. Because such routes require state partnerships and funding, the new routes shown on the map released in March [see “Amtrak unveils ‘Connect US’ map …,” Trains News Wire, March 31, 2021] are largely aspirational. Along with legislative support at the state level, such new service will also require operating agreements with host railroads, which can be extremely difficult to obtain, as is being illustrated in the current fight with CSX Transportation and Norfolk Southern over efforts to restore service in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama along the Gulf Coast [see “Analysis: Amtrak defends its Gulf Coast access request …,” News Wire, April 29, 2021].

For these reasons and others, Amtrak has yet to outline a time frame or other details for initiating service. In its funding and legislative request to Congress earlier this week, Amtrak did ask for money for a key element of its route expansion plan: the ability to fully pay for the first two years of new multi-frequency routes, after which it would gradually shift costs to states or local operating agencies [see “Amtrak establishes priorities …,” News Wire, April 29, 2021]. But the actual expansion of service figures to be a slow-moving process.

It almost always has been, although the Passenger Rail network is in better shape in a lot of places than it was on 30 April 1971.