Passenger Trains > Here's the link,

it's high time that we (those interested in the survival of Amtrak) do more than complain on trainorders.
http://www.narprail.org
Click on "Action Alert>"

Glad, if your referring to me, I have a membershipt to NARP. I email all my reps and Senators as well as the President, so I think at this point I'm entitled to gripe about it.

GNR1938 Wrote:
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> Glad, if your referring to me, I have a
> membershipt to NARP. I email all my reps and
> Senators as well as the President, so I think at
> this point I'm entitled to gripe about it.

Where in my post were you mentioned? We are all entitled to complain, I am only asking THOSE that are so inclined to contact their elected officials.

Congress gave Amtrak the money it asked for the past two years. However, the quality of Amtrak service continues to decline. Where is all the money going? It's certainly not going into equipment maintenance or terminal facilities as we have seen the past few weeks.

For years, NARP has advocated that if Congress gave Amtrak more money, Amtrak would be successful. Could it be that Amtrak is so grossly mismanaged that throwing additional tax dollars at it doesn't achieve anything? Indeed, the death spiral formula of Amtrak appears to be fewer trains going fewer places, running hours late with shoddier equipment. Bob

bnsfbob Wrote:
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> Congress gave Amtrak the money it asked for the
> past two years. However, the quality of Amtrak
> service continues to decline. Where is all the
> money going? It's certainly not going into
> equipment maintenance or terminal facilities as we
> have seen the past few weeks.
>
> For years, NARP has advocated that if Congress
> gave Amtrak more money, Amtrak would be
> successful. Could it be that Amtrak is so grossly
> mismanaged that throwing additional tax dollars at
> it doesn't achieve anything? Indeed, the death
> spiral formula of Amtrak appears to be fewer
> trains going fewer places, running hours late with
> shoddier equipment. Bob
Was Amtrak certain the money would be there as requested? IIRC, the necessary funding was allocated after threatened shutdowns, service disruptions, etc. It's far easier to budget money for equipment/terminal maintenance when you know far in advance what you're working with. Don't misunderstand me, I agree that Amtrak has problems that all the money in the world won't solve. These problems will more than likely never be solved, with or without adequate funding.

gladhand Wrote:
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> Was Amtrak certain the money would be there as
> requested? IIRC, the necessary funding was
> allocated after threatened shutdowns, service
> disruptions, etc. It's far easier to budget money
> for equipment/terminal maintenance when you know
> far in advance what you're working with.

Absolutely correct. Case in point: Amtrak's funding for FY2004, which started Oct. 1, 2003, wasn't approved until just two weeks ago. They were basically operating for almost 4 months at FY2003 funding levels.

lowwater