Passenger Trains > Devils Lake rebuilding gets additional funding

$10 million closer, still $20 million short to keep the Empire Builder on its traditional route:

http://www.grandforksherald.com/event/article/id/223829/

According to the application, there were 32,000 boardings/alightings at Grand Forks, Devils Lake, and Rugby (the three Empire Builder stops on the route) in 2010. Freight has been re-routed. BNSF said it would operate five or six grain trains a week over the line once the work is complete.

So the state is asking for $100 million to raise three miles of track and replace welded rail with CWR on the entire route. A benefit-cost analysis is required of every applicant for TIGER funds. The application did not contain a BCA.

I'm sorry, gents, but $100 million for 32,000 passengers is a waste of money, even if a third of the cost is borne by BNSF.

shoretower Wrote:
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> A benefit-cost analysis
> is required of every applicant for TIGER funds.
> The application did not contain a BCA.

That is curious. I assume Amtrak has pledged its share, but has not set aside the money. Amtrak's FY2012 appropriation makes all of its plans a bit suspect right now as to whether there are enough funds to go around.

Amtrak's share is $33M to retain 32K passengers. Politically, they do not dare say no. They'd be smart now to puff up the 32K passengers with a Thruway mini-bus to Winnipeg to improve ROI, especially now that the Jefferson Lines route is completly gone.

would this be a one time expense? or is devils lake still rising? i thought that there was a natural outlet after it reached a certain level. can anyone enlighten us on the details? TIA dave, out.

davebb71 Wrote:
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> would this be a one time expense? or is devils
> lake still rising? i thought that there was a
> natural outlet after it reached a certain level.
> can anyone enlighten us on the details? TIA
> dave, out.

I'm no expert, but I think it is a one time expense to get the track high enough that it won't be affected. I believe when Devils Lake reaches a certain level, it will drain out naturally at that level.

Lets see: $33 million each from BNSF and Amtrak, and now $10 million from the Feds. Who's missing? How about North Dakota? If this line is so important to Grand Forks and the state, shouldn't the state kick in a couple of million themselves?

prr60 Wrote:
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> Lets see: $33 million each from BNSF and Amtrak,
> and now $10 million from the Feds. Who's missing?
> How about North Dakota? If this line is so
> important to Grand Forks and the state, shouldn't
> the state kick in a couple of million themselves?

and North Dakota is one state that is rolling in the dough!

shoretower Wrote:
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> I'm sorry, gents, but $100 million for 32,000
> passengers is a waste of money, even if a third of
> the cost is borne by BNSF.

Why do you think it is a waste of money? In your view, how much money is worth spending to retain 32,000 annual rail passengers?

What do you think this money would be better spent on by BNSF, Amtrak, and North Dakota?

Personal thrift leads to savings and personal wealth, but governmental thrift leads to societal austerity and impoverishment.

abyler Wrote:
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> shoretower Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > I'm sorry, gents, but $100 million for 32,000
> > passengers is a waste of money, even if a third
> of
> > the cost is borne by BNSF.
>
> Why do you think it is a waste of money? In your
> view, how much money is worth spending to retain
> 32,000 annual rail passengers?
>
> What do you think this money would be better spent
> on by BNSF, Amtrak, and North Dakota?
>
> Personal thrift leads to savings and personal
> wealth, but governmental thrift leads to societal
> austerity and impoverishment.


This belief is one of the reasons why we are in the debt we are in. Government does have a role to play in transportation, but they do not have a bottomless pit of funds to draw from since they are bleeding the citizenry dry. Just that money alone for that segment even over 25 years is still $125 per passenger subsidy. Way too much to consider it justifiable.

"governmental thrift leads to societal austerity and impoverishment." This sounds like it came right of of some freshman sociology college course. What, exactly, is "societal austerity"? Sounds like gobbledygook to me.

Dick

shoretower Wrote:
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> So the state is asking for $100 million to raise
> three miles of track and replace welded rail with
> CWR on the entire route.

CWR is welded rail ... so whats wrong with the rail that it needs replacing

At present, the rail is bolted, and old. If you're going to spend megabucks raising the grade, you may as well replace the old "stick rail" at the same time.

But $100 million for 32,000 passengers? With all due respect, Mr. Byler, I'm not advocating "government austerity" here. That would be laughable with a $3 trillion budget. Since I work in the policy office, I'm simply suggesting we put the money where it can produce the best return -- say, replacing the Portageville Bridge on a busy freight line in western NY, rather than raising the grade on some stupid line in North Dakota that carries nothing but two Amtrak trains a day.

Or do you believe we shoud just run huge deficits and give out money to whoever asks?

GNR1938 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> abyler Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> > What do you think this money would be better spent
> > on by BNSF, Amtrak, and North Dakota?
> >
> > Personal thrift leads to savings and personal
> > wealth, but governmental thrift leads to
> societal
> > austerity and impoverishment.
>
>
> This belief is one of the reasons why we are in
> the debt we are in. Government does have a role

National Debt = Private Wealth

Who do you think owns it? Our 401K's, and pensions, our money market funds, the nation's banks, and you and I personally if we own savings bonds and T-Bills, and millions of other like us.

We are only paying 2% or so on it, and I think it is around 75%+/- of that gets paid right back to American citizens. Its not like it is some horrific unbearabale cost to society where we are flushing money down the toilet or dropping gold bricks into the depths of the sea.

Our wealth comes from what we as a nation produce every year. Much of what we produce is related to government purchases of goods and services, and the ancilliary prosperity they produce for others from the purchases of their employees and government employees. If the government wasn't around doing these things, national economic output would collapse by 20% or more. How would your firm fare if 20% of its customers suddenly had no money to buy from you? It would probably bring on an economic death spiral like the Great Depression.

