Will segmented train routes work?

   An issue that is bound to be heavily debated in coming months is the idea of breaking up long distance Amtrak routes into segments
that involve a series of day trains covering the same routes. 

   The idea originated with anti-Amtrak sources in the Administration, but actually dates back further, having been proposed by various think tanks with anti-rail orientations. 

   The apparent money- saving idea is that there would no longer be a need for sleeping cars and the crews to man them. The day trains would cover the same route, but there would be no overnight operation, so that travelers whose routes included an overnight portion would have to occupy hotel rooms between train segments. 

   The National Association of Railroad Passengers has been performing comparison analyses of existing long distance routes and the segmented routes that would most likely substitute for them. The results are so weighted in favor of the long distance routes that no logical justification could be made for the segments.

   Rather than creating cost saving for Amtrak, the segmenting would actually either yield no savings or raise costs, while reducing patronage to such an extent that the segmented route would fail altogether. 

   Of course, creating a route failure might be the ultimate aim of the anti-rail originators of this scheme. 

   Amtrak President Kummant and other company officials continue to mention this plan while being fairly noncommital and saying it would be evaluated carefully. If the evaluation is indeed done carefully and rationally, it would seem that no possible case could be made for segmenting. 
 
 

   Rail Travel News will resume publication late in December, published by Citizens for Rail California. The first issue will carry the cover date of Jan 2008 and is projected to be mailed during the last week of December.

   RTN editor Jim Russell will continue to write for the publication.

   With global warming and an oil crisis inexorably approaching, the passenger rail mode is receiving more attention from citizens, the media and politicians--with the usual exception of the White House.

   The Senate has passed bill S294 by a veto-proof vote of 70-22. The House must still act on its version. The Senate Lautenberg-Lott legislation re-authorizes Amtrak for six years, giving it $11.45 billion over that time period for passenger rail improvement. Amtrak has never before been so generously endowed.

   Editorials are more favorable to Amtrak and to enlarging and improving its system than ever. Among new calls for added service are the restoration of the DESERT WIND and the NORTH COAST HIAWATHA.

   Behind the favorable editorials, one senses a feeling of inevitability, that the nation unquestionably needs the rail option given the threatening future of energy, transportation and pollution control.

   Rail Travel News print publication, which has not been published for nearly a year due to the illness and recuperation of its editor, will resume publication soon under a new publisher.

   Arrangements are now underway to transfer ownership of RTN to a different publisher, who will continue servicing the subscriptions of current subscribers and take new subscriptions. Full details will be announced when arrangements have been completed. 

   Editor Jim Russell will continue to write for the new publication. 

   The northbound Amtrak CRESCENT, train 20 between New Orleans and New York, struck a stalled auto in Greer, South Carolina shortly after midnight on Tuesday, October 16. The train, carrying 180 passengers, had left the Greenville station a short time before the accident and was traveling at over 70mph. 

   A car driven by Betsy Devall became stuck on the tracks, and Devall was making a cell phone call to relatives for help. She said she was not aware that she had turned onto a railroad track. 

   Officer Marcus O'Shields of the Greer police had made a routine stop to conver with an officer from the nearby airport when he spotted the car on the tracks and became aware that a train was approaching. The car was facing away from the oncoming Amtrak train. 

   O'Shields told the media that it took him a minute and a half to convince Devall to leave her car. Just seconds after she had exited the car and moved, at O'Shields' insistence, away from the tracks, the fast train struck the vehicle, instantly demolishing it and pushing the wreckage about 300 feet. 

   All of this action was caught by the dashboard video camera in the police car and later shown on local TV and on the Web. The video can be viewed at this link:

http://www.wspa.com/midatlantic/spa/news.apx.
-content-articles-SPA-2007-10-16-0006.html

   This very unusual video might constitute part of a public outreach effort by Operation Lifesaver, showing the public the frightening results of a train-auto collision. 

   Three people on the train suffered minor injuries. The train was able to continue on to New York after five hours.

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