New Interview; Mr. Anderson/NPR

[eolesen]

Oh, sure there will be some urban markets where rail does well, and that's an entirely different discussion. This is about Long Distance.

Certainly, there are *states* who believe in funding passenger rail. That's exactly how it should work -- states funding and defining where service should be. It's great that Oklahoma can decide to fund a train that isn't economically justified without impacting Indiana or Minnesota taxpayers.

What we shouldn't be doing as national policy/infrastructure is funding rail for those making a lifestyle choice to live in urban centers without personal transportation. The cost of taking the train to escape the city should be borne by the people making those lifestyle choices...

[mtuandrew]

Oh, sure there will be some urban markets where rail does well, and that's an entirely different discussion. This is about Long Distance.

Certainly, there are *states* who believe in funding passenger rail. That's exactly how it should work -- states funding and defining where service should be. It's great that Oklahoma can decide to fund a train that isn't economically justified without impacting Indiana or Minnesota taxpayers.

What we shouldn't be doing as national policy/infrastructure is funding rail for those making a lifestyle choice to live in urban centers without personal transportation. The cost of taking the train to escape the city should be borne by the people making those lifestyle choices...

What we shouldn't be doing as national policy/infrastructure is funding roads for those making a lifestyle choice to live in suburban centers without public transportation. The cost of driving cars to enter the city should be borne by the people making those lifestyle choices.

Keep in mind that prior to the 1800s, there was next to no suburban settlement. It was urban, small town, or farms; auto-centric suburbia is recent and no more deserving of tax dollars than transit- or walking/biking-centric urban areas (which pay the majority of taxes in America as well.)

[eolesen]

Well, you'll need to change the Constitution to eliminate funding roads. Article I, Section 8, Clause 7 requires the government to provide and maintain post roads...

Good luck with changing that.

[Arborwayfan]

Well, you'll need to change the Constitution to eliminate funding roads. Article I, Section 8, Clause 7 requires the government to provide and maintain post roads...

Good luck with changing that.

The Constitution allows Congress to maintain post offices and post roads. It doesn't require it. And it certainly doesn't require the government to maintain a nationwide network of free multilane divided highways designed to make it easy for people to live far from their jobs and far from shopping and get everywhere by private car. It doesn't require the federal government or the states to make extensive use of eminent domain to assemble the rights of way for those roads (although other parts of the constitution allow that). It doesn't require a federal gas tax to create a big pot of money for highways that Congress can appropriate outside the budget process that pays for everything else from the Air Force and Amtrak to the National Zoo. It doesn't require Congress to apportion those gas tax dollars in any particular way. All those are policy choices from the 1950s that built on a lot of starts in the 30s, and policy choices that the country continues to make because a lot of people like them, a lot of other people can't imagine anything else, and highway construction is a big source of construction contracts and jobs. The policies might be extremely hard to change, but they would absolutely not require changing the constitution.

There's no constitutional reason that the gas tax from someone who drives a car mostly on city and country roads in state A should go to build or maintain interstate highways in some other place (or that gas tax from rural Kansas, where highways are flat and cheap but people drive long distances, should go to pay for the Big Dig or for I-70 in Glennwood Canyon, where the roads are a lot more expensive, but that's been the practice for decades). To say nothing of the general revenue (not gas tax) that goes to state and federal highway projects all over -- and which kind of tends to balance out the extra federal rail and transit funding that goes to states that invest in those things.

[rcthompson04]

Keep in mind that prior to the 1800s, there was next to no suburban settlement. It was urban, small town, or farms; auto-centric suburbia is recent and no more deserving of tax dollars than transit- or walking/biking-centric urban areas (which pay the majority of taxes in America as well.)

There was a lot of suburban development in the late 19th century and early 20th century. Most of our original suburbs started in that period of time. They were serviced by a mixture of railroads, interurbans, and a new thing called an automobile.

[Tadman]

Gotta laugh at y'all who ignore the fact that passenger rail is not a thing of the past. If it is, then what is old is what's new. It is easy to see this when you look at the last decade or so that has passed.

