The House has passed the new, two-year bipartisan budget agreement. Senate passage is considered likely. It appears that appropriations committees will soon be deciding how much Amtrak and other programs will get for the current fiscal year.

The best guess is that Amtrak will end up in the vicinity of $1.4 billion. A slight increase over the $1.3 billion from fiscal 2013 is possible, but still far below the real needs, and still we need to remind legislators of that.

Failing congressional action, the transit commuter benefit will revert to $130 per month on January 1, 2014, adversely affecting working families, discouraging transit use and further encouraging and subsidizing the use of overcrowded roads and highways.

Currently, the benefit is set to $245 per month, equivalent to the parking commuter benefit.Both the transit and the parking commuter benefits are an employer-provided federal tax benefit designed to defray the cost of traveling for workers. While the parking commuter benefit is permanent and rises with inflation, the concept of parity for transit has skated by on a series of extensions. If Congress fails to pass another extension—or better yet, make the parity permanent—the transit benefit falls to $130 per month on the first of the year even as the parking benefit rises to $250.

Congress’ failure to act sends the exact wrong message at a time when the U.S. is trying to maximize its fiscal resources. Trains and transit are extremely efficient modes of transportation that reduce dependence on foreign oil, lower harmful emissions that are polluting the air we breathe, and provide a practical form of relief for road congestion that costs the nation $121 billion annually. They are also safer than private cars.

You can let your representatives know that you support the transit benefit here.

Image: Nate Beal

Faced with mounting delays on the Empire Builder due to heavy freight traffic from the Bakken formation and an unusually large agricultural harvest, Amtrak has truncated three eastbound and two westbound trips in an attempt to “reset” the service.

Through-train West Coast departures were canceled on Wed., Dec. 11, today and will not run on Sunday, Dec. 15. The two Chicago departures affected: yesterday and tomorrow. Amtrak is running “stub” trains to protect daily service between Chicago-St. Paul and Spokane-Seattle. Substitute buses protected daily service Portland-Spokane (and also from Seattle to Spokane on Dec. 11.)

In normal times, the Empire Builder is perhaps the premier long-distance train operating on the Amtrak network, offering stunning scenery and a vital economic lifeline to the northern plains. Recently, however, the train has been beleaguered by delays. The crude oil boom in North Dakota’s Bakken formation, almost in the middle of the Builder’s 2,000 mile journey, is causing unprecedented levels of freight traffic along the BNSF corridor, stretching the capacity of the track to the limit. BNSF is working to expand capacity, but demand has far outstretched their efforts.

This, combined with the anemic condition of Amtrak’s long distance services—hindering any kind of redundancy of crews or equipment—has resulted in an average delay of 310 minutes, or a little over five hours. While Empire Builder is a very large passenger train, it is quick and nimble when compared to the mile-long freight trains it shares the tracks with. However, virtually every siding is jammed with freight trains awaiting crews and/or power, with the main line heavily congested, resulting in those big delays.

Despite this inconvenience, the demand for transportation is so high along the corridor that the train is still booked full of passengers—further evidence that our national network trains are valuable transportation assets in need of increased levels of support.

NARP President & CEO Ross Capon issued a statement in response to this development:

Amtrak’s goal was to get to recover semblance of normalcy before the holiday rush period. The additional train set Amtrak is assigning should mitigate over-the-road delays but BNSF does not have a projection as to when things will improve. As of yesterday morning, BNSF had 143 trains in their Northern Region in yards and parked on sidings waiting for crews and locomotives. I understand one train has been on a siding around Wenatchee since about November 26. Veteran railroaders on this route have never seen anything like this.

Full daily operations resume for train 7/27 with Sunday Dec. 15 departure from Chicago (disregard previous question mark about the Monday departure – it will operate normally).

Full daily operations resume for train 8/28 with Monday Dec. 16 departures from Seattle and Portland.

You can read more on the specifics of the scheduling on the NARP Blog.

Despite recent setbacks to California’s 220 mph train project, the California High Speed Rail Authority (CAHSRA) told reporters December 5 that workers will break ground on the project by this February.

The state is in the process of buying land for the rail line, which would connect San Francisco to Los Angeles via the Central Valley.

