Talk:Amtrak
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Routes and Services
I tidied up the listings for things like Routes, Commuter services, Freight, etc, and combined them under "Amtrak routes and services". I also took the infrastructure-related items and consolidated them under "Trains and Tracks". I see Slambo, a fellow UNIX/Railroad geek is cleaning up the route table as well. Good. It needs it. --Plaws 15:27, 2005 Jun 22 (UTC)
- The table was a little crunched by the route schematic, so a quick br fixed that. Adding the background color on the column headers makes them easier to distinguish too. I used the same background color as we're using on the Trains Wikiportal and in the infobox at the top of the page. I think it could look a little better if it had a 1px border on the cells, especially for rows where the text wraps (which will happen on smaller monitor resolutions). slambo 15:37, Jun 22, 2005 (UTC)
Amtrak in the UK
In the UK, Amtrak is the name of a parcel delivery company.
Possible the two companies are related?
No, but U.S. Amtrak does accept parcels for station-to-station shipment. Mine disappeared without a trace. Or as they say, Do all Amtrak trains go to Chicago? No, but all the baggage does.
It seems like Amtrak is doing better, i.e. less crashes (or maybe I'm just not up on the news). All I ever used to hear about Amtrak was yet another crash. The article doesn't seem to address their safety record. Does anyone have information on this?
hmm...not really... i ride it between home and college every few weeks. The trains are often late and not very popular. However, I still glad that it's an transportation option for me. --Macrowiz 20:55, 24 Jun 2004 (UTC)
- Amtrak employs over 22,000 employees and receives a great deal of federal government funding, leading to recurring debates over its elimination. However, since the terrorist atttacks of September 11, 2001, government funding of Amtrak has been greatly increased.
Is there a single thing happening in the United States that's not related to terrorism ?
good call. I'm glad you changed that.--Macrowiz 20:55, 24 Jun 2004 (UTC)
NPOV?
Often, Amtrak's top management would be more interested in their own political ambitions than in actually making the operation successful, and would often lie to Congress about Amtrak being close to self-sufficiency. This changed when President George W. Bush appointed David Gunn as President of Amtrak. He immediately began a program of trimming fat from the operation, and of giving Congress unvarnished truth, rather than toadying to curry favor, a change that earned him respect from both Congress and the Public.
This does not seem very neutral to me. I'm certain that no one in Washington has ever muttered the "unvarnished truth," and how can one prove the supposed respect he has with Congress and the public? Just say what he did in an "unvarnished" way. What are the facts? This seems to me a bit too enthusiastic to be considered neutral.
- I agree, not very neutral. My personal opinion would be to just delete the whole paragraph. Any other opinions? JYolkowski 03:32, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)
- NPOV does NOT mean removing any points of view that are not neutral, it means including all points of view to make the article neutral. If there are criticisms of Amtrak then they do belong in this article, as well as reasonable responses to such criticisms, if they are held by Amtrak users; what I am not sure about is the accuracy of the above. If it is accurate the writer should back it up with sources. — © Alex756 05:03, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)
- Yeah that seems like an POV statemnt to me. --User:Boothy443 | comhrÚ 05:20, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)
There is truth in the statement, but it is incomplete and poorly expressed. I do not think we can fairly use the word lie when those in Washington are all playing something of a game of the Emporer's New Clothes. The fact is that they truth was twisted to be politically correct. I think the comments present an important problem Amtrak has had (and will have for the foreseeable future). Vaoverland
Try this working as an alternative:
Amtrak was established to relieve railroads of their federally-mandated responsibilities to transport passengers as a priority over freight. This was causing increasingly large large financial losses for the railroads as the networks of federally-funded highways and airports expanded.
At the outset, Amtrak was expected to pursue conflicting goals. Amtrak was supposed to provide a national rail passenger service while simultaneously operating as a commercial enterprise. Without a without a dedicated source of capital equipment and operating funding (except for competitive passenger fares and even less express income, Amtrak's continued operation has been dependent upon both the Executive and Legislative branches of the U.S. government. Both congressional funding, and appointments of Amtrak's leaders are subject to political considerations, which have varied widely during its existence through seven U.S. presidencies and major shifts of power in the U.S. Congress.
