White House Chronicle

News Analysis With a Sense of Humor

Amtrak at 42: Making the Grade

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Two cheers for Amtrak, which celebrated its 42nd anniversary on May 1. The nation's only intercity passenger rail service, derided by its critics and begrudged funding by Congress, is providing improved service and reliability.

But this service is lopsided, favoring the Northeast Corridor — the electrified route from Washington to Boston. Here, you have a choice of two levels of service. The premier level is the Acela Express, a Swedish import. Reaching speeds of 150 mph, the Acela trains compensate for tight curves with sophisticated tilting technology. The second level is the Northeast Regional with traditional trains running up to 125 mph, but mostly traveling much slower and with frequent stops. In both levels of service, the trains seem to be clean and well-maintained.

The two principal Northeast stations, Penn Station in New York and Union Station in Washington, are a different story. They are both horrific in their own way, and both are maintained by Amtrak.

Penn Station has a lot of low-grade retailing that seems to attract people who have no plan to ride the train and add to the sense of urban threat.

Union Station is less threatening, but it seems to have given itself over to chain retailing. The grandeur of this architectural masterpiece has been undermined by a proliferation of chain stores. Passenger accommodation is an afterthought: The restrooms are inadequate and too few, seating is scarce and often shabby, and passengers stand in long lines waiting to board their trains. This gives the feeling that the trains are as bad as the stations; they are not.

Outside of the prized Northeast Corridor, Amtrak shows decades of underinvestment. It tries to deliver rail service across 46 states. Correspondents tell me that this is often inadequate and is a last resort. I've been told horror stories about delays in Florida and the Midwest and breakdowns in California. One has to think seriously about whether one wants to take a long-haul train, even a sleeper, outside of the Northeast Corridor.

Amtrak came into being 42 years ago because passenger rail service from commercial railroads had collapsed and Congress felt that the United States couldn't be without passenger rail service. In those days, it was thought that Amtrak would serve those who couldn't afford to fly and those who simply didn't like flying. Amtrak wasn't set up as a government department but rather as a business, although it was understood that government funding would be necessary.

So began a long struggle; ostensibly over money, but more so over ideology. Conservatives in Congress have never liked Amtrak, and have believed that it should either perish or survive without government funding. Amtrak initiated relentless mallification of its station properties and predatory pricing in the Northeast Corridor, euphemistically called revenue management. Here Amtrak, like the airlines, charges what the traffic will bear. The Acela between Washington and New York and between New York and Boston is fast, elegant transportation for those who can afford it. The Northeast Regional uses the same revenue-management pricing, but charges somewhat less for slower rail service.

By means of its commercial struggling, Amtrak says it is able to cover 88 percent of its costs from revenue. The government subsidy amounts to $1.3 billion — $443 million for operations and $705 million for capital improvement. The total Amtrak budget is around $4 billion. By comparison, the much-admired European rail systems, with their sleek trains that run at 220 mph, have huge subsidies amounting to about 50 percent of the ticket price. In that sense, Amtrak may be a model performer.

As a passenger, someone who is infused with a sublime sense of well-being when a train pulls out of a station, I'm glad to report that despite its limitations, its chaotic terminals, its gotcha pricing, Amtrak has rolled into middle age, proving that rail transportation is still the most civilized way to travel and should have a bright future. Will Congress get smart and take the train? — For the Hearst-New York Times Syndicate

The Case for Fixing Up America

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I’m asked with some frequency these days, what do I think the United States will look like in 25 years to 50 years? Underlying this question is a real concern that we’ve lost our way as a nation, that the best is behind us and a strong feeling that the generations to come won’t have it as good as we’ve had.

Actually, I think the United States will be fine. It’ll still be a world power, but not as dominant as it is today and was in the 20th century. I think we’ll still have one of the largest and most important economies in the world; that we’ll still be a powerhouse of invention; and that ourmovies, music and other entertainment forms will still dominate the globe.

American English will continue to be the international means of communication. Sorry Britain, there’s no license fee on language.

A rosy picture, eh? Not quite.

The second, and maybe the more important question, is what sort of country will the United States be to live in? This picture is less rosy.

First, we’re dividing into a country of the super rich and the burgeoning working poor living unpleasantly. The movement of quality manufacturing jobs in the auto and steel industries to the South tells part of that story. The high-wage jobs of Michigan and the unionized North — jobs that pay about $35 an hour — to the union-free auto plants and factories of the South, which pay $14 an hour, is a harbinger of the future. Can less be more?

If the United States is going to have told hold down its wages, then we should fix the living space; that means the infrastructure. It’s a mess and it’ll take decades to bring it up to the standards of much of the rest of the world.

We need better roads (less time in traffic), repaired bridges, sewers, water systems and public transportation. We also should fix the parks — state and national — and build pedestrian areas where we can enjoy the great natural beauty of our rivers and woodlands. London and Paris and Vienna make their rivers places of beauty and recreation. New York runs highways along its rivers — highways where it should have cafes. Los Angeles has enclosed its streams in concrete.

London has refurbished Brunel's masterpiece of design St. Pancras railway station to accommodate the new 200-mph trains that will whisk you to Paris in a little over two hours. Both the station and the trains are great achievements; achievements that can be enjoyed by traveler and visitor alike.

By contrast Union Station in Washington, D.C., a masterpiece in its day, is a mess. The tracks are inadequate. The station seating is inadequate, broken and mostly an afterthought. The restrooms are inadequate and dirty. The majesty of the station has been destroyed by tawdry retailers and half-finished repairs. Decay permeates the place — maybe to prepare the passengers for the disreputable taxis outside.

What an introduction to the capital of the free world. However, if you’ve just arrived on Amtrak, you might already be so dispirited you won't notice.

Likewise, the nation's schools need to be renovated. Leaky buildings seem more designed to prepare students for a lifetime of failure and decline than for a life of pride and accomplishment. “We make buildings and they make us,” Winston Churchill said.

The case for fixing the nation's infrastructure is compelling. But it does not compel in Congress. Congress is hell-bent to hurt the infrastructure with cost cutting-measures that will — as has happened in Britain and Spain — as likely as not add to the deficit rather than reducing it.

A more believable use of the government's resources might be to start fixing America by diverting some of the defense budget to sprucing up and repairing the nation, yielding results in a time frame of 25 to 50 years.

The story of another Churchill saying goes like this:

Churchill was walking in the garden of his beloved home, Chartwell, when he summoned the gardener and said, “I want you to plant an oak tree here.”

The gardener, looking to Churchill and seeing a man approaching 90, said, “But sir, it’ll take a hundred years to grow.”

“Well, you had better plant it now, hadn't you?” averred Churchill.

Quite so. The future awaits. – For the Hearst-New York Times Syndicate