Fred Frailey Column- "It's Time"

rohr turbo wrote: Split hairs all you want, but it sure appears Amtrak was involved in technical specs (both corridor&LD), must have negotiated price (LD), and got in the queue. It's not nothing.

the long distance order was placed under anderson. it remains to be seen if specs are the same.

Gilbert B Norman wrote:Wholly agree, Mr. Stephens.

WIth hindsight the V-II Sleepers should have been configured 8BR-4RM. No need for an "H Room" as the requirement is one per train and not per car.

There’s a lot of hindsight involved, including skewing the V-II order away from diners and toward sleepers, or away from full diners and toward grill cars with more seating. Alas, the business model has been changed (by Congress, the executive branch, Amtrak leadership and market forces) since the late President Boardman chose to order a full-kitchen-equipped Viewdiner rather than something with fewer amenities yet more flexibility.

rohr turbo wrote:Tad said no one made any moves to prepare P42 replacements during the Obama years.

Split hairs all you want, but it sure appears Amtrak was involved in technical specs (both corridor&LD), must have negotiated price (LD), and got in the queue. It's not nothing.

Amtrak wasn't involved in the IDOT/Caltrans technical specs because of any bold moves by the Obama Admin.... They had a seat at the table because they were expected to be the operator and maintainer of the equipment, and it had to be compatible with their own equipment. Period. Full stop. That's cold, hard, established practice since 1971.

Maybe you're not familiar with how government procurement works, but no, Amtrak wouldn't have been allowed to negotiate anything without its own RFI/RFP process being initiated, which was done under Anderson's tenure. Nor did they "get in the queue" -- VIA will see their deliveries arrive before's Amtrak will. If they were in the queue, VIA would be waiting instead of Amtrak....


This isn't splitting hairs or spinning for political positioning.... it's fact. You just have to read the actual procurement documents (public record with some redactions around pricing) instead of the almost-garbage that advocacy groups put out.


You seem hell-bent to try and show the Obama Admin was proactive, but aside from HSR grants which all went towards infrastructure, they didn't do much for the long distance network. They focused on corridors.

I know that some of you may be too blinded by partisan views to see otherwise, but Richard Anderson (and by association the Trump Admin) seem to have done more to re-invest in Amtrak's corridor and long distance rolling stock and motive power than any previous Administration has done in over 20 years. And again, these are the guys routinely vilified as hating rail....

Without promoting one side or the other, I think y'all might want to reconsider who is and isn't a friend to sustainable rail. There's been lots of sizzle out of many politicians, but not so much steak. What Anderson is doing is steak.

So where was the money for the states chargers coming from then ? And the flow on from that was that Amtrak would get its P42's back .

eolesen wrote: You seem hell-bent to try and show the Obama Admin was proactive, but aside from HSR grants which all went towards infrastructure, they didn't do much for the long distance network. They focused on corridors.

I know that some of you may be too blinded by partisan views to see otherwise, but Richard Anderson (and by association the Trump Admin) seem to have done more to re-invest in Amtrak's corridor and long distance rolling stock and motive power than any previous Administration has done in over 20 years. And again, these are the guys routinely vilified as hating rail....

Without promoting one side or the other, I think y'all might want to reconsider who is and isn't a friend to sustainable rail. There's been lots of sizzle out of many politicians, but not so much steak. What Anderson is doing is steak.

Anderson was not appointed by the Trump Admin. The Amtrak board (the body which chooses the CEO) today is chaired by an Obama appointee, and is indeed composed almost entirely of Obama appointees -- Elaine Chao being the only exception. Anderson's successes (and I agree he's doing more than people give him credit for) are actually likely in spite of the Trump administration, which has been delaying transit grants in general and has campaigned for cuts in Amtrak's budget more specifically -- including, I might add, full elimination of the long distance network. ( http://trn.trains.com/news/news-wire/20 ... t-spending" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; )

FWIW, Obama may not have spent lots on the LD network, but other efforts made by the administration -- notably, the (failed) effort to hold freight railroads accountable for reliability issues, and the requirement that improvement plans for LD service be put together -- would have benefited LD service, which IMHO cannot be discounted.

