WE PERIODICALLY FIND IT USEFUL TO REMIND OURSELVES
that the world of logistics includes—or should—people movement
as well as product movement. The two, while independent, share
some interests and concerns, and might benefit from a little conceptual cross-pollination. We do not always assume the superiority
of European practices, but in this case, their professional logistics
perspectives include both goods and persons.
In the U.S., the worlds came together in the heyday of railroads,
and rail solutions to people-movement challenges still pop up from
time to time. Don’t get us wrong. We are freaky for trains and seek
out passenger rail alternatives all over Europe, in touristic excursions elsewhere, and whenever caught in the Boston-Washington
corridor.
But realistically, passenger rail in the U.S. is a
historical curiosity that, over time, has gone
from breakthrough technology to a money pit of
epic proportions. In the day, railroads made
horses and wagon trains obsolete and opened up
the West to expansion, with both goods and people moving vast distances relatively quickly and
at reasonable cost.
On the people side of the equation, the automobile changed all that, with bus lines handling
quantity movement in the days before virtually
everyone had access to autos. Over time, over-the-road truck transport eroded rail’s dominant
position in freight movement. And the railroads’ refusal to accept the
inevitable led to the deterioration of freight movement and the collapse of passenger service, following a long period of bleeding cash.
Today, bus lines are a near afterthought, and the limited remaining passenger rail service requires billions of dollars in subsidies. But
rail freight is making a comeback, thanks to factors of cost and environmental impact, and the rail infrastructure is being rebuilt and
expanded. (Limited small bus service is, in fact, serving largely business markets in localized intercity movement, by the way.)
REALLY, ONLY THE SECOND VERSE?
No, not really. There are railroad buffs, environmental activists,
Europhiles, and those-who-know-better-than-the-rest-of-us who are
promoting one rail solution after another all over the country. We got
our tighty-whities in a bunch a year or so ago when a very serious
proposal was mounted for a passenger rail system to link Cincinnati,
Columbus, and Cleveland, Ohio, with fervent support from the usual
BY ART VAN BODEGRAVEN AND
KENNETH B. ACKERMAN basictraining
Same song, second verse
suspects, fueled by false hopes and the promise of
“free” money from the federal government.
Granted, the headline was seductively attractive.
Only later did we learn that 1) travel time would be
longer than by highway; 2) the trains would use
existing freight rail track infrastructure, with
freight trains having the right of way; 3) schedules
and elapsed times would not allow day trips
(morning departure, evening return); 4) the states
and municipalities would need to come up with
hundreds of millions of dollars to fund design and
construction; 5) ongoing maintenance was
unfunded and would fall to the
state; 7) speeds would be 25 or
30 percent of the much-hyped
“high speed” rate; and 6) travel
would cost more than either
flying or driving. What a deal!
How could we possibly have
said no?
WHAT NOW?
You would think that we would
have learned by now that putting tail fins on a Yugo would
not make it a better automobile, any more than added décolletage makes Miss
Piggy a hotter commodity on eHarmony.com. And
so it is with passenger rail.
The latest flim-flam job is bigger, badder, bolder, and even more wrong-headed than the last
one. Apparently traveling in disguise, it originates
in Fort Wayne, Ind., as a proposal to link Chicago
and Columbus. It would feature intermediate
stops in Ohio (Marysville, Kenton, and Lima) and
Indiana (Fort Wayne, Warsaw, Plymouth,
Valparaiso, and Gary).
As with the earlier scheme, the project is being
proposed as a high-speed line, reaching speeds of
over 100 miles per hour. Funding has not been
secured, or even seriously pursued, with rosy hopes
that some combination of federal, state/local, railroad, and private money would provide the expect-
