Have you ever ridden on Amtrak?
I have.
50 empty seats for every person on board.
Beats the hell out of squeezing next to some big fat guy with BO on the airlines.
Posted on 06/25/2010 3:33:50 AM PDT by Willie Green
Duke University analysis of U.S. rail manufacturing shows that Pennsylvania has 26 rail manufacturing facilities, from Pittsburgh to Philadelphia
The U.S. rail manufacturing industry stands to undergo considerable growth in the coming years, as Amtrak upgrades its railcars and adds high-speed trains, and as lawmakers consider a transportation bill that calls for significantly greater investments in public transit, including rail, according to a new study by Duke University prepared for the Apollo Alliance. Pennsylvania, which is home to 26 rail-manufacturing facilities and is planning its own high-speed rail network, would reap major benefits from such a bill.
"Our research found that there is a healthy chain of U.S.-based suppliers that manufacture components and systems for rail cars, and many of them are located in Pennsylvania," said Marcy Lowe, a senior research analyst at the Duke University Center on Globalization, Governance & Competitiveness (CGGC) and the report's lead author.
The report, U.S. Manufacture of Rail Vehicles for Intercity Passenger Rail and Urban Transit: A Value Chain Analysis, looks at the manufacture of U.S. rail vehicles in six categories: intercity passenger, high speed, regional, metro, light rail and streetcars. It finds that the U.S. rail supply chain includes at least 247 manufacturing locations in 35 states. The states with the most manufacturing facilities are New York (32 rail manufacturing facilities), Pennsylvania (26), Illinois (23), California (22) and Ohio (13). Although the U.S. rail manufacturing industry is small -- the report's authors estimate its employment at between 10,000 and 14,000 employees -- industry analysts expect it to grow due to pent-up demand for intercity and urban rail service.
"Pennsylvania has a real chance to be at the center of America's 21st century rail manufacturing industry," said Phil Angelides, chairman of the Apollo Alliance. "Our nation needs a new transportation policy that invests in expanded public transit and more energy-efficient transportation, including rail. Done right, these investments could mean a windfall of manufacturing jobs for Pennsylvanians."
Another study released today, by Transportation for America and the Economic Policy Institute, finds that a $500B transportation bill that invests heavily in public transit will create 7.2 million jobs across the economy, including 761,321 manufacturing jobs, of which 168,024 jobs would be located in the rail manufacturing sector. For more information, visit www.t4america.org.
The Duke University rail study found that manufacturers with facilities in Pennsylvania are Bombardier Transportation (Pittsburgh); Brookville Equipment (Brookville); Hyundai Rotem (Philadelphia); Kasgro Rail (New Castle); GE Transportation (Erie and Grove City); Amsted Industries (Camp Hill); Ansaldo STS USA (Pittsburgh); Bentech (Philadelphia); CAM Innovation Inc (Hanover); Converteam Inc (Pittsburgh); Mitsubishi Electric (Pittsburgh); North American Specialty Glass (Trumbauersville); ORX Railway (Tipton); Penn Machine Company (Blairsville); PHW (East Pittsburgh); Standard Steel (Pittsburgh and Burnham); USSC Group (Exton); UTC Rail Inc (Morton); Westcode Inc (Wilmerding and Greensburg); WEXCO Industries (Philadelphia); Young Windows (Conshohocken); and ZF Sachs Automotive of America (Pittsburgh). They produce a variety of equipment, including driving control systems, door systems, engines and windows.
A similar study on transit bus manufacturing released by Duke researchers in October 2009 identified eight transit bus-manufacturing facilities in Pennsylvania. These companies also would benefit from increased public transit investments in a new transportation bill.
The report's authors conclude that to grow the U.S. rail manufacturing industry will require committing much larger and more consistent U.S. investments to intercity passenger and urban transit rail. The report also recommends that Buy America provisions be improved through additional accountability mechanisms and the closing of loopholes. Finally, it recommends that policymakers and manufacturers implement measures to capture higher-value activities in the supply chain, such as design and engineering, for the U.S. market. Currently those activities are mostly performed abroad.
Have you ever ridden on Amtrak?
I have.
50 empty seats for every person on board.
Beats the hell out of squeezing next to some big fat guy with BO on the airlines.
Yes, I knew that; in fact, I had originally had some sentences along the lines of
"Pennsylvania was once one of our great manufacturing states, and now this all that we can find? Several of those smaller companies even only do parts that might be used by rail companies."