Oh, I'm well aware of who hired Anderson. He was also a Hillary donor after being a life-long Republican, and had been rumored to be up for an Ambassador spot prior to the election... and then he wound up at Amtrak.

I do find it ironic that so many says Anderson's doing Trump's bidding when it comes to the "bad things" like food service cuts on the LSL, yet on this line of discussion, he gets the credit as an Obama friendly hire.

I have a lot of respect for Richard Anderson. He did good work at Delta, and could do good things at Amtrak if people would stop making him out to be a hatchet man.

eolesen, I don't want to pick a fight and I have not espoused any political agenda, I just tried to simply point out an assertion I thought was inaccurate. (Tad: "nothing was done"; me: "options were placed")

And again I respectfully question your statement:

eolesen wrote: Nor did they "get in the queue" -- VIA will see their deliveries arrive before's Amtrak will. If they were in the queue, VIA would be waiting instead of Amtrak....

According to these two Railway Age articles (both Dec 2018), Amtrak will receive LD CHargers summer 2021 with service fall 2021, while Via's will enter service 2022.

https://www.railwayage.com/passenger/in ... ce-trains/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
https://www.railwayage.com/passenger/vi ... t-renewal/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

If I'm wrong, and I may be, please inform me in a nonjudgmental way.

eolesen wrote:Oh, I'm well aware of who hired Anderson. He was also a Hillary donor after being a life-long Republican, and had been rumored to be up for an Ambassador spot prior to the election... and then he wound up at Amtrak.

I do find it ironic that so many says Anderson's doing Trump's bidding when it comes to the "bad things" like food service cuts on the LSL, yet on this line of discussion, he gets the credit as an Obama friendly hire.

I have a lot of respect for Richard Anderson. He did good work at Delta, and could do good things at Amtrak if people would stop making him out to be a hatchet man.

food service cuts are not trump's bidding, by law Amtrak is required to eliminate them.

Options mean very little and in cases like this cost nothing. It simply says a party has the right to purchase something for a price. It occurs when a production line is done building one pre existing order and has not yet closed. The reason is that it costs less to build locomotives (or any heavy equipment) when the production line is open, supply chain is current, and workers trained. I do this stuff for a living, making cranes for steel mills, Shipyards, and railroad shops.The Obama administration did not allocate money for long distance chargers, this was done under Trump and Anderson.

My status as a moderator has no bearing on statements about Obama/Biden. They didn’t repeal PRIIA despite a friendly Congress and they didn’t do much for long distance trains. They made some big moves for corridor trains. It’s a statement of fact and if you can’t handle it, I can’t help you. It was intended to show that neither party is a friend to the long distance train.

David Benton wrote:Maybe we should discuss ways to improve long distance and other trains.That was what 90% of Fred's blog was about.

The US has missed out on the rail developments in other countries for the last 70 years. The remaining services have been stuck in the conditions of the 1950s. The result is a transport system unsuited to present day conditions. The most important feature is that there are no FAST trains. Another feature is the almost total lack of electrification. The reliance on oil is going to prove a serious defect. Burning oil and coal worldwide must be reduced severely. Rail transport is ideally suited to electrification but the US is notable for its avoidance of electric. That is something that must change as soon as possible. Slow freight has dominated the system and prevented fast passenger service. Fast electric rail is needed to replace polluting air transport.

george matthews wrote:Slow freight has dominated the system and prevented fast passenger service. Fast electric rail is needed to replace polluting air transport.

No one beyond PRR and NH and interurbans used electric power for freight (RDG and Lackawanna were electric passenger MUs only).

