CSX opposes high-speed rail on its tracks

The passenger train companies in Great Britain are making healthy profits. 

Yes, they are, and those passenger companies have ZERO DOLLARS tied up in right-of-way maintenance.

If the passenger train operating companies in the UK had to bear the burden of right-of-way maintenance, they would be in the red, just like every other passenger operation in the world. They are "subsidized" in the form of of not having to pay anything for ROW maintenance.

Originally Posted by N.Q.D.Y.:

The passenger train companies in Great Britain are making healthy profits. 

Yes, they are, and those passenger companies have ZERO DOLLARS tied up in right-of-way maintenance.

 

If the passenger train operating companies in the UK had to bear the burden of right-of-way maintenance, they would be in the red, just like every other passenger operation in the world. They are "subsidized" in the form of of not having to pay anything for ROW maintenance.

 

 

I'm sorry to disagree Rich, but that is not correct. The train operating companies have to pay Network Rail for use of the infrastructure. Although Network Rail is partially subsidised, the train operating companies pay an average of 75% of the costs of R.o.W. and infrastructure maintenance.

Originally Posted by OGR Webmaster:

Originally Posted by N.Q.D.Y.:

The passenger train companies in Great Britain are making healthy profits. 

Yes, they are, and those passenger companies have ZERO DOLLARS tied up in right-of-way maintenance.

 

If the passenger train operating companies in the UK had to bear the burden of right-of-way maintenance, they would be in the red, just like every other passenger operation in the world. They are "subsidized" in the form of of not having to pay anything for ROW maintenance.

 

 

I'm sorry to disagree Rich, but that is not correct. The train operating companies have to pay Network Rail for use of the infrastructure. Although Network Rail is partially subsidised, the train operating companies pay an average of 75% of the costs of R.o.W. and infrastructure maintenance.

Very true. A few years ago I did an efficiency improvement and asset management project for a consortium of four operating companies in southeastern England.  I recall the ROW fees were a noticeable expense item. I was impressed with their management, too.  Solid sensible people.  

Partially subsidized is still subsidized.  And I would like to see an actual source one way or another.

OK...so they pay 75% of the ROW maintenance costs. That is NOT 100%!

If they DID have to pay 100% of the ROW maintenance costs, they would NOT make a profit.

But it's a lot more than 'Zero' Rich. 

in the near future, the government expects to end it's subsidies to Network Rail, and then the passenger train operators will be paying 100%+ of the infrastructure costs (On top of paying the government for their franchises, and a percentage of their profits.) , as Network Rail is expected to make a profit too.

CSX was part of the "Stakeholder Committee" providing input for the federal DIES study and never raised most of the issues they now complain about. CSX would not pay for any of the proposed improvements and gain revenue from 4 more daily passenger trains as well as collect a bonus for running passenger trains on time. IIRC, CSX left more than $20 million on the table in lost "on time" bonuses last year. Also, CSX would have additional track for its freight trains since there would be only 8 passenger trains a day.

I suspect the CSX complaint is just the beginning of a dance to extract more public money to allow more passenger trains. In addition, it may be part of conversations about public money to help finish double tracking the CSX west-of Hudson line to NJ.

Tony

Up on "The D & H Bridge Line"

Exactly. CSX has some leverage and they are going to use it to their advantage. Can't blame them one bit for doing that.

Jeff C

Sure...just like Amtrak has been "...expected to make a profit..." ever since 1981.

1971

Jeff C

This conversation brings to mind what Alfred Pearlman was saying decades ago in this video....(skip to 23:00 for the real scoop )

Aww...what's 10 years among friends. 

Thanks for the correction. The ol' finger meant to hit the "7" and got the "8" instead.

I'm sorry Rich, but simply taking a few words of my post out of context does absolutely nothing to prove your point.

Just because the USA does not have a profitable passenger rail network does not mean that no other country can have one. I simply used the railway companies in Great Britain as an example, but there are many systems, both large and small, around the world that make a profit and are successful. So please do not tar the rest of the world with the same brush.

