Iraqing Amtrak? Bush appointees making big changes to Amtrak

Acela in the Union Station railyard, Washington, DC.

The New York Times reports, in "Amtrak Breakup Advances," that:

The Amtrak board has approved an essential step in the Bush administration plan to break up the railroad, voting to carve out the Northeast Corridor, the tracks between Boston andWashington, as a separate division. The board, made up entirely of Mr. Bush's appointees, voted in a meeting on Sept. 22 to create a new subsidiary to own and manage the corridor, which includes nearly all the track that Amtrak owns.

The vote was not announced. It was reported on Wednesday in the newsletter of the United Rail Passenger Alliance of Jacksonville, Fla.,a n organization that has been highly critical of Amtrak management. The plan, which would require action by Congress, is to transfer the corridor to a consortium including the federal government and the governments of the states in the region that would share the costs to maintain it.

That would relieve Amtrak from spending billions of dollars to build and rebuild bridges, rails and electrical systems, but still let the company run its trains.The plan would also remove Amtrak from control of that sector, a condition that the railroad's senior executives say would doom high-speed long-distance service. Managers say they have to be able to give their trains priority over local traffic if they have any hope of keeping their schedules.
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This does not bode well. And, in Washington, DC the high-speed services are important, not just the commuter railroads. Plus, as I repeat over and over, Amtrak is an economic development issue for DC. It has high-paying "blue collar" jobs in railroad equipment maintenance as well as white collar jobs.

Given the recent debacle in Maryland over the management of the Port of Baltimore, I fear frequent changes in state political administrations and the potential negative impact on the professional management of rail services. (E.g., remember the MTA pr department on the MARC Train Crash...)