When the government spends money on things like rebuilding a railroad line, it adds to net national wealth. It doesn't impoverish us by borrowing the money, because by doing so the Government exchanges our cash or bank balances for a different asset that actually pays a return of a few percent - bonds. Meanwhile, money has been injected into the economy to buy goods and services that otherwise would have sat idle to produce a product that society finds useful. How can any of that be in any way negative? Who is suffering a loss here?

This is what I mean by people advocating a self-imposed impoverishment of austerity. When you say you don't want the Empire Builder's route rebuilt, you are saying you want a decrease in the national wealth by the loss of the fixed capital stock the rail line already represents, and also by forcing otherwise employable people into unemployment by failing to invest to provide them work. Its no different than saying you need to tear down a bedroom on your house because your bed wore out and you think you can't afford to buy a new bed.

> to play in transportation, but they do not have a
> bottomless pit of funds to draw from since they
> are bleeding the citizenry dry. Just that money

Taxes have not been lower in decades. Its impossible they are bleeding the citizeny dry when they are less than 15% of Gross Domestic Product.

> alone for that segment even over 25 years is still
> $125 per passenger subsidy. Way too much to
> consider it justifiable.

No one ever makes these same sort of calculations when it comes to fixing parts of the road system in danger of failure or that have failed. We simply fix them because they contribute to the national commonwealth by their existence. What you are saying is that the Empire Builder does not contribute to our national wellbeing, and that we are better off without it. That is ridiculous on its face. How can the nation be better off without its passenger railroads? We are then less mobile, more people are out of work, and tremendous amounts of investments are laid waste.

Rail and roadbed and bridges can have an expected life of 50 or more years if lightly used, as this line is. Its not as if it will wear out quickly, so 25 years is a very conservative timeframe to view the investment. You also assume it provides not benefits to the other riders on the Empire Builder, as if the movement of the train to a new line has no costs, and as though the train does not need this particular subset of riders to contribute to its economics.

Well, if spending money on *anything* was the key to reviving the economy, then as John Maynard Keynes famously said, we could simply bury dollar bills in bottles and give people shovels with which to dig them up. Ben Bernanke made a similar comment about "throwing money from helicopters".

I think we need to look at where the money goes. We shouldn't just be replacing highways mindlessly because it contributes to the "common wealth". Example: in Oklahoma City they're replacing 4.5 miles of I-40 through downtown, at a cost of $650 billion. When I heard that, my reaction was that they should simply demolish the interstate and move traffic to surface streets. There is simply no way that an expenditure of $650 million for 4.5 miles of road could ever be economically justified.

I guess engineers don't learn a concept called "opportunity cost". Since the supply of anything (money or other goods) is never infinite, there is a cost to doing anything which is the foregone cost of doing something else. If we spend $100 million raising three miles of track, that's $100 million that is now unavailable to build schools, hospitals, or any number of other things that would be better investments with a higher return. That's just the way it is.

This would be (is) a stupid investment. There were many better ones among the projects I reviewed.

2ebright Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> "governmental thrift leads to societal austerity
> and impoverishment." This sounds like it came
> right of of some freshman sociology college
> course. What, exactly, is "societal austerity"?
> Sounds like gobbledygook to me.
>
> Dick

Yep, sounds like a self-serving jingle little concerned with reality or accountability.

Perhaps there should also be a disclosure that Mr. Byler may have a vested (employment) interest in passenger rail projects?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/14/11 20:47 by darkcloud.

The cover story for the January-February 2012 issue of AMERICAN SCIENTIST (www.americanscientist.org) shows the major changes in the water level of Devil's Lake over the years. This is not the usual river flooding situation.

JHL

shoretower Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Well, if spending money on *anything* was the key
> to reviving the economy, then as John Maynard
> Keynes famously said, we could simply bury dollar
> bills in bottles and give people shovels with
> which to dig them up. Ben Bernanke made a similar
> comment about "throwing money from helicopters".
>
> I think we need to look at where the money goes.
> We shouldn't just be replacing highways mindlessly
> because it contributes to the "common wealth".
> Example: in Oklahoma City they're replacing 4.5
> miles of I-40 through downtown, at a cost of $650
> billion. When I heard that, my reaction was that
> they should simply demolish the interstate and
> move traffic to surface streets. There is simply
> no way that an expenditure of $650 million for 4.5
> miles of road could ever be economically
> justified.
>
> I guess engineers don't learn a concept called
> "opportunity cost". Since the supply of anything
> (money or other goods) is never infinite, there is
> a cost to doing anything which is the foregone
> cost of doing something else. If we spend $100
> million raising three miles of track, that's $100
> million that is now unavailable to build schools,
> hospitals, or any number of other things that
> would be better investments with a higher return.
> That's just the way it is.
>
> This would be (is) a stupid investment. There
> were many better ones among the projects I
> reviewed.

I think this shows the nature of the problem: $650 billion for four miles of interstate is spent without thinking, even though it is now unavailable to build schools, hospitals, or any number of other things. But an expenditure on Amtrak or rail service is "a stupid investment."

Ptolemy Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I think this shows the nature of the problem: $650
> billion for four miles of interstate is spent
> without thinking, even though it is now
> unavailable to build schools, hospitals, or any
> number of other things. But an expenditure on
> Amtrak or rail service is "a stupid investment."

Obviously, the amount is $650 million, not billion. Given limited resources do you spend $650 million that would have benefits for tens of thousands people a day, or a $100 million (not all public funds) to impact a handful of people?

t>
> Obviously, the amount is $650 million, not
> billion.

The source said $650 billion. As happens when I am evaluating grant applications or reviewing books, you have to take it as written, not what the author intended to say.