April 2, 2021
Senator Richard Blumenthal
U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation
Dear Senator Blumenthal:
We are writing on behalf of our members, as well as the millions of Americans who depend on public transportation on a regular basis to travel to work, see relatives, seek medical attention, food and other necessities of life. We support your effort to establish an “Intercity Passenger Rail Trust Fund” which would create a dedicated funding stream to help Amtrak in planning and investing in major improvement projects, increase passenger rail’s efficiency and help promote safer, more reliable service especially on the fifteen long distance routes which have long been financially neglected.
While this indeed could be a game changer, Amtrak will still need annual appropriations to carry out what it is currently able to do. It is our hope and expectation that Amtrak, through the creation of a trust fund, will be able to restore passenger rail service on routes that it abandoned in December, 1997. This would include the Desert Wind which was a separate section of the California Zephyr which continued on from Salt Lake City to Las Vegas and Los Angeles.
A second section called the Pioneer continued on from Denver through Cheyenne to Portland, Oregon and Seattle, Washington. We also support the work of the new Big Sky Passenger Rail Authority which is working to restore passenger service to the southern part of Montana and other efforts underway to restore passenger service across the nation.
There is also the need to establish daily service on the two tri-weekly trains: the Cardinal, that operates from New York to Washington, D.C., and then onto Cincinnati, Ohio, Indianapolis, Indiana and Chicago; and the Sunset Limited, which operates between Los Angeles, El Paso, San Antonio, Houston and New Orleans. This one train also provides a link between numerous and important military installations along its route.
To restore these routes as well as to provide for the current service, Amtrak also needs to replace passenger carrying equipment, which is more than 40 years old.
Finally, there is also a need to provide capital and operational funds for creating new state-supported routes. Amtrak’s current plan would provide upfront capital, but would drastically reduce operational support after the first five years. Co-operation between Federal and State rail passenger entities would help to ensure a well-used system of interconnected routes with at least daily service in each direction.
There is much work to be done with much funding needed to upgrade and extend Amtrak service. We commend your effort to create an “Intercity Passenger Rail Trust Fund”, and hope we can work together to provide high quality public transportation options for all of our citizens.
Sincerely,
Richard Rudolph, Ph.D.
Chairman
Rail Users’ Network