Amtrak has benefited from both highly skilled and politically-oriented leaders. For example, former U.S. Secretary of the Navy Southern Railway head W. Graham Claytor Jr. brought his naval and railroad experience to the job. Claytor to come out of retirement to lead Amtrak after the disastrous results of the Alan Boyd presidency during the Carter administration (1979-1983). He was recruited and strongly supported by John H. Riley, an attorney who was the highly-skilled head of the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) from 1983-1989. Secretary of Transportation Elizabeth Dole also tacitly supported Amtrak. Claytor seemed to enjoy a good relationship with the Congress for his 11 years on the job. Since then, leadership changed several times. Two of the leaders who followed Claytor lacked freight railroad or private-sector experience. They also inherited the Amtrak self-sufficiency myth which began under David Stockman and his successors at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) under Claytor's presidency (in 1986).
Amtrak President Thomas Downs had been City Administrator of Washington DC, and oversaw the Union Station project, which had experienced massive delays and cost overruns. Under Downs, in 1995 Amtrak began to claim that it could achieve operating self-sufficiency, and its leaders seemed to be increasingly misleading as to the prospects of achieving that goal when pressed by Congress and the media.
After Downs left Amtrak, George Warrington was appointed as Amtrak's president. He had extensive experience in the New York City area, where citizens have long demonstrated a commitment to the mass transit services. When he took the helm in January, 1998, self-sufficiency was still officially a goal, although it was becoming elusive in the eyes of Congress. Under Warrington's administration, Amtrak was mandated by the Administration and Congress to become totally self-sufficient within a five-year period, and all its management efforts were directed to that goal. Finally, at the end of that period, it became clear that self-sufficiency was an idealistic goal which was simply unachievable, no matter how many much additional express revenue was gained or how many cuts were made in Amtrak services.
In fairness, while both Downs or Warrington had extensive experience in government, neither had the non-governmental cost accounting or practical experience in railroading of that Claytor also had. Claytor also enjoyed the benefit of serving during the Reagan Administration when increases in federal spending on military items was drawing a lot of the political attention in Congress.
When David Gunn was selected as Amtrak president, the myth of Amtrak self-sufficiency had been exposed. He came with a reputation as a strong, straight-foward and experienced operating manager. In his selection, President George W. Bush knew he was not hiring someone who would tell Congress whatever was politically correct. Years earlier, Gunn's refusal to "do politics" put him at odds with the WMATA (Metro) board, which includes representatives from the District of Columbia and suburban jurisdictions in Maryland and Virginia during his tenure from 1991-1994. His work as president of the New York City Transit Authority from 1984 to 1990 and as Chief General Manager of the Toronto Transit Commission in Canada from 1995-1999 earned him a great deal of operating credibility, despite his rough handling of politics and labor unions. The two agencies were each the largest transit operations of their respective countries. Prior to 1974, Gunn also gained private-sector railroad experience with Illinois Central Gulf Railroad, the New York Central Railroad System (before the Penn Central debacle) and for the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway. Before that, he had experince with the U.S. Navy in the Naval Reserve. Gunn's credentials are the strongest at the head of Amtrak since W. Graham Claytor came out of retirement by request in 1982.
So far, Gunn has been polite, but very direct in response to congressional criticism, and is seen as more credible by the Congress, the media, and many Amtrak supporters and employees. Perhaps more than any past president of Amtrak, Gunn seems willing to publicly oppose the positions of the President of the United States who appointed him, and whose pleasure he serves.
A more realistic view of Amtrak under the Gunn administration is that no form of mass passenger transportation in the United States is self-sufficient as the economy is currently structured. Highways, airports, and air traffic control all require large expenditures to build and maintain. Gunn answered a demand by leading Amtrak critic Arizona Senator John McCain to eliminate all operating subsidies by asking the Senator if he would also demand the same of the commuter airlines, upon whom the citizens of Arizona are much more dependent.
If Amtrak is to operate, it must do so safely and it will require extensive ongoing financial capital and operating support. Gunn and President Bush are probably in agreement that more state and local funding support would be desirable for Amtrak. Both probably also realize that the more practical and frugal management under Gunn will draw less fire from Amtrak's opponents in Congress, where the question of federal financing will ultimately be decided, perhaps an a year-to-year basis for the foreseeable future.
Is this too much detail? My career has been in transportation, mostly in competition with Amtrak to a point. However, I am not anti-Amtrak, mostly I am NPOV, personally. I am comfortable with the facts as I have written them above. How is that for a more balanced statement of Amtrak, leadership, and the funding dilemma? Mark in Richmond. Vaoverland 08:10, Feb 21, 2005 (UTC)
I am going to go ahead and replace the offensive paragraph with the suggested text as listed above. Vaoverland 11:29, Feb 21, 2005 (UTC)
Commuter services- Sounder
The Puget Sound Area's Sounder Commuter Rail system is also a partnership with Amtrak, some Amtrak trains accept Sounder passes, and the logo is displayed as a partership symbol.