Rail

Now that the surface transportation bill fight is over -- at least for the moment -- transportation reformers are eying the expiration date of another key piece of legislation later this year. The reauthorization of the Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act of 2008 (PRIIA) could be a chance to make some needed changes to jump-start progress in the passenger rail system. Or it could be the next partisan battleground, making it a process as unnavigable as the lead-up to the passage of MAP-21.

In a sense, there’s not much to say about the joint appearance at the AASHTO conference yesterday of House Transportation Committee Chair Bill Shuster and Senate EPW Chair Barbara Boxer. They thanked AASHTO for all its help getting MAP-21 passed. They addressed the big question of how to raise revenues without actually making any proposals. They agreed that infrastructure should be a non-partisan issue. None of these are breaking news.

Yesterday afternoon, Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), chair of the Senate Commerce Committee, announced that Frank Lautenberg would return as chair of the committee's Surface Transportation, & Merchant Marine Infrastructure, Safety, & Security Subcommittee.

Rep. John Mica (R-FL) no longer chairs the House Transportation Committee, but that doesn’t mean he’s eased up on his crusade against Amtrak. Calling the company a “Soviet style monopoly,” Mica used his afternoon address to the U.S. High Speed Rail Association to announce his plan to revive his despised and defeated measure to privatize parts of Amtrak.

The most significant part of the fiscal cliff deal for transportation was the bump that some transit riders got in the form of a commuter tax break that's now on par with what drivers get. There are two more minor elements in the bill for transportation -- both of them random enough to fit into the Washington Post's list of "weird" provisions in the deal -- but Congress punted on the bigger questions for another two months.

In 2006, 14-year old Kristen Bowen was killed on the train tracks near her house in the Chicago suburb of Villa Park. She was using a well-worn shortcut across the tracks that cut her residential neighborhood off from the school and the park they used. Four years after Kristen's death, her twin sister committed suicide by stepping in front of a train near where Kristen was struck. Those tracks are covered with balloon memorials and crosses, commemorating those who have died.

For the past two years, Amtrak has been under constant attack from House Transportation Committee Chair John Mica (R-FL), who has used his gavel to bully the rail company. He likes to call it a “Soviet-style” monopoly and he goads it for losing money on everything from long-distance routes to food service. His vitriolic diatribes against Amtrak have become white noise, and they’re about to fade into the background as Mica surrenders his post to Rep. Bill Shuster next year.

This is the first of two posts examining Rep. Bill Shuster's candidacy for the chairmanship of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure. We'll post the second one, focused on his positions on bike/ped programs and funding issues, tomorrow.