“In the January or February timeframe is when we will see actual physical construction out there,” said CAHSRA Chairman Dan Richard. “This is a design-build contract, so when I say we are in the construction phase, I mean that the first contract has been issued and what that contractor is doing right now is the design. That’s the first part of their contract, which is why you don’t see a bunch of people out there, but the work is under way.”

The Surface Transportation Board cleared construction for 24 miles, but refused to hasten its review of a critical 5-mile segment which could cause complications with the Authority’s timeline. Additionally, a recent court rulinghas also required CAHSRA to overhaul their financing plan. However, Governor Jerry Brown has committed to move the project forward.

A study released by the American Public Transportation Association (APTA) and the Economic Development Research Corporation (EDRC) found that unless the shortfall in public transportation investment is addressed, rising congestion will threaten to eliminate 480,000 jobs between now and 2040.

The report, The Role of Transit in Support of High Growth Business Clusters in the U.S., found that the 480,000 new jobs put at risk by traffic congestion represent $32 billion per year in lost wages.

Congressional leaders have seized on the report’s findings to call for increased government investment in public transportation and trains.

“Only with robust, reliable and safe public transportation systems can we begin to unlock the country’s true economic potential,” said U.S. Representative Dan Lipinski (D-IL) and co-chair of the Congressional Public Transportation Caucus. “As our economy continues to evolve in the 21st century, it is imperative that we provide employers and workers with more options to connect people to jobs. Improving public transportation is a critical part of meeting this goal.”

The Congressional Public Transportation Caucus is a bipartisan group. Conservatives, including suburban Republicans whose constituents rely on commuter trains, have been attracted to the case for public transportation because it is a foundation for economic activity. Not only does it allow for the efficient movement of people within and around urban areas, it fosters strong domestic manufacturing and construction sectors. Economists have calculated that for every $1 billion invested in public transportation, more than 36,000 jobs are supported.

“These industries in high-growth areas rely on creative, high-skilled workers who choose places where public transportation is an option,” said U.S. Representative Michael Grimm (R-NY) and co-chair of the Caucus. “With physical limitations to adding highway lanes, public transportation is the most cost-effective option to help support sustained job growth in these locations.”

The group was joined by business leaders from the tech industry, who see efficient transportation systems as a vital tool to recruit young, highly skilled workers. One need look no further to the recent fight over the “Google buses” in San Francisco to see how vital these resources are to tech employees in the 21st Century.

"Silicon Valley's economy is fueled by the productivity of a world-class, knowledge-based workforce," said Silicon Valley Leadership Group CEO Carl Guardino. "That workforce is less productive, more constrained and less successful when trapped in traffic, when our time could be used more productively while riding transit. It is why the Leadership Group has led several successful sales tax campaigns to fund transit options of all types for our talented workers and their families."

Following the deadly Metro-North Railroad accident that claimed four lives earlier this month, the Federal Railroad Administration has announced that it will launch a 60-day assessment of the commuter agenciy’s operations, with an eye towards evaluating safety procedures and compliance to federal regulations.

The FRA will look engage in a top-to-bottom review of Metro-North—from reviewing repair and maintenance procedures to investigating employee certifications.

“Encouraging a safety stand-down with employees and issuing an Emergency Order and Safety Advisory after the recent Metro-North accident were all necessary first steps to immediately secure and improve safety, and we commend Governor Cuomo and MTA in taking those steps,” said Federal Railroad Administrator Joseph C. Szabo. “Operation Deep Dive allows FRA to further identify sources of risk and drive continuous safety improvement. This approach will help restore public confidence in Metro-North and is evidence of FRA’s safety program that has helped reduce train accidents nation-wide by 43 percent over the last decade.”

The federal oversight team will produce a report following its 60-day assessment; if necessary, additional steps to strengthen safety will be recommended.

NARP has emphatically advocated for Positive Train Control technology, which prevents train-to-train collisions and prevents trains from going too fast, including around curves—the situation that led to the Metro-North derailment.

Amtrak and the Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT) unveiled a new schedule for the Cascadesservice that will let residents of Portland commute south to Salem and Eugene beginning January 2014.