Even Amtrak has made huge steps towards profitability in recent years, and could do even better if it were allowed to. There are many great things about the USA, but having the vision and political willpower to enable a successful modern passenger rail network does not seem to be one of them at this time.

I don't wish to get into an argument with you, as it seems that you are pretty fixed in your views on passenger rail transport. But please be kind enough to either check your facts before making sweeping statements, or at least be prepared to accept correction when you are wrong. 

Thank you.

Nicole, I HAVE checked my facts! What I learned was that there is NOT ONE passenger rail operation anywhere in the world that bears ALL its costs and still makes a profit.

Some make a "profit" (if you want to call it that) after a subsidy takes care of some of the expenses, but if the passenger operation had to bear all the costs of running the operation (locomotive acquisition and maintenance, passenger equipment acquisition and maintenance, right-of-way acquisition and maintenance, admin costs, labor costs, taxes, etc.) it will not make a profit.

Amtrak does not bear all its costs...and still cannot make any money. Even if they do edge toward "profitability" they are still not bearing ALL the costs associated with running their trains. They don't pay their fair share of ROW maintenance (except on the NE Corridor) and if forced to do so, would quickly rack up huge deficits.

   I can certainly side with CSX's views but then again i am "freight" biased...keeps this country running.

Hold on there, hombre...

I'm sure that in most cases Amtrak pays very little towards ROW maintenance or other capital costs, but it would also be more than fair to say that Amtrak, nationwide, has an extremely light footprint compared to the host railroad, so it is to some extent a skewed argument.

It's comparable to asking our military to pay a "fair share" of capital costs/maintenance for our roads--there is no doubt that the military uses public roads, and that public roads are strategically important, but by and large the road system is used and paid for by non-military based funding, and the sum total of all military movements are insignificant in ton/miles when compared to total usage.

Jeff C

I think that proves too much, Rich.  There is NO TRANSPORTATION SYSTEM IN THE WORLD that "bears all its costs."

Take the highways: taxes support highway construction and maintenance, policing, accident and emergency response, etc.

And just imagine if users had to "bear all the costs" of emissions from cars, trucks, ships, what have you.  Instead, all of us pay the costs of pollution, whether it be particulates, smog, or greenhouse gases.

In short, every system is "subsidized" in some way.

Railroads do own all the land they operate on.  It was given to them by the government to serve the public interest by building and operating the railroads on the land.  They were also given millions of acres of additional land to help defray the cost of building and operating the railroads they built on that land.

Railroads also have the power of eminent domain to become the owners of any land they can convince the government is in the public's best interest.

UP has always wanted to run the fastest freight possible.  That's good business to me.  To get the taxpayers to pay for the upgrades required to run faster and faster freight seems like a good business decision to me.

In the end how much taxpayer money was given to CSX to buy what they did of Conrail vs what Conrail inherited from Penn Central, etal?

As with the Florida example above CSX also has trackage rights over the Northeast corridor.  And I would bet CSX doesn't pay any more or less than Amtrak pays.

It was noted above that coal drags were delaying Amtrak.  If CSX hasn't figured out yet that the amount of coal being transported is declining and will continue to do so, in an accelerated fashion once a carbon tax is in effect and they they should be looking long term for alternative revenues now then they really aren't a very good management team.

They don't need to run 110 MPH.  What they need to do is continue to run 90 MPH and not stop or slow down because of other traffic.  That will provide a perfectly acceptable running time.

That would be me Matt is talking about, took the Sunset limited to Pensacola FL. from L.A.  It was 12 hours late, Amtrak said it was UP's fault. They were given many stop signal as I watched freight trains pull ahead of us. Having said all that I enjoyed the extra 12 hours of watching trains and eating like crazy on Amtrak, As I was eating on the last night and I asked the waiter if they were running low on food and he said, No,  we are prepared for this it happens all the time. 

Number 90   I agree with you

Clem k

Me too.  The scheduled speed for the Coast Starlight is 39 mph.  And we want to skip the 80 mph train and go directly to 250 mph between Bakersfield and Madera?

