Posted on 05/21/2015 11:15:54 AM PDT by Oldeconomybuyer
Senate Democrats on Thursday demanded that Republicans provide more money for Amtrak so the railroad can tackle a $21 billion maintenance and repair backlog, including replacing tunnels more than a century old.
Democrats at a news conference cited last week's deadly crash in Philadelphia and said the backlog is compromising safety and service.
Democrats want to Congress to give Amtrak the entire $2 billion in subsidies the railroad requested for the budget year that starts Oct. 1. They say GOP lawmakers have starved the railroad financially for years.
A Republican-controlled House panel approved a spending bill the day after the crash that provide Amtrak's with $1.1 billion, a cut of $251 million from this year.
The budget that President Barack Obama submitted to Congress in February proposed allotting Amtrak $2.5 billion next year, with most of the increase dedicated to capital investment in tracks, tunnels and bridge.
(Excerpt) Read more at abcnews.go.com ...
How about not letting raging homos drive these trains 106 mph?
I demand congress sell off Amtrak.
IF they get the money they’ll claim the reason being the Republicans caved because the Republicans felt guilty for not funding Amtrak, and causing the crash killing all of those poor people.
Why no wait for the conclusion to the investigation? Seems that would be the smart thing to do before throwing away more tax dollars on the word of lying Democrats.
Yup...Republicans were in control when the train went into a curve at 106 mph.
YIPEEEEEEEEE PEOPLE DIED!!!! Break out the old funding, funding, funding mantra and let’s hit the cameras fellas and get more moola. Nothing like some corpses to advance the agenda!! Happy days are here again, dead people are here and there again, blame the lack of funding, happy days are here again.
What a sick arse set of bass turds!
Shut it down it can’t pay its own way.
More than likely, Amtrak is mismanaged, and most of their budget goes into the pockets of cronies.
You name it. They'll steal it.
Democrats: Never let a tragedy go to waste.
What did they do with the billions we already gave them?
Just feeding more money by the insane democrats to the problem will not solve anything. Spending what they already have might be a real answer. Just throwing money to a problem is the most stupid thing they can do. Liberal Democrats, the insanity of America.
Demand it from the 47% that isn’t paying taxes. I already paid mine.
How about asking the railroad companies that actually own the tracks to fix the infrastructure.
I thought CSX owned those tracks
The NEC was assembled by the Pennsylvania Railroad and New Haven Railroad. In 1970, the Penn Central bankruptcy put the NEC into the hands of the Consolidated Rail Corporation (Conrail), a US government entity. In 1976, Conrail, having no interest in the passenger business, handed it over to Amtrak, another government entity. (The stretch between New York and New Haven was handed to the Metro-North division of New York's Metropolitan Transit Authority (NYMTA).) Conrail held trackage rights over the NEC for freight business after hours.
In 1986, the government sold Conrail to Wall St. In 1999, CXS and Norfolk Southern split Conrail between them, and both railroads inherited trackage rights on the NEC after hours. But Amtrak has been the owner since 1976.
Not too long ago the Dem’s had Ø as Prez, and controlled both houses. Where were the demands then?
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