Page 24 - Flathead Beacon // 8.13.14

24 / AUGUST 13, 2014 / AMTRAK'S BROKEN BUILDER
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ing 31.6 million passengers.
While Amtrak was hauling more passengers, BNSF was start-
ing to haul even more freight, particularly intermodal, grain and crude oil from North Dakota. The traffic increases created a rail- road “logjam,” wrote National Association of Railroad Passen- gers president and CEO Ross Capon in a letter to U.S. Secretary of Transportation Anthony Foxx in January. In that same letter ask- ing Foxx to step in and find a solution, Capon accused BNSF of giv- ing crude oil a “priority over people.”
“I think the increase in (freight traffic) caught us all off guard,” said Green, NARP’s Montana passenger rail advocate and a loco- motive engineer for 37 years. “There’s just a lot of freight to move.”
The problems facing Amtrak were made even worse by a his- torically harsh winter in North Dakota and Montana that caused derailments and avalanches, which closed the rail line over Marias Pass. On the days the Empire Builder wasn’t replaced with a bus, it sometimes ran 11 or 12 hours late.
“All of those factors combined and created a perfect storm for the Empire Builder and it struggled,” said Jim Brzezinski, Amtrak route director for the train. “When you go from being the number one on-time performance train on the entire system to being dead last, it’s a shock.”
Yet NARP vice president Sean Jeans-Gail points to another reason why the Empire Builder and other Amtrak trains have been running late.
In 2008, the Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act gave Amtrak the ability to penalize railroads if passenger trains were consistently late for two consecutive quarters because of freight-train congestion. The system appeared to be working and during the 2013 fiscal year, Amtrak trains were on schedule 85 per- cent of the time.
But in 2011, the Association of American Railroads sued the U.S. Department of Transportation, arguing that the new rule was
TIMELINE CONTINUED FROM PAGE 22
September 1977: Budget cuts force Amtrak to reduce Empire Builder service to four days a week.
October 28, 1978: The Empire Builder gets new Superliner passenger cars, the same cars it uses today.
1982: The Empire Builder begins daily service again.
1995: Budget cuts force Amtrak to reduce Empire Builder service to four days a week.
December 31, 1996: Burlington Northern Railroad merges with the Santa Fe to create the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad, now known as BNSF Railway.
1997: The Empire Builder begins daily service again.
April 15, 2014: To deal with additional freight traffic and delays, Amtrak adjusts the Empire Builder’s schedule through Northwest Montana.
INFORMATION FROM THE GREAT NORTHERN RAILWAY HISTORICAL SOCIETY AND AMTRAK
illegal, in part, because Am- trak helped write it. In 2013, the U.S. Court of Appeals over- turned the rule, saying that Amtrak is a private company and that it could not regu- late other private companies. Since then, Amtrak’s on-time, system-wide performance has dropped nearly 12 points.
In June, the Supreme Court announced it would review the ap- pellate court decision. The case is expected to be argued late this year or early next year. Amtrak spokesperson Marc Magliari said although Amtrak is not part of the lawsuit, it will be watching the case with interest.
In hopes of improving the on-time performance of the Empire Builder, Amtrak changed its schedule to allow the train more time
ABOVE: The Empire Builder passes Lake Five in Coram. JUSTIN FRANZ | FLATHEAD BEACON
BELOW: Passengers wait at
the whitefish station.
BEACON FILE PHOTO