Don_ wrote:We could very well say the same thing for ANY Amtrak train, your Cascades as well.
You'll notice that I frequently decry the Cascades route from Portland to Eugene (part of a corridor) as one that should be axed as being unsuccessful; the much more successful Portland-Seattle segment could strongly benefit from having additional equipment available north of Portland for service expansions, without new equipment or costs.
Don_ wrote:People in Idaho used the train and it was popular when it ran before so-called expert consultants recommended Amtrak discontinue a viable route to allow the CZ to run daily.
The question is "how many" People, and the definition of "popular".
A train that consistently ran with just four cars - two coaches, a diner, and a sleeper, and rarely ran close to capacity, is hardly "popular". (When I rode the Pioneer from Portland-Denver in 1992 the train had three coaches; none of the coaches were at capacity; the dining car typically was used only at 50% of capacity so that the other half could be used as a lounge area for lack of a Sightseer Lounge - and I don't recall anyone being denied meal service in the diner because of the imposed reduced capacity.)
Boise does not suffer from any lack of transportation options; in fact its smaller airport is quite well-served, and surprisingly has competition on many of its routes. On routes to Seattle, Portland, the Bay Area, Los Angeles, Salt Lake City and Denver - each of those routes are served by at least two carriers; Denver has three carriers. That is quite unusual for many airports and especially one that serves a smaller area like Boise. The residents of the Treasure Valley are huge recipients of this - better service, lower fares, more flights and more capacity - from for-profit companies. Meanwhile, Greyhound and Northwestern Trailways provides regional and intercity bus service along the I-84 and U.S. 95 corridors for local service needs.
It is questionable as to the need of Amtrak service given the wide range of transportation options; and especially given the required capital cost to start a service given the limited potential for ridership, the virtual impossibility that revenues will come even close to expenses (and the questionable ability for governments to cover the operating losses - Idaho is not a big-budget state, and Oregon is close to financial crisis). It is not the responsibility of any government agency to provide a rail service simply on the whims and desires of its residents who make an active choice not to avail themselves of the existing options; a dislike of Greyhound is hardly a rationale to spend tens of millions of taxpayer dollars for a few elitist citizens to demand an expensive new train. If Boise and the rest of the Pioneer corridor could offer some type of ridership projection that could demonstrate the financial benefits of mass transportation by rail then there would be an argument, but there is nothing to suggest that the benefits of rail can be achieved here.
