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Organizations
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Advocacy
- The National Association of Railroad Passengers (NARP) is an alliance of railroad passengers and citizens who want a transportation choice in this country.
- Community Transportation Association
- Welcome to Imagine City “We are dedicated to making cities better for life.”
- The Albuquerque Rapid Transit Project (RTP) seeks to identify a preferred alignment for implementation of Albuquerque’s first rapid transit route.
- Citizens for Sensible Transportation is a grassroots organization based in Portland Oregon that helps people to build better communities with less traffic and reduced reliance on the automobile.
- Rail Volution is the national conference on building livable communities with transit. Includes several links to groups with an interest in rail and sustainable growth.
- The American Passenger Rail Coalition (APRC), a national association of railroad equipment suppliers and rail businesses, acts as an advocate for the highest quality and safest intercity rail passenger system in the United States.
- The Sierra Club’s “stop sprawl” website, featuring reports and links to many sprawl sites.
- The purpose of the Transit Alliance is to contribute to the economic vitality, the quality of life, and the environment of the Denver metropolitan region by promoting public transit as part of a balanced, multi-modal transportation network.
- United Rail Passenger Alliance is dedicated to preservation of the present rail passenger system, and encouraging its expansion.
- Trams for Bath (England) is a non-profit group which supports the installation of a modern electric tramway network as the core of an integrated public transport solution to Baths traffic problems.
- Light Rail Transit Association. Information and campaigning about better public transport through trams, tramways, streetcars and light rail transit systems.
- Tucsonans for Sensible Transportation promotes the concept that light rail as the flagship of a comprehensive transit system is a proven, practical way to transform Tucson’s future for the better.
- Citizens for Modern Transit, or CMT, is a transit advocacy group whose purpose is to work towards building communities and improving the quality of life in the St. Louis region through alternative methods of transportation.
- The Surface Transportation Policy Project (STPP) is a non-profit organization working to ensure a diversified transportation system.
- MISSOURI-KANSAS Rail Passenger Coalition (MOKSRail) works for a more balanced transportation system.
- The Light Rail Now Project is a charitable educational enterprise designed to support efforts both within North America and worldwide to develop and improve light rail transit (LRT) and other rail transit and mass transportation systems.
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Articles and Editorials
- Phoenix Business Journal December 21, 2001
Mike Padgett Light-rail system could be powered by sunshine - Albuquerque Journal December 30, 2003
Rails, Inc From Feet to Rail – We Need It All - New Mexico Business Weekly August, 2004
Lawrence Rael Commuter rail service is no pipe dream - The Albuquerque Tribune August, 2004
Rails, Inc On Track - The Albuquerque Tribune December 18, 2007
Tribune Subsidy Op Ed - The Weekly Alibi September 9-15, 2009
Breaking Out Of The Bus Trap - Albuquerque Journal April 6, 2009
City’s “Streetcar II” Deserves Serious Consideration - Albuquerque Journal August 5, 2009
Urban Rail Is More Than Just A Streetcar - Albuquerque Journal December 26, 2012
Rail Transit Smart Direction For City - Albuquerque Journal November 21, 2013
Is The SW Chief Really All That Important?
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Newsletters
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3 Legged Stool
The National Picture
After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, a rail advocate told Congress that a good national transportation system should be like a “3-legged stool”, with road, rail, and air being the legs. He stated, and we agree, that one of the legs is missing. We further state that modern civilization cannot long exist successfully without a rail-anchored transportation network. We Americans abandoned rail as the primary passenger-carrying “mode” less than 50 years ago, and we’re in serious trouble already.
Reasons that rail should dominate modern transportation are numerous and discussed elsewhere in the web site.
Freight rail at the national level is not doing too badly, so we’re ignoring it here. On the passenger side, local and regional rail is coming back all over America. But nationally, all we have is Amtrak.
The history of Amtrak includes periods of ignorant and top-heavy management, which the late David Gunn administration was trying to address and rectify, but that’s not its big problem. In fact, most discussion of how Amtrak is run (or not run) is a red red herring. Amtrak has three big problems:
- The inconsistent notion that passenger rail should pay for itself, when no other mode of transportation does.
- This issue is discussed in detail in other places on this web site.