Not true at all...... South Shore used electrics for freight in Indiana up until about 20 years ago. The Milwaukee Road and Great Northern both had electrics up until the 1970's and 1950's respectively in Montana, Idaho and Washington. So did the Virginian up until the 1960's. IRM has a Virginian and South Shore locomotive, while the LSRM in Duluth and MOT in St. Louis each have a Milwaukee boxcab. None of the GN locomotives were saved.

Deseret Railroad in Utah still uses electrics today, as does/did the Lake Powell & Black Mesa in Arizona. Both exist to serve powerplants at the end of the line, and the Black Mesa plant is in the process of shutting down.

Kennecott Copper in Utah also used to run an all-electric operation as well to move ore from their pit to their smelter, but that was shut down in favor of a conveyor system.

The problem with electrifying any of the west coast railroads is power distribution. There's lots of vast nothingness that would need power lines, substations, etc. just to serve the railroad, and that drives the cost up to where it makes it too expensive. Might work better on the east coast where there's less vast nothingness to contend with.

JoeBas wrote:

Tadman wrote: Pretend we are talking about horse and buggy instead of long distance train.

Nice strawman. You thoroughly destroyed it! Hay EVERYWHERE!!!! Woo Hoo!!!

Where's that rolleyes guy when you need him again? :rolleyes:

We're not talking about horse and buggy. We're talking about viable interstate transportation that routinely sells out despite its neglected, underfunded, marginally-utilitarian state, that with just a little bit of POSITIVE ATTENTION and actual honest-to-God investment instead of ignorance and neglect could become a true part of the overall transportation solution in this country.

You instead, want to raid it to fund your little back-and-forth benefits-the-few-at-the-cost-of-the-many corridors, which would ultimately be better appreciated, funded and understood (or not) by the people they benefit (hey, smaller government, amirite???), in a regional fashion.

How would you quantify the long distance passenger train as more or less viable than a stagecoach? You’ve asserted that this is a straw man, and you should support that argument. I bet you can’t. Your assertion is based on opinion.

And what makes you think the long distance trains are sold out? I’m Select Plus and I don’t see that many sold out long distance trains.

george matthews wrote:

David Benton wrote:Maybe we should discuss ways to improve long distance and other trains.That was what 90% of Fred's blog was about.

The US has missed out on the rail developments in other countries for the last 70 years. The remaining services have been stuck in the conditions of the 1950s. The result is a transport system unsuited to present day conditions. The most important feature is that there are no FAST trains. Another feature is the almost total lack of electrification. The reliance on oil is going to prove a serious defect. Burning oil and coal worldwide must be reduced severely. Rail transport is ideally suited to electrification but the US is notable for its avoidance of electric. That is something that must change as soon as possible. Slow freight has dominated the system and prevented fast passenger service. Fast electric rail is needed to replace polluting air transport.

We’ve missed out so much that our railway network is bigger than anybody else’s and makes more money, supporting social necessities such as retirement pensions and insurance companies with no government help at all by creating value for shareholders. Tell me, does British Rail do that? Any public carriers? No, they don’t. You could make the argument that socialized railways create poverty and thus are unsuited to present day conditions.

Obviously, I don't agree with this guy. He holds that LD's should have an operator other than Amtrak. I hold owing to their incursion on the Class I systems, it it time to finish what the "Carter and Clinton Cuts" started and the "Bush Prunings" continued, with an orderly discontinuance of the LD System. It belonged to another era that had ended prior to A-Day:

https://ntbraymer.wordpress.com/2019/05 ... rom-amtrak" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Fair Use:

If we were to create a new Long Distance Passenger train service in this country, we would need funding to upgrade the railroads which will allow more and faster passenger and freight rail service. In many cases the railroads need improvements across the county. Such investments would likely also stimulate economic growth both in much of the rural areas of the country as well as in many cities across the country. By using some of the money now given to Amtrak, a new Long Distance National Passenger Rail System could be created. Some of this funding would be used as seed money to buy new equipment and to expand rail passenger service.