Posted on 07/12/2024 7:46:37 AM PDT by george76
Amtrak, the national passenger railroad company of the U.S., continues to have routine breakdowns despite receiving massive injections of taxpayer dollars from the Biden administration, according to data from the Department of Transportation (DOT).
Since 2021, there have been 333 Amtrak train incidents reported nationwide as of July 9, 2024, slightly less than the 397 incidents that occurred between 2016 and July 2020 during former President Trump’s tenure, according to the DOT. The Biden administration, as a part of an announced $66 billion for passenger rail in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Act, has dedicated huge amounts of taxpayer cash to Amtrak, including $4 billion being given to the rail company near the end of 2022, according to the White House.
Of the incidents under Biden, 66 of the 333 were derailments, 84 were obstructions, five were fires or “violent ruptures,” 115 involved rail crossings over roads and 54 were described as “other,” according to the data. In total, $4 million in equipment damage has been incurred since 2021
...
The most recent Amtrak disruption was on Saturday after a faulty circuit breaker caused a power outage that disrupted service on the busy New York and Boston lines, with officials blaming a lightning strike for the outage, according to CBS. The outage was announced in the afternoon and lasted until 9:50 p.m. when Amtrak completed its repairs and offered to waive other charges to customers changing reservations.
...
Since the creation of Amtrak in 1971, it has failed to turn a profit and is predicted to continue losing $1 billion a year for the foreseeable future.
The Biden administration has championed passenger rail as “more convenient and climate-friendly than either driving or flying,” according to the White House. The White House has pushed for 25 new passenger rail projects on the Northeast corridor to bring Biden “closer to his vision for world-class passenger rail.”
“Bidenomics and President Biden’s Investing in America agenda are tackling long-standing infrastructure needs, supporting communities nationwide, and making it possible to get people and goods where they need to be safely, quickly, and conveniently,” the White House said in November 2023. “The President’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law makes the largest investment in passenger rail since the creation of Amtrak, with a $66 billion total investment in rail.”
The Biden administration also announced in December that it was granting $3.07 billion to the California High-Speed Rail Authority despite the project failing to make meaningful progress since funding was first approved by California voters in 2008.
333 Amtrak train incidents and only $4 million in equipment damage?
Talk about numbers that DO NOT add up! One derailment alone would probably cost that to repair.
Philosophical Question: If trains “derail,” then why don’t automobiles “deroad”?
Where was the cash injected..?
DEi hires can’t run a railroad, but they still suck up the funding.
Here’s a prime example of something the Trump administration needs to defund, privatize and get rid of. When Nixon took it over, it was supposed to be temporary. That was over 50 years ago.
Like PBS, the National Endowments for the Arts and the Humanities, the Dept of Education, the FBI, NPR, and several other federal agencies, it needs to be defunded and gotten rid of.
Well, if it stopped breaking down, the infusions of cash would stop, wouldn’t they? Duh.
If you go through the FRA reports on railroad incidents in the U.S., you’d be surprised how many derailments occur in the U.S. in any given year. You never hear about most of them because they’re minor events that occur at low speeds in rail yards or on sidings.
They do.
It's called "ditch suction".
Usually not as dramatic as derailing though.
Your new word should be in the dictionary, it fits.
No President can eliminate these things. Every AMTRAK station in a crapstain town with three elderly railroad geeks has a Congressman pushing to ensure the station stays there and the rail service never stops.
meh... Everything breaks down.
The cost of living skyrockets, due to Regulations+paybacks to political Donors, via Taxpayers' funding various handouts, and the continuous hiring of over-paid, meaningless jobs, and DEI hires by government AT ALL LEVELS (also known as government Union "Labor").
DEI maintenance crews.
>>>meh... Everything breaks down.
Yup, but some more than others.
I don’t trust AMTRAK for spit. They allowed an activist faggot engineer to obliviously enter a sharp turn at over 100 mph several years ago, resulting in a horrific crash killing dozens and injuring hundreds. He escaped without ANY consequences.
>If you go through the FRA reports on railroad incidents in the U.S., you’d be surprised how many derailments occur in the U.S. in any given year. You never hear about most of them because they’re minor events that occur at low speeds in rail yards or on sidings.
IIRC, there are around a dozen derailments per week. Most are minor.
My question is: Where’s “Pistol” Pete Buttigieg at on this. I mean after all he (sic) is the U.S. Secretary of Transportation. Seems like quite a lot of these things have been happening since he took command, trains derailing, doors and wheels falling off airplanes, 30 tons of ammonium nitrate disappearing while enroute from WY to CA, etc.
No one wants to ride the rails when, in most cases, driving is quicker and cheaper. Not to mention the increased local taxes.
I swore afterwards that I would never ride Amtrak again, and I never have.
10% for the Big Guys.
AMTRAK - make-work project for lazy minorities.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.