- Chronic underfunding.
- Amtrak never gets enough money to do the job right. As a result, they have to fight with one hand tied behind their back, even under the best management. They have to make choices among necessities rather than take care of all of them. The prevailing attitude from on high seems to be, “If Amtrak needs a quarter, let’s dole them out a dime and then hound them to death for their poor performance.”
- Track sharing, or lack thereof.
- In much of America, Amtrak shares the tracks with one or more of the freight railroads, who own most of them. This is not always a bad thing – the management at Burlington Northern Santa Fe (BNSF), for example, is fairly kind to passenger rail on their tracks. They consider track rental and incentive payments one more way to make some money. But the picture is not always so pretty. The Southern Pacific barely tolerates Amtrak, one result being that the Sunset Limited from Los Angeles to Florida is almost never on time. This problem of course tends to spread to every service connected to the Sunset. Freight rail used to pull over for passenger rail, but this is no longer true.
We submit the following suggestions toward improving this situation. NOTE: We admit these are sketchy, and hope to awaken the interest of like-minded people and groups more expert than we are.
- Keep in touch with our leaders. Let them know the importance of rail to your community and your nation.
- As for those leaders, and you know who you are – give Amtrak all they ask for and set up some kind of trust or endowment, a funding source free of the politics of the moment, to disburse same. It would be interesting to find out just how they handle it. We all might be pleasantly surprised. Well, maybe not rail opponents . . .
- Also, while we have your attention, how about working out some means to improve passenger priority along freight-owned rights-of-way? Dedicated track certainly comes to mind, but even if we’re dreaming here, some combination of money, legislation and good-faith negotiating can still go a long way.
- Okay, back to the great unwashed (That’s us, folks). Why not hold on to your “old” car a little bit longer, bike or walk to work and play when you can. By doing these things you will contribute less to a financially and environmentally insane system. And don’t forget to let your political leaders know, repeatedly, that you want modern rail in your life.
Paying for itself
Next time somebody tells you that passenger trains don’t “pay for themselves”, hit ’em with a few of these:
- Shrewd Investment in rail-based transit has been shown to return 4 to 6 dollars in benefits to the community for every 1 dollar spent. Taxation is not always a bad thing – as with any investment, it all depends on what you get back.
- Fuel Economy. A long distance train achieves 5 to 7 times the passenger miles per unit of fuel or energy as does a mid-size car with two occupants. Similar economies in steel, plastic, cement and other materials apply. NOTE: The fuel economy picture, for rail, gets even prettier when you realize that, unlike rail-beds and train wheels, roads and rubber tires are themselves made out of petroleum products.
- Wise Land Use. One “lane” of railroad track is good for as much passenger-carrying capacity as three to four lanes of highway, not to mention that it requires a lot less maintenance and repair.
- Clean Energy. Passenger trains, local or long distance, can easily be made to operate on renewably-generated energy or home-grown fuel. A prime example of this is the C-Train system of Calgary, Alberta, which buys all its power from a nearby wind farm.
- Staying Alive. Compared to the auto/highway mode of transportation, rail kills and injures far fewer people, even when counted by passenger mile. This, of course, results in huge savings in both money and heartache. You’re 30.55 times more likely to be killed or injured in a car or small truck than in a train, per vehicle mile travelled (VMT). Further, a rail “vehicle” consists of an entire train, not one car. Source:Bureau of Transportation Statistics, 2004.
- Productivity. Workers in our metro areas who commute by rail tend to save a lot of time and energy, arriving at work more ready to work than to recuperate. They’re also more likely to arrive on time.
- Take Home Pay. Good transit (which usually means rail-based transit) saves users a lot of money, which they can save or spend on something besides getting to work, school or entertainment.
- Security. After a natural or man-made disaster, rail lines can be restored to service much faster than highways or even runways.
- Wide Open Spaces. Rail service promotes infill and redevelopment along existing urban and suburban transportation corridors. This increases the tax base in those areas and saves a fortune on utility lines and other infrastructure (a given length of utility line can serve many more people). Besides all this, the less land we suck up housing people and moving them around, the more we have left for all the things we like about open space.
