“When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?” — John Maynard Keynes
How can the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania be freed from Amtrak’s abusive monopoly on intercity passenger rail service? This editorial is based on my Dec. 17, 2019 testimony before the Pennsylvania House of Representatives Transportation Committee, during which I spoke about creating viable rail passenger opportunities for Western Pennsylvania and the Philadelphia-Harrisburg corridor that could serve as a template for other states currently paying for Amtrak service under the bizarre federal legislation called PRIIA.
Since railroad freight is often bulk or shipments of large goods, changes in the economy or in global trade can impact the flow of railroad traffic in large up and down movements. Translation: There will often be cyclicality.
FINANCIAL EDGE, RAILWAY AGE FEBRUARY 2020 ISSUE: The 2015 FAST Act is notable to most consumers of rail assets as being the legislation that established the tank car regulations and time frames for moving the tank railcar design from the DOT-111 (legacy or CPC1232 specification) to the DOT-117J (and 117R) design.
On Feb. 6—the second time in less than two months—a Canadian Pacific tank car train carrying Alberta bitumen diluted with highly volatile petroleum gases derailed near the tiny town of Guernsey, Sask. The derailment created an explosive fire and prompted the evacuation of more than 80 nearby residents.
If International Railway Journal had suggested in 2016 that school children striking in Sweden over the lack of government action concerning the impact of climate change would lead to an overnight sleeper train revival, when most of them were being withdrawn across much of western Europe, most readers would have questioned the logic. However, the reality in 2020 is that the Swedish flight shaming movement, inspired in part by teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg, is aiding the reintroduction of overnight trains.
WATCHING WASHINGTON, RAILWAY AGE FEBRUARY 2020 ISSUE: Spending others’ money as if it were one’s own isn’t successful politics. Yet notwithstanding Congress’ current appetite for trillion-dollar annual deficits, there are limits to federal spending—especially on Amtrak, which labors perennially for but a miniscule portion.
The U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), essentially a reboot of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which has governed trade among the United States and its North American neighbors since 1994, is now in place. President Donald Trump signed the agreement in a ceremony marked by “great fanfare,” as one news outlet described it, on the South Lawn of the White House on Jan. 29, with about 400 guests, including farmers, corporate executives and workers, members of the Republican party, but not surprisingly, no representatives from the Democratic congressional contingent that supported its ratification.
There is a great deal of passion about coal as a railroad commodity. Some suggest that the railroads have been in denial about coal’s decline as a business sector. Yet, I bore witness to an awareness of the risks of the coal decline a long time ago.
New York City Transit President Andy Byford resigned on Jan. 23. Andy was hired in January 2018 to improve and transform New York City’s 116-year-old subway, North America’s largest, and he was doing just that. But he got fed up with New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who thinks he’s in charge of running New York’s railways. Now, someone else will have to carry on—if they’re capable—and that remains to be seen.
