[Publius]

I got word from Texas tonight that Dubya is planning on a major federal infrastructure program to be announced this spring as a way to get people back to work. (Shades of FDR!)

There will be a major rail component to this program because the Defense Dept. has declared 30,000 miles of track to be critical to the national defense. Word is that the future of Amtrak will be tied to this initiative, i.e. there will be massive amounts of federal pork for the Class I railroads to rebuild if they form a consortium to take Amtrak from the government and run it privately.

There are couple of names in the air for Mineta's replacement. Tommy Thompson is one. (He badly wanted the job two years ago.) Another is Gil Carmichael, chair of the Amtrak Reform Council and confidant of both Bushes.

Something big is brewing.

[NormsRevenge]

"Something big is brewing."

Maybe this infrastructure thing will help make it easier to move the center of Government to the mid-continent away from the coast. It would be a shame to let all those Amtrak rail properties go to auction for a pittance.

Re: govt relocation.. Isn't that why the new Denver airport was built?

[NewYorker]

I love taking the train to Boston and Washington from NY and avoiding the airports. It's a real mystery how this great business can be so badly run but it always has been.

[JoeSixPack1]

Something big is brewing.

Sounds like a giant pork roast.

[JoeSixPack1]

PS. 30,000 miles of track cross's the USA 10 times!! That's a lot of track!!!!!

[bvw]

I like that huge Boeing concept cargo plane that flies above the waves. Let's take back the merchant seas!