When an essential component of a nation's infrastructure goes rogue and starts devouring itself for short term profits at the very moment it is most needed, something must be done. Rail is an essential element of a 21st Century transportation infrastructure. Its capacity, safety, reliability and efficient operation is a public good commensurate with interstate highways, rural electrification, and postal service.

Here are three important articles to help you understand the problem we face when a railroad infrastructure is captured by Wall St. greed:

• Hurray for Surface Transportation Board (STB) Chair Martin Oberman! He is perhaps the one person in the country positioned to lead the fight to bring US railroads inline with 21st Century public interests. Check out his shot "across the bow" of Class 1 Railroads: STB’S Oberman says US railroads reduced service, raised rates and derived $191 billion in dividends and buybacks since 2010- by Stas Margaronis.
• In August 2021, Phillip Longman published Amtrak Joe vs the Modern Robber Barons in the Washington Monthly. Phil beautifully weaves the details of our modern rail dilemma into a call to action.
• Critics of so-called "Precision Scheduled Railroading" (aka "PSR") often lack specific examples to bolster their case. That's not a problem for locomotive engineer and rail labor leader Matt Parker. in his essay in Railway Age "Can we please be honest here?"  

If you care about climate, environmental justice, rural communities, resilient supply chains, rapid and robust passenger rail, reshoring American manufacturing and sustainable agriculture - then dig into these piece, send out the below to your members of Congress, and get ready to lock arms. It is going to require a bold, unconventional alliance to wrest railroads from Wall St. profiteers.

TAKE ACTION:

Contact your congressional representatives about Common Carrier Obligations and PSR by copying and pasting the text below. (Find Contact Info for your Senators or Representatives HERE.)

TEXT TO COMMUNICATE:

It is time to clarify Common Carrier Obligations of railroads, particularly in regards to the interstate (Class 1) railroads, but also in relation to the connectivity of and access to mainlines and branch line service. Since the 1976 Railroad Revitalization and Regulatory Reform Act gave the ICC the authority to exempt from rail regulation any rail transaction or service for which by reason of its limited scope regulation was not deemed necessary to carry out the national transportation policy as stated in the Interstate Commerce Act, the very definition of Common Carrier Obligation has been perverted and increasingly rendered this fundamental common law principle nugatory. Congressional action is necessary to:

1. 1. Update the national transportation policy to reflect the 21st century public interest in decarbonization, equitable and affordable access, and supply chain resilience.
      
      
   2. Restore meaning to the concept of Common Carrier based on the public benefits of equitable, accessible, reliable and affordable service that does not discriminate according to volume or distance in ways that undermine the opportunity of smaller or rural shippers and the public to benefit from the efficiencies and harm reduction of rail transport and its role in local, regional, and national supply chains.
      
      
   3. End the distorting practice of granting commodity and service exemptions and revoke existing exemptions; and
      
      
   4. Instruct the Surface Transportation Board (STB) to expand the scope of rate complaint process to include access to service and the range of parties with standing to include municipalities negatively impacted by inadequate or discriminatory service.
      

Rail is an essential element of a 21st Century transportation infrastructure. Its capacity, safety, reliability and efficient operation is a public good commensurate with interstate highways, rural electrification, and postal service. If the US experiment with private railroads in service of shareholders is incompatible with the 21st Century public goods and national transportation goals, then a transition to a new system - such as open access separating infrastructure from carriers - must be initiated.