Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
The Obama administration has resurrected an emphasis on passenger
rail transport. High-speed rail has emerged as the cornerstone of the
president's desire to remake the nation's transportation agenda by
switching the government's fi nancial focus away from building highways
and roads to building mass transport.
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This makes good environmental sense. According to the National
Association of Railroad Passengers, airplanes use energy at a rate 20
percent higher per passenger mile than passenger trains. Cars are even
worse, at 27 percent more per passenger mile.
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The president's pro-
posed budget for 2010 gives an additional $2 billion to the DOT,
most of it to be used for rail and aviation improvements. Amtrak will
receive $1.3 billion. Nearly half of the $48 billion in stimulus money
for transportation projects will be spent on rail, buses, and other
nonhighway projects.
The need for improvement in the nation's passenger rail system was
dramatically illustrated in June 2009 when two trains carrying hundreds
of passengers rear-ended in Washington State, killing nine and injuring
more than seventy. Federal safety offi cials had warned the train company
that the cars could be unsafe in crashes and called for them to be
replaced, or at least strengthened. But nothing was done because of
fi nancial constraints.
When a northbound train belonging to the Chicago Transit Authority
derailed in July 2006, injuring more than 150 people, the National
Transportation Safety Board reported that the line had been placed into
service fi fty-fi ve years earlier and that many parts of the track had never
been replaced. The report described corroded rails and fasteners, and
rotten wood on the ties, and questioned why the problems had not been
identifi ed and repaired before the derailment.
Although federal fi nancing for capital improvements to transit systems
has been rising, the share going to the largest systems has been shrinking
because they have had to compete with new, smaller systems. The
nation's seven largest systems, which carry 80 percent of the nation's rail
riders, have received only 23 percent of federal fi nancing eligible for
bringing systems into a state of good repair, according to the transit
administration.
The need to reduce energy consumption is clear to all Americans
today. A Harris poll in December 2005 revealed that the public believes
that the federal government should set transportation policy and that
trains should have an increased share of public transportation, with an
emphasis on commuter trains rather than long-distance trains.
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