Being somewhat socialist in outlook, I am in favor of taxpayer support for infrastructure, but skipping this step (the 80 mph passenger train) baffles me.  If I get the chance again, I shall vote against high speed rail.  If I ever get the chance, I would vote for a national passenger rail system that has priority over freight, one way or another, and that is useful to the point where folks use it for travel, not leisure.

It  was my understanding that part of the deal with Amtrak was that host railroads couldn't give their trains priority.  Is that not correct, or are some just more inclined to disregard the rules?

Three thoughts to add here:

1.  A number of years ago, I recall reading that Amtrak is reasonably efficient - close to profitable or actually profitable, in other words- on the northeast corridor.  I wish I remember the source.  A related point was that a great deal of this was due to the fact that the northeast corridor, similar to, for example, much of Europe, has the population density to support passenger rail as a viable option.  In parts of the US where the population density is very low, the article pointed out that Amtrak loses tremendous amounts of money on those routes.  The accounting and cost assumptions behind those statements would mke for some interesting reading and debate, but those were not provided.  Irrespective of the underlying assumptions, these statements make some intuitive sense.

2.  All transport options involve public funding.  We pay for roads via gas taxes and tolls, airports and security infrastructure via airport taxes and fees as well as state support, etc.  Passenger rail is no different.  However what is different about Amtrak, and a source of tremendous inefficiency (similar to, for example, the US postal service where outdated ways of doing business such as six day a week delivery and unaffordable retirement and healthcare costs cannot be changed due to the fact it is a quasi-governmental organization) is that Amtrak is government owned.  I have no issue with public support for transportation funding, whether for rail or other forms so long as it is underpinned by some sort of rationality about how it is used in a given situation, but direct public ownership of Amtrak makes the system, in my opinion, more inefficient and less likely to deliver good service.  Provide support for passenger rail just the way we do for roads and airports, but get Uncle Sam out of actually owning the thing.  

3.  My personal opinion is that high speed rail is a boondoggle for most of the US.  I respect that other countries have gone in that direction but my opinion is that many of these countries are more socialist than the US is or should be.  Moreover, I also believe that the sheer size of the US, as comared to for example Europe or Japan, makes rail far less appealing as an option than plane travel.  And while the personal automobile is no faster than normal rail service, there is data supporting that it is more effficient and more flexible.  Rail service in the US makes sense where we have it already -in dense areas where it serves as a form of mass transit.

Perhaps CSX could run faster intermodals on track that is improved for 110mph Amtrak trains.  There is no reason a modern intermodal couldn't do 90.

An excerpt from two posts above:

  "And while the personal automobile is no faster than normal rail service, there is data supporting that it is more effficient and more flexible.  Rail service in the US makes sense where we have it . . ."

That may be true, but it does not seem to hold for the Coast Starlight, unless "normal rail service" is a lot faster than our trains are.  A personal automobile may be more flexible, but I suspect rail is a lot more efficient.  I have heard it said that a steel wheel on steel rail is the most efficient transport, unless you include a barge going down-river.

There are at least three vastly different travel markets, at least in long- distance travel. Rail will never capture those who need to go from LAX to DCA in four hours, but if the schedules and amenities are there, there are trainloads of people who will endure the three days a fast train would take.  I am one of them - I will pay money to never ride in the back of a jet.  Cutting that down to, say, a day and a half on a 200 mph train will not capture the airline business.  Let's make what we have work the way it did in 1950.

opinion.

UK at 8.5 billion passenger miles traveled(quarterly moving annual average) the government subsidy is 6.8 pence per passenger mile. https://www.gov.uk/government/...ions/rail-statistics

Yeah, sure, they are making money in Great Britain  with passenger rail... at the government printing office.

