From: johnl@iecc.com

>Without revenue from freight operations, the NE corridor is not econmically
>viable.

Amtrak's NECIP summary says that on a typical day the NEC sees 2300
passenger trains and 50 freight trains, mostly at night to avoid
conflicts with passenger traffic.  That's under 2.5% of the trains.
There is no freight through NY or Baltimore due to the tunnels.

A table on cost sharing says that of the $431 million of shared
infrastructure costs, $20M is attributable to freight, $258M to
Amtrak, and $153M to commuter rail.  Cross-subsidization is
specifically prohibited, so freight pays its 4.6% share of costs.
Freight trains are much longer and heavier than passenger trains, so
it makes sense that the fraction of costs would be higher than the
relative number of trains.

The NECIP plan says freight will continue to be important, but because
shippers need the capacity and there's no room on the parallel
highways, not because Amtrak needs the money.

--
Regards,
John Levine, johnl@iecc.com, Primary Perpetrator of "The Internet for Dummies",
Please consider the environment before reading this e-mail. http://jl.ly

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