Amtrak will begin operating a 6:00 am southbound train out of Portland Union Station on weekdays beginning January 6. The new train departure will replace an existing 6:00 am departure by an Amtrak Thruway bus. The train will allow residents of Portland, Oregon’s largest city, to travel south to the state capital in Salem, and Eugene, the state’s second largest city.

"For Oregon, it's a pretty big change," ODOT passenger rail coordinator Kathy Holmes told the Oregonian. "You'll actually be able to easily get down to Eugene in the morning and get back to Portland in the evening."

ODOT and Amtrak offer two daily round trips between Portland and Eugene. The state’s 20-year rail plan calls for that number to increase to six daily roundtrips.

New JerseyTransit announced it carried a record number of passenger over extended Thanksgiving weekend.

During a December 11 board meeting, NJ Transit Executive Director Jim Weinstein revealed that the agency had almost 400,000 trips beginning Thanksgiving Day through the following Sunday.

The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration announced yesterday that 52 bus companies and 340 vehicles were put out of business and removed from the road for violating safety regulations.

"Bus travel is increasingly popular because it is a convenient, inexpensive option for students, groups and families," said U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx. "But it must also be safe. Through Operation Quick Strike and our regular enforcement efforts, we’re shutting down companies that put passengers at risk and educating the public on safe motorcoach travel."

Led by companies such as Bolt Bus and Megabus, bus companies have played a larger role in recent years in meeting rapidly growing demand for intercity transportation in the U.S. However, motorcoach companies often keep their prices artificially low by cutting corners on maintenance, overworking drivers, and freeloading on public resources (the companies are often called “curbside operators” after the practice of loading and unloading passengers on the street, a practice many municipalities have cracked down on). Dubbed “Operation Quick Strike,” the action was part of a larger U.S. DOT effort to create a safe, well-regulated motorcoach industry.

From the NARP Blog

—Building Up the Steel Interstate: Our readers know that the major hallmark of U.S. passenger rail operations is that, in most places, Amtrak’s passenger trains run on track owned by the private freight railroads. This arrangement unfortunately can cause significant delays for Amtrak passenger as well as logistical difficulties for the freight railroads. To remedy this, the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act appropriated $10.1 billion as part of the High Speed Intercity Passenger Rail initiative (which we’ve mapped) for improvements to track infrastructure. But as Curtis Tate observed in a recent article, these improvements don’t benefit passenger rail exclusively. Rather, they benefit freight and passenger operations and thus improve total system performance. [Read More]

—Rail investment meets Amtrak critic’s standard for wise policy: Washington Post columnist Robert J. Samuelson is a conservative who recently sounded very reasonable notes on the subject of climate change, echoing arguments NARP has often made in favor of using higher taxes on the users of other modes to fund the ramped-up expansion and modernization of America’s passenger train network. He quotes MIT Economist Robert Pindyck, who says the results of climate change could be either much worse or much milder than the predictions of computer models, which he finds totally inadequate. Samuelson’s bottom line: “For years, I’ve advocated an energy tax — my preference now is a carbon tax — because it could advance other national goals. It could reduce budget deficits and enhance energy security by pushing consumers toward more efficient cars and trucks. That’s my standard: Support policies that, though they might address climate change, can be justified on other grounds.” [Read More]

—Spain welcomes Paris-Barcelona TGV, auctions off new “ghost airport”: Yet another important new high-speed rail service will begin Sunday, December 15. Twice-daily Paris-Barcelona through-trains will end a long history of changing trains at the international border. The running time will be six hours 25 minutes. The Financial Times reported that travelers starting from London St. Pancras will be able to leave at 9:31 AM and reach Barcelona within 10 hours 9 minutes [Read More]

—Bricks will Burst Bubbles: In this week’s The Economist, An article was written on the topic of another foreseeable financial bubble. This time not in the form of bundled low rated mortgage-backed securities, rather this bubble is one of “secular stagnation.” The Economist explains the term as a time when “appetite to invest is persistently below people’s desire to save.” This suggests a permanent lid on growth. The current practice of “quantitative easing” (printing money to buy bonds), usually translates into new investments rather in higher pricing for existing assets. These higher valuations of assets in most cases spur firms to re-invest and consumers to spend money. [Read More]