Nahanni said
“You want to see rail travel work in this country? Take it out of the hands of the federal government.”
wont work. Several reasons, first of all the eisenhower interstate highway which cost several billion dollars was proven to be a way to reduce costs and increase efficiencies of road travel. so you really do want the government to participate in building and maintaining roads, you get more than just the simple cost of the trip by building roads, you get these infrastructure multipliers too.
Now, on the other hand, railways have had almost no subsidies. Airlines, by the way have had huge subsidies, for the same reasons. Cities know that developing infrastructures like good airports brings economic productivity to the entire reasons, so it makes sense for cities, states and the national government to work towards building airport infrastructures.
Every year, we spend billions for airlines and automobiles and trucks and almost nothing on rails. We are talking about spending billions on airlines and road transportation vs millions for the railiways.
It just makes sense to subsidize the railways to much greater extent. Gasoline and diesel prices keep going up and railways have been, will be and have always been the most efficient way to transport people and goods in america.
I have a feeling if we subsidized railways to the extent we subsidize our highways and airports, railways would be the cheapest transportation option in america.
Of course, for the past 90 years Detroit has successfully lobbied against any support for the railroads, not only that, cities and states have taxed railways for revenue (while subsidizing roads and airports). Gasoline and diesel prices will continue to go up. The federal government should support the railways to a greater extent and drop support for the less useful highways. We spend around $600 per driver per year on our highways, as people continue to have to cut back on driving due to high oil prices, we need to step down the highway subsidizes and build back our rail systems.
