Amtrak struggles to keep funding on track

[Save Our Trains Michigan]

WASHINGTON - The federal government spends billions of dollars every year on airports, canals, harbors and interstate highways. Yet when it comes to Amtrak passenger rail service, there is an annual struggle over how much taxpayers should have to spend to keep the trains running.

Amtrak is caught nearly every year between those who want to do away with passenger rail and those who complain that it's chronically underfunded.

In its budget for next year, the Bush administration proposes spending only $360 million for passenger rail service to maintain tracks used by commuter rail services in the Northeast and other urban areas. Amtrak said it needs $1.8 billion to continue operating in the 2006 fiscal year that starts Oct. 1.

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[Poindexter118]

Good Lord! $360 million! That's chump change in Washington. Does the Bush administration want Amtrak to go out? I kinda think so. Amtrak isn't the greatest all the time, but the times I have ridden it, I have always arrived there and back safely. Granted, sometimes a little late, but that's some of their problems. I like riding the train because the highways are getting more and more clogged. Whenever my wife and I go somewhere, we either drive or take the train. She will not fly. Period.

 

Anyway, I have written my congress people, and I hope my voice plus many others, will turn the tide.

 

Here's hoping.