Great post, Penn-Pacific! This issue has been ongoing for more than a half-century. It's still the same. High speed rail planning

If you study the documents that you refer to above, you will see that the 6.8p per passsenger mile is due to the subsidies provided to Network Rail, the infrastructure owner. They are currently receiving 9.8p per passenger mile. Overall, the train operating companies are not receiving any subsidies, and are actually paying a premium to the government of 3p per passenger mile from their profits.

you are kidding, right? Is that Euro math? 9.8p-3p=6.8p cost to taxpayer\govt. Does separating the cost of infrastructure from operation make it feel better spending billions per quarter? If I have no track and infrastructure can I operate a train?

The point is that passenger trains are not profit generators. It doesn't matter which country it is located.

The age old question is, who will bear the cost of this social good? The profit making freight railroads in the USA certainly don't want to bear it. They already support the economy and government.

Well, not unless you were the old New York Central, I suppose...

If you do the maths on this, you'll see that the cost works out at less than $1 per week per person. (£0.70p/$0.95¢ ) And this is excluding all of the tax revenue that the railway companies generate. Once you take that into account, the government makes a healthy return on the railway system. 

I agree with Nicole here and I've seen similar computations for the awesome rail system they have in Switzerland and its just a bit more (probably all those tunnels!).  Railroads generate good return for many governments both directly (as she says, they see a healthy tax revenue) and in ways never directly associated with them except in papers by economists: they stimulate the economy which generates more sales and income which gets taxed.   Really the same phenomena as the Interstate road system here. 

I really wish we would do it here. I f and when I become absolute dictator, among my first decrees will that there will be that there will no commercial airplane flights shorter than 1000 miles in the US.  Travel between major cities will be entirely on dedicated ROW and high-speed tracks paid for in much the same way the Interstate road system was done. Airlines will be encouraged to open rail divisions (Southwest Rail, etc).  Any type of locomotives will be allowed as long as it can make the minimum speeds (200 mph) but they will all have to look like streamlined art deco steam locomotives (Dreyfus Hudson, S-1, etc.). 

Seriously, if we have a system like that in the US, nearly all of us would be better for it. 

Nicole,

I suppose that you will bend the numbers to suit your needs, but you don't need to do any math. There are excel spreadsheets showing 2012-13 costs at 10,104£m, total revenue at 7,707£m. That's a loss of 2307£m. There is no profit. Oh, but wait

there was 5,060£m in Gov't support. Well, I would say you could call the 2663£m a profit to the franchisees. But to the citizens, taxpayers, it's a 5060£m cost for the services after paying ticket fees.

While it may be a necessary cost for the social good passenger rail service provides,  it still doesn't make the service profitable.

The conditions don't exist in the US for passenger rail to be a necessity as it is Europe. Getting from our present status to a well managed system like the UK will take many years. Even then, unlike freight, it will cost the taxpayers more than it generates. It's a little more difficult to find Amtrak numbers...I wonder why?

"See the USA in your Chevrolet" the GM jingle from the 50's.

Be well and ride the trains!

I find all this discussion about the "social" good that a high speed rail system brings to a country very interresting.  I recently visited England for the first time and was really excited about the potential for some wonder rail travel.  I had planned to visit York and the railway museum there.  It is about 230 miles from where I was staying but I found the costs to be exorbitant.  I could rent a car for four days at less than 1/2 the cost of one round trip ticket so if my wife were to have gone with me, we could have driven for 1/4 the cost of taking the train (and done it is less time per Google Maps).

Based on that type of pricing, the trains  in England should be making a profit.

Having never been to London, I decided to take the train from Winchester to London (a distance of about 60 miles).  I was stunned to find the price of my one way fare to be 33 Pounds ($56 at the time) and this was arrive in off peak time (10:40 AM).  Not having any idea what the wage structure is in GB, I asked my son-in-law, who was born and raised in England, how do the average folks on England afford that kind of rate to visit London.  His response really surprised me.  He responded -"they just don't go"  with a question in his voice as to why would I even ask.

Can someone please explain to me how these trains in Europe help the common folks if they cannot afford to ride them.

DG Jones

As a tourist, and presumably buying your ticket on the day of travel at Winchester Station - you would pay the highest price.

