privatization

Can Privatization Put Passenger Rail Back on Track?

America needs passenger rail service as an economical and ecological alternative to endless road and airport construction. Unfortunately, Amtrak cannot (and probably should not) survive as it is presently structured and funded. Perpetuating the status quo will burden America with a lame, government-run passenger operation, limping along on the nation's freight rail rights-of-way, operating under outdated federal rules from its 1970 authorization, and surviving on Congressional handouts. But, the solution is not to throw Amtrak on the market, accepting whatever happens. What would happen is, Amtrak would die. The proper course is to reorganize the system, privatizing whatever can be privatized, building new public-private alliances and compacts around the set of rail corridors that link cities 100-500 miles apart-which is the functional core of the national system-and then reconnecting this reorganized nation system to other forms of transportation to create a true intermodal passenger network. Read More ›