US Passenger Rail Panel Discussion with John Robert Smith, Meredith Richards & Tom White
To celebrate the long awaited release of Reconnect America's Episode 3. Amtrak's genesis and the ongoing struggle to reclaim the public purpose of passenger rail, Solutionary Rail used our monthly Hive Call with folks around the country as an opportunity to have a discussion with three of the nationally recognized passenger rail champions we featured in the episode:
- John Robert Smith, Chair of Transportation for America and former Amtrak Board Chair.
- Meredith Richards, National Chair for the Rail Passengers Association.
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Tom White, Co-founder of Climate Rail Alliance and veteran rail planner and author with nearly 60 years in the industry.
These are three of the leaders who shaped our recent episodes and who are shaping our thinking about rail in the public interests. Each talk about their past and present work, and build upon the content of Episode 3 and update us all on the current state of affairs with Amtrak, what they see happening in rail today, and where we go from here.
Read moreEpisode 3. Amtrak's genesis and the ongoing struggle to reclaim the public purpose of passenger rail (Part 2)
Listen/Subscribe on: Apple Podcasts, Substack, Spotify, YouTube, or watch this page for New Episodes.
Why was Amtrak created? What impact did that have on US passenger rail service? How is Amtrak’s story part of a broader struggle between public purpose and private profit that has consistently plagued U.S. railroading?
Read moreRail Bite #8: Economic Benefits of Passenger Rail and Why Frequent Service is Pivotal for Strong Ridership (w/ Meredith Richards)
In this Rail Bite, Meredith Richards, who is chair of the Rail Passengers Association (RPA), articulates two principles that lie at the center of successful passenger rail systems everywhere.
Read moreRail Bite #7: Tom White on Bullet Train Hype and the Need for Better Conventional Passenger Service
Why is it that many Americans suddenly seem obsessed with building high speed rail, when most of us don’t even use the 21,400-mile passenger rail system we already have? It’s not as though regular passenger trains are incapable of going faster than the cars we choose to drive instead. Many Amtrak trains can top 100 miles per hour, given the right track conditions. And who can claim that being stuck behind the wheel in traffic is enjoyable?
Read moreRail Bite #6: Maddock Thomas on Why the U.S. Has So Little Amtrak Service
Amtrak was established by the Rail Passenger Service Act of 1970 and began operations on May 1, 1971. It was created to relieve the struggling railroad corporations of their historic obligation to carry passengers. Half a century of public investment in highways and air travel had undermined the ability of railroads to provide passenger service at a profit and was causing a crisis in the industry. (Check out Episode 2 of our main series for an in-depth exploration of this history.) So the public bailed the railroads out by creating Amtrak, a quasi-public corporation that would henceforth carry passengers across almost the entire U.S. rail network.
Read moreRail Bite #5: Knox Ross on Whether Passenger Rail Should Be Privatized
Knox Ross is chair of the Southern Rail Commission, an interstate rail compact between Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama that advocates for and engages stakeholders around the expansion and revitalization of rail service in the region.
In this timely Rail Bite, Mr. Ross—who is also a practicing Certified Public Accountant—illuminates some of the widespread misconceptions behind the expectation that passenger trains turn a profit.
Read moreRail Bite #4: Dave Strohmaier on the Unlikely Coalition Reviving Passenger Rail Across Southern Montana
If you look at Amtrak’s national network on a map, you will see a giant hole spanning roughly a third of the contiguous United States. Two states in this area, Wyoming and South Dakota, have no intercity passenger rail service at all. The lone route that crosses the northern tier of the country through Idaho, Montana, and North Dakota lies far away from most of the major cities in each state.
Read moreIntroducing... Rail Bites!
If you follow Solutionary Rail on Substack or another platform, you may have noticed that we have a new, weekly podcast series!
Our brand new Rail Bites series presents you with some of our favorite clips from our amazing guests on Reconnect America.
With Rail Bites, you can look forward to more frequent, shorter-form content in between our carefully crafted longer episodes.
Read moreRail Bite #3: Professor David Alff on the expectation that trains turn a profit
In this timely meditation, author and professor David Alff probes the inner tension of rail transport in the U.S.: that it is expected to make a profit while providing an essential public service.
Read more