I don't think passenger trains are a thing of the past, and I agree that they should be nurtured. I'm simply recognizing that from 1960 to 1980, it is documented fact that passenger trains were absolutely awful and the passengers knew it. They voted with their feet. It's no different than customers leaving the big three automakers around the same time because their cars were awful. This is not an opinion piece. There is myriad written accounts of how bad service was in that generation, and how decrepit equipment was. Many operators retired equipment around 1980 that was approximately double the age of the equipment being retired now.

As such, the older half of the traveling public, especially those not in the NEC, are going to be hard to convince. If, in forty years, we have continued to nurture passenger rail, there will be an even larger possible customer base as an entire alienated generation will be gone.

[mtuandrew]

Keep in mind that prior to the 1800s, there was next to no suburban settlement. It was urban, small town, or farms; auto-centric suburbia is recent and no more deserving of tax dollars than transit- or walking/biking-centric urban areas (which pay the majority of taxes in America as well.)

There was a lot of suburban development in the late 19th century and early 20th century. Most of our original suburbs started in that period of time. They were serviced by a mixture of railroads, interurbans, and a new thing called an automobile.

Yup, that’s why I said the 1800s

Mr. Olesen, Arborwayfan states my point far better than I do. Neither cars nor railroads are listed in the Constitution, a “post road” could be interpreted by the high court as a canal or a railroad (as did happen in in 1823 and 1838 respectively); and rural delivery is a very recent phenomenon, meaning the Federal government had to create a new category of local appropriations so it didn’t stretch “post road” to beyond its limits.

I don’t even remember what this has to do with Richard Anderson anymore!

[Gilbert B Norman]

I hope the Moderators will note I'm only reporting on rumors originating "elsewhere":

https://www.airliners.net/forum/viewtop ... &t=1447407

Yesterday, 11:37 pm

Title says it all. No link. No source. But heard from multiple people I know these past few days from folks at AA and DL of what they’ve been hearing.

For those who don’t know who Richard Anderson is; he’s the former CEO at Delta.

Supposedly happening at the end of the year.

Thoughts?

Later in the discussion it is noted Mr. Anderson was Amtrak CEO.

Finally, be it noted we address him as "Mr. Anderson"; don't exactly think they will extend the same courtesy.

[Tadman]

That would be amazing. As a fairly frequent AA passenger, I support Jeremy Clarkson’s assertion: “if American Airlines were a country, it would be North Korea”.

[eolesen]

Yeah, no. Anderson won't be going to work for AA. Unlike American, who let Scott Kirby and Andrew Nocella go to work for a competitor without any recourse, DL does have their officers non-compete agreements in place with their officers, which would include Anderson even though he's retired.

Plus, I don't see him tarnishing his reputation by going to work for AA. North Korea is a good descriptor. I worked at AA for almost two decades, and left. The number of people in management willingly taking retirement packages right now is stunning.

[David Benton]

Yeah, no. Anderson won't be going to work for AA. Unlike American, who let Scott Kirby and Andrew Nocella go to work for a competitor without any recourse, DL does have their officers non-compete agreements in place with their officers, which would include Anderson even though he's retired.

Plus, I don't see him tarnishing his reputation by going to work for AA. North Korea is a good descriptor. I worked at AA for almost two decades, and left. The number of people in management willingly taking retirement packages right now is stunning.

Most agreements have time limits , as little as 6 months for new / lower skilled/workers. ( lower skilled is not the right word , its usually based on how much information they have access too , and/or how many customers they interact with) . I would be surprised if his agreement was for more than say 2 years .

[Tadman]

Agreed on the time limits. It can vary and usually goes up with size of retirement package. Lee Iaccoca was famous for taking a very large buyout when he was fired by Henry Ford II, then being asked to run Chrysler. Ford told him no, and he gave back the buyout package and ran Chrysler anyway. Closer to this industry, Hunter Harrison had to give back some of his CN retirement package when he came on board at CP. It was a bit messy if I recall.

Regarding AMR, my former father-in-law took a buyout at 58 years when they said "get your full pension now or gamble later". He saw the writing on the wall and knew he didnt' want to work for Doug Parker. I have never really liked AMR, but didn't fly often enough before the US Air merger to have an opinion on whether pre-merger AMR was worse or better than post merger. But the insiders sure didn't like Doug Parker.