Amtrak FY 2020 Budget

I am curious about the teaser "ROW Acquisition Auburndale". What is its scope? Acquire ROW Poinciana to Auburndale? Auburndale to Mangonia? Auburndale to Tampa? Assuming all along of course that this is the Auburndale on the route of the Silvers in Florida that it is talking about.

(1) I did a Google search. There are five Auburndales in the US. One is a neighborhood in Louisville. Seems unlikely. One is a neighborhood in Queens. Seems unlikely as it is well to the east of Sunnyside. One is a town in Wisconsin that is on the wrong railroad line for Amtrak to be interested. This leaves two candidates:
-Auburndale, FL (presumably associated with the Silvers, potentially part of a potential joint project with Florida, and the obvious candidate)
-Auburndale, MA (a town on the Framingham-Worcester line; I think MA owns this track, so that would eliminate this as a candidate, but I'm not entirely sure on that front).

(2) 2nd Ave yard in Seattle would be a bit south of King Street. 2nd Ave terminates in Stadium Place. 3rd Ave terminates at the station but resumes a while further south and parallels the yard.

Auburndale in Florida is where the line west to Tampa and the line south to Miami splits at a Wye, the east approach to it is from Poinciana/Haynes City towards Orlando. Silver Star travels two legs of the Wye while Silver Meteor travels the third leg.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/C...8a26e7e8f844962e!8m2!3d28.060309!4d-81.796124

A nice concise article on Amtrak's 2020 Appropriation request in line with the 2020 Authorization in the FAST Act.

https://www.enotrans.org/article/amtrak-requests-141-million-cut-in-its-own-budget/

Thanks for posting that. It answers an important question: how much money does the administration want to put on the table for states. $550 million for Restoration and Enhancement grants will be tempting to states, like California, that are already spending money on corridor service. It's an end run around the 750 mile rule, and makes cutting LD service an attractive proposition for some important stakeholders like state-level transportation departments and advocates.

jis said:

A nice concise article on Amtrak's 2020 Appropriation request in line with the 2020 Authorization in the FAST Act.

https://www.enotrans.org/article/amtrak-requests-141-million-cut-in-its-own-budget/

Click to expand...

It should be noted though that almost everyone agrees that the Trump budget proposal this year is DOA, like it was last year even with Congress fully in Republican control. So while it gives an indication of what the administration wants to do, we also know that it has very little chance of getting its way.

The dollar amounts in the Trump budget proposal don't mean much, but by adding a third line to the budget – grants to states – it aligns well with what Amtrak asking for, by creating a mechanism to shift resources from cross country routes to shorter corridors. Giving money to states for public transit will be looked upon kindly by both democrats and republicans – they'll start thinking about getting their own slice of the pie.

Giving the states access to more money is a good thing, but we really need to go into this with the fact that highways get blank checks and rail projects get cries of "won't someone please think of the CHILDREN!!!" should so much as a tree need to die. I don't think most people know that highway projects get backed by federal money to the tune of 75% at minimum where rail gets guaranteed nothing. $500 million is nothing compared to highway projects will get this year. If highways are getting 75% federal backing, transit projects need to be getting the same level of funding....or we should push for highways to get treated the same way?

This week's hotline from RPA contains a good description of stated Amtrak position in their 2020 Appropriation as well as the Reauthorization request documents, that are positive...

https://www.railpassengers.org/happening-now/news/hotline/hotline-1-110/