"Pennsylvania was once one of our great manufacturing states, and now this all that we can find? Several of those smaller companies even only do parts that might be used by rail companies."
Well then perhaps it would be helpful to rescan the list.
Bombardier, General Electric, Mitsubishi and a few others are hardly "smaller" companies.
And some of the others may have simply changed ownership to a different group of investors and currently have less recognizable brand names outside of the industry.
Anything the apollo alliance approves of can immediately be written off as a means of stuffing the pockets of Obama and his crimminal cabal.
Anything the apollo alliance approves of can immediately be written off as a means of stuffing the pockets of Obama and his crimminal cabal.
My bus is private and gets almost no government subsidies. The 10% or so of operating costs that the state gives is not nearly enough to make up for taxes (diesel, business taxes, etc).
???
So why do you feel that your private bus is entitled to more subsidies to "make up" for taxes?
That doesn't make sense.
I had said in the original posting that the American companies were the smaller ones --- look at the last sentence of my posting #7: And I believe that most of the American companies listed are small ones.
The taxes my bus pays (esp diesel) are funneled into useless government boondoggles like your choo choo trains.
WILLIE ONE NOTE
This is 22 companies. Where are the other four?
I know Amtrak is a favorite target around here. I agree that Amtrak should not be subsidized but the true scandal here is that the government has made rail travel the mess it is. There is a place for an “Amtrak” with some level of government subsidy. Keep in mind that trucking companies get a huge subsidy in that they don’t own and maintain the roads. Airlines get a huge subsidy because they don’t own and pay for airports and the air traffic control system. A chunk of the Amtrak subsidy goes for maintaining the tracks. In addition, Congress really meddles in where Amtrak stops, how many stops it has and, of course, pressures Amtrak to give in to union demands. Rail unions are the most powerful unions in the country—no question. More powerful than teachers’ unions and government employee unions. If Amtrak were allowed to operate in a relatively free market (free of government direction) and got a reasonable subsidy for track building and maintenance, passenger rail travel would work.
Rail in Pennsylvania is a great example to use!
First, they have subsidized rail lines that nobody wants to use and have no consistent demand.
Second, the Lackawanna Cutoff, a route that could be restored cheaply to connect the Poconos to NYC for daily commuters, received no funding. They only need about $40 million to restore old rail lines to serve several hundred thousand commuters and the Feds instead allocated $8 billion to new, high-speed lines with no promise of ridership.
Train junkies are the worst!
I agree with you, Willie. I consider mass transit to fall under the government’s defense responsibility, in the same vein as what was done with the Interstate Highway system.
AMTRAC runs daily between Portland, Oregon, and Seattle, Washington. It, too, is mostly empty. The automobiles on Interstate 5, running nearly parallel with AMTRAC, move faster. Three people in an automobile can travel more cheaply than those same three people could riding AMTRAC.
Well the facts are that Amtrak carried 1,196,483 passengers in Washington State in 2008, and 813,753 in Oregon the same year.
So obviously those trains aren't as empty as you say.
If it’s such a great idea, why does Pennsylvania need Federal money?
I don’t give a sh*t about your facts; my own eyes tell me your ‘facts’ aren’t the whole story.
And I wasn’t the only one to point that out.
Mass transit projects cannot pay for themselves and are a net drain on tax revenues.
?
Airlines pay landing fees, terminal fees, fuel taxes( to maintain the clouds, I suppose ). All fees collected by the Airlines, from the passangers, exceed contruction and operating costs for airports. Which is supprising in that say Logan, is a 100% union hack heaven. Ditto trucks that pay, and collect from customers, huge amounts of taxes. Trucks and cars, via federal fuel taxes pay more than construction and maintance costs. Airlines, cars and trucks are cash cows. Airports, air traffic should all be privitized. And fuel charges should be removed from aircraft fuel. Look at the communication innovation, price drop with privitized telecommunication. We could have the same rate of innovation, price drop if we totally privitized rail, air and highways.
"...Well the facts are that Amtrak carried 1,196,483 passengers in Washington State in 2008"
3,200 a day. Whooo hoo! A small town school bus company does that. Would we care if such a small company went out of buisness? No. Then why would we care about an equally small, low quality, tax eating, union paying loser rail road company?
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