Reply #14: Other countries have shown [View All]

[Lydia Leftcoast]

that rail equals or exceeds air in efficiency for journeys of 600 miles or less. In Japan, it carries more than 1/3 of the traffic between the two largest metro areas of Tokyo and Osaka, holding its own against airlines and expressways.

Our govt. has treated Amtrak like the inmate of a slave labor camp: feeding it only enough to keep it alive, not enough to keep it healthy.

The anti-rail types bitch and moan about 1 billion dollar annual subsidies--for Amtrak service for the whole nation. Meanwhile, most states spend billions just for the highways within their own states.

If the Reagan admin had been smart (I know, fantasyland), they would have redirected a goodly percentage of the military budget to building both intercity rail and urban transit systems with the purpose of cutting down on the need for driving and flying. That would have been the environmentally responsible thing to do, and it would have freed us from slavery to the oil companies and OPEC--which is precisely why the Repiggies DIDN'T do it.