Cascades Plotting

by Aaron Hockley on October 18, 2006

Lots of folks like to “armchair quarterback” and dream of improved rail service.  Looks like Adron Hall has done a bit of math and come up with an interesting proposal for using DMUs to improve service along and around the Cascades Corridor between Eugene, OR and Vancouver, BC.

Go check out his blog entry where he offers a “first draft” of a plan for increased service, including some initial numbers.

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  • Re: David Parson
    The guys at Virgin rails (and other services in England) (Which carry 2x the passengers our Amtrak workers do) are a prime example of better, safer, and questionably "profitable" rail service that runs at or better than 120 mph in a lot of areas.

    The unions are working (just like the ticket collection still) off of a decrepit 100+ year old mentality like we actually NEED rail service. The sad part is that Amtrak is unneeded, if it dissappeared tomorrow there would be zero economic impact, but if the Unions would work with Amtrak to assure that Amtrak was successful and profitable things would be DRASTICALLY different. Amtrak would be an economic impact, but instead they continue to make and provide the service as a mediocrity and completely irrelevent to America as a whole.

    ...I'm pro working wages but when they're garnered by force through mob rule then how can one honestly say that the market supports them or that something is even sustainable. If the market relevency of a service dictates lower wages, then the Governmnet mandates and forces the operation to continue against the wishes of many, something is corrupt, and those wages are horribly askew and highly undeserved.

    ...and btw.

    My initial numbers are relative that the work force doesn't particularly increase, but doesn't decrease either. Wages stay at or better than they are. The primary motive of my numbers is better service provided via better technologies more intelligently and with better infrastructure. In the end it would most likely dictate MORE employees, but definately NOT more employees running trains like they currently are - horribly inefficiently.

    btw - Amtrak agrees with me, so does A. Kummant. I had the fortune of speaking to him recently :)
  • I'd wonder why it's even pitched to the government in the first place, aside from possibly being able to better union-bust a government-run operation. And given the prominence of union-busting, I'm guessing that this is a plan that breaks even by squeezing it out of the employees. I don't think that's a particularly sustainable (or safe) way of operating, but it might be useful at convincing railroad workers that the whole arrangement of government mediated strikes is untenable and that they should go back to the traditional industry-crippling general strike when they want to preserve a working wage.
  • Thanks for the trackback!
  • To bad it's only me being an armchair quarterback. :(
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