People living in Winchester commuting to London will have season tickets, local leisure travellers these days buy tickets in advance if they have advance notice when they will be travelling, probably on ine, and thus the situation is not as bad as it seems to you.

Having said that, any journey of up to 200 miles is just as quick by car door-to door - and bear in mind that our gas costs twice yours too.  The result, when I am going to train shows I fill the car (LS400) with chums and we have a nice friendly trip there and back, chatting so much we hardly use the radio.  

What makes, particularly London, different is the cost and difficulty, of parking - costing perhaps £40 (say $60) per day, and the slow speeds in the rush hours too, of course.

However, commuting is a different subject.  There is a niche for rail between 200 - 500 miles, after which air is better in spite of the security hassle.   A few trains in the UK do cover all their costs, but the necessary comprehensive service hardly ever does.  Our busiest rail route, the West Coast Main Line (London - Birmingham - Liverpool & Manchester - Glasgow) for example, has an average seat occupancy of a mere 20%. Since the train s are full for a couple of hours in the morning and evening, you can see that for the rest of the time they are probably only 10% occupied.

But when mentioning efficiency, it is necessary to multiply the rail-road quoted figures by five to get a proper picture for they always quote consumption per passenger mile assuming all seats were occupied.

When it comes to ordinary people, most never use rail travel at all.  It has developed into a service for the middle classes and business people, only a small number finding it useful for social and pleasure travel.  The exception is commuting, where all classes use trains going to and from work.

Electric cars will eliminate any fuel-efficiency claims railways possess and autonomy will eliminate the point of being able to work while you travel by train too.  So the medium term outlook for passenger rail travel does not seem particularly bright to me.

Hi DG Jones,

As Claughton stated above, buying a ticket on the day of travel is the most expensive way these days. And buying a one-way ticket is by far the most expensive option.

For your trip from Winchester to London, the one-way fare is £33.40, yet the cost of a return (round-trip) ticket is £34.70, only £1.30 more. If you book in advance, then there are normally even greater savings available, but you do have to learn your way around a rather complex fare structure. The whole question of complex fare structures is a bone of contention among many, and I understand that the government is trying to get the rail companies to simplify the structure.

Hi Moonman.

I haven't been trying to bend any numbers. I was just using the figures that you provided. Even using your latest figures for the total cost of subsidies (Most of which are for infrastructure improvement, and providing service to underused rural routes.), this still works out at less than the price of a cup of coffee per week. (Per person.)

I think that that is pretty good value for money. 

I think we are the "common people" the trains are meant to help.  Most of my friends who live in the UK and on the continent are ex-pat US folks over there on long-term (maybe permanent) assignments with large corporations - professionals or executives making a good living, and they don't have a car, although a few have one car for the entire family.

My friends live in London, Zurich, Frankfort and Milan, and all of them spend a fair amount on local and cross country train travel but ultimately no more than we do on cars in total.  when we visit they advise me on what discount rail passes to get to get around at affordable rates - as Nicole says, there are lower cost alternatives but you have to understand the system and play it.  Overall, it's just a different life there - I'm not sure I want that personally - but I recognize the quality of life is pretty good and that a society that wants those types of cities and city life, etc., has to make sure there are good trains, and plenty of them. Some of my buddies really aren't keen on coming back, so I guess those countries have made it work pretty nicely.

I does bring its own challenges.  My buddy in Zurich went ballistic at this: One Saturday this 12-year old daughter came home just before dinner with a bunch of shopping bags.  She and her best friend, also 12, had gone to Paris to shop: light rail around breakfast time to the station downtown, then rail-pass on a high-speed train to Paris (its about four hours), and back after two or three hours of shopping.  He hold me that most Americans have to worry about kids driving when they are sixteen, but he said, "She has something much more dangerous than a car, and at only age twelve: a card in her pocket and in six hours she can be just about anywhere in Europe."  

Is that cost of less than one cup of coffee per week for the folks actually riding the trains, or everybody?