- Fairness. Our auto and air networks are already heavily and wastefully subsidized. What’s the difference with rail, except for a much greater return for our tax and commuting dollars?
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Chew on This
13 Reasons We Need Passenger Rail
- A modern small automobile with two passengers generates almost 25 times the air pollution, per passenger mile, as a four car commuter train at 35% capacity.
- Two sets of commuter rail tracks will handle the passenger traffic of at least six lanes of highway.
- The tracks for a commuter train already exist here; those for a light rail system can be laid within existing infrastructure, preserving open space and minimizing land and business condemnation.
- A new light-rail line costs about a third of a new highway or loop road, and recent developments in track-laying technology can shave 60% to 70% off that cost.
- Trains are faster, quieter, and smoother than buses. In addition, they avoid traffic jams and most accident scenes.
- Modern commuter and light-rail trains are built to run forward or backward, eliminating the need for huge turnaround loops.
- Rail deaths and injuries are almost nothing compared to those in automobiles.
- Rail cars and locomotives have been known to last up to 100 years with decent maintenance.
- Railroad tracks are cheaper and easier to maintain than roads and highways.
- There is no rubber tire disposal problem with trains (a much bigger issue than many people realize).
- Most skeptical commuters who try trains are converted within a trip or two.
- Commuter and light rail lines have triggered a boom, revitalizing rundown neighborhoods and buildings in areas where they have been located. Land values in older communities are rising, a dent is being made in suburban sprawl and even some long-abandoned hazardous waste sites are slated for clean-up, having become more attractive to housing, retail, and office developers.
- Railroad transit is a big part of the “intermodal”– or many modes of transportation–thinking that has become more popular nationally and worldwide every year–not to mention mandated by federal law since 1991.
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Tagged Clean Air, Clean Water, Cost Management, Development, Economy, Environment, People, Safety, Security, Wise Land Use
Track Sharing
If you are looking to start a commuter railroad line in the Southwest, one serious consideration is that of sharing tracks, signals, etc., with the Burlington Northern Santa Fe (which owns them) and Amtrak. Anti-rail forces in New Mexico sometimes use this as an excuse for not having any regional passenger rail service, in effect blaming the BNSF for the lack of service.
We contacted officials of both Amtrak and the BNSF, asking them for their “take” on the track sharing issue. The BNSF has replied to our inquiry by sending us their “Commuter Principles.” This document defines their guidelines and restrictions concerning passenger trains using their tracks. The list is long, but remember:
- You can find almost as many clauses and disclaimers on a rental agreement.
- These guidelines have not been impossible for Denver, Dallas and Fort Worth to comply with. They are all successfully running commuter and/or light rail lines.
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Red Herrings
Red Herrings
- A modern rail system is more expensive than a freeway.
- Actually, it isn’t. You may be thinking about bullet or “maglev” trains, which are expensive (though not more than a freeway). Appropriate passenger rail solutions are much less expensive than the high-profile, high-tech trains, and a downright bargain compared to the endless expansion of our highway systems.
- Rail is not self-supporting.
- You have us there. Rail is not “self-supporting”. No mode of transportation in America is, especially not automobiles.
- Mass transportation is for the “transit dependent” only.
- This is not only snobbish and offensive, it is also simply not true. All economic classes will ride a well run inter-modal transportation system anchored by rail.
- You’ll never get people out of their cars.
- Of course not. You can’t put tracks everywhere. Seriously, ridership has soared beyond all expectations everywhere rail has been introduced, including in some pretty car-dependent states such as Texas.
- More and better buses will solve the problem.
- Although large, small and express buses are an important part of the transit picture, the fact is that nothing beats a train in most larger transportation corridors. And many thousands of people will ride a train who won’t ride a bus. Also, commuter and light-rail systems have been shown to increase bus, bicycle, and pedestrian use.
- There are too many scheduling and liability problems with Amtrak and the Burlington Northern & Santa Fe freight railroad.
- These problems have been and are being worked out all over the West through good-faith negotiations.
- Our population is too dispersed for an efficient rail system.
- Not around Albuquerque and Santa Fe and points south.
- Everyone has the right to choose how they get around.
- You’re preaching to the choir. That’s why we’re promoting more choice, not less.
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