The New York Times reports that “Amtrak Dominates Northeast Corridor Travel.” That’s absolutely true–as long as you don’t count buses. Or cars. Or intermediate points between Boston, New York, and Washington.
The Times says that Amtrak has a 75 percent share of the “air/rail” market between Washington and New York, but it only has a 54 percent share of the “air/rail” market between New York and Boston. It doesn’t say anything about intermediate points.
In a more realistic assessment, page 4 of Amtrak’s 2010 Vision for the Northeast Corridor reports that Amtrak carries 6 percent of travel in the Northeast Corridor, while planes carry 5 percent and the remaining 89 percent goes by highway. Amtrak doesn’t break out bus travel, but I estimate buses carry significantly more passengers than Amtrak, or approximately 8 to 9 percent of the corridor market.
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The Times admits that “buses are eating into Amtrak’s market share” and blames it on “an aging infrastructure and Congressional opposition” to more subsidies to Amtrak. Well, boo hoo! Amtrak gets subsidies of nearly 30 cents per passenger mile, while subsidies to buses are so small as to be practically undetectable. Bus fares are also “far less than Amtrak,” admits the Times. I guess so: I estimate the average Bolt or Megabus rider pays under $15 to go between Washington and New York, while fares on Amtrak’s trains range from $49 (for the “Regional” trains that make more stops) to $145 (for the Acela, which is 20 minutes faster than the Regional trains).
The Times makes the usual point that Amtrak is time-competitive with airlines when travel times to and from downtowns are included. But even in New York, most people don’t work downtown. Subsidies to Amtrak are subsidies to the high-paid bankers, lawyers, and lobbyists who work in downtown DC and Manhattan.
The Antiplanner wrote:
That’s absolutely true–as long as you don’t count buses. Or cars.
I agree.
To make such claims about modal share without looking at automobile traffic does not make much sense.
Of course, in an automobile, it is much easier to drive from someplace (as in anyplace) in the Baltimore/Washington CMSA to someplace (again, as in anyplace) in the Tri-State area, from Pike County, Penna. in the west; to Orange and Dutchess Counties, N.Y. in the Hudson River Valley; to Southwest Connecticut; across the Long Island Sound to Nassau and Suffolk Counties; to Monmouth and Mercer Counties in New Jersey.
Most of the places in the New York City metropolitan areas are not well-served by Amtrak.
Of course they aren’t. They are well served by connections to NJT, LIRR, and MNR.
My best man and I rode Amtrak cross country to get to my wedding and we found the Northeast Regional to be one of the least enjoyable parts.
To Amtrak’s credit they did hold the train for our four hour late Cardinal but all the connecting passengers were told the quiet car was the only one with empty seats. For the rest of the trip we had to endure downright rude passengers flipping out over the slightest noise. One lady started scolding people like they were children. I found the seats to be extremely uncomfortable and the WiFi service was a joke. Our locomotive died halfway through the trip and we were left without air conditioning for half an hour with no explanation from the crew.
Real stats from the DOT show this is nothing more than rail foamer nonsense.
Has air travel dipped in the corridor? Yes. But it’s due to 9/11 and the economy. It tanked post 9/11 then began to recover until the economy tanked:
Year: Passengers:
2000 14,938,244
2001 10,791,454
2002 10,002,468
2003 10,410,516
2004 11,542,234
2005 11,694,528
2006 12,577,946
2007 11,484,616
2008 9,271,422
2009 8,734,728
2010 9,208,896
2011 9,917,368
Average gross air fares are ridiculously high (including taxes)?
DOT says otherwise:
Year: Avg Gross Fare:
(One Way)
2000 $146.00
2001 $149.00
2002 $141.00
2003 $134.00
2004 $129.00
2005 $136.00
2006 $137.00
2007 $152.00
2008 $170.00
2009 $142.00
2010 $148.00
2011 $145.00
Accounting for inflation since 2000 fares are down 25%:
Year: Constant Dollars:
(CY 2000)
2000 $149.00
2001 $146.65
2002 $135.53
2003 $126.40
2004 $117.79
2005 $120.10
2006 $118.03
2007 $127.39
2008 $137.26
2009 $115.11
2010 $118.09
2011 $111.00
Those are the facts. Moving on.
Most of the air travel shown (66%) is IAD/DCA/BWI/PHL to PVD/BOS/MHT where Amtrak is not particularly time competitive. It also includes connecting flights at the hubs in DCA, PHL, and EWR, which is obviously not comparable. The NYC-Providence/Boston air market is still 2.5 million per year and is the last big nugget of intermediate travel to be cracked by the train. NYC-DC is down to less than 1 million trips.
@Andrew: It also includes connecting flights at the hubs in DCA, PHL, and EWR, which is obviously not comparable.
False.
Moving on.
More proof you don’t understand a shred of information about the airline data. The data I provided is specific NEC city pair data for the airlines between individual market pairs. This is the total for connecting pax:
Year: Pax:
2000 19,700,404
2001 15,726,892
2002 15,641,680
2003 16,956,612
2004 18,915,580
2005 19,499,060
2006 20,592,044
2007 20,203,436
2008 18,347,760
2009 18,608,612
2010 20,359,156
2011 21,202,452
Please provide a link to your data source, and note which airports you are counting. Your numbers don’t look anythng like what is on the BTS.
Maybe you need a dataminer to properly read the information.
@Andrew: US DOT O&D survey, T-100 and point of sale data.
Again, what O&D pairs are you using to define the NEC?
Which airports are on the NEC?
More specifically, which ones are you not counting because you think they don’t matter or are non-competitive? You either compare all the airports in markets served by both the NEC and airlines or you’re comparing apples to oranges.
PlanesnotTrains:
Has air travel dipped in the corridor? Yes. But it’s due to 9/11 and the economy. It tanked post 9/11 then began to recover until the economy tanked
Excuses, excuses.
Rail travel didn’t tank in response to either one of those things.
1996 – 8,259,776
1998 – 8,911,718
2003 – 10,171,217
2004 – 10,572,644
2005 – 11,047,666
2006 – 11,118,235
2007 – 12,196,913
2008 – 12,772,933
2009 – 12,129,637
2010 – 12,858,078
2011 – 13,537,258
12 months to 5/2012 – 13,867,591
The tanking of air fares is another sign of distress in the industry in the NEC. A strong industry has pricing power and can raise prices in response to things like 1/3 of its costs going up (fuel prices).
I’m sure its frustrating to be on the losing side of history.
Excuses, excuses.
The data provides a direct correlation between a dip in traffic post 9/11 and dip in traffic that tracks with the economic downturn in late 2007.
Rail travel didn’t tank in response to either one of those things.
Proof of my point. As the economy dips, rail should see an increase due to its artificially lower grossly subsidized fares.
There are always two guarantees with rail foamers:
1. They can always be relied on to misinterpret aviation stats because they don’t understand them.
2. They never know when to shut up ,even when they don’t know what they are talking about.
The tanking of air fares is another sign of distress in the industry in the NEC.
Also false. Fares have declined year over year in real dollars every year since deregulation. It’s not an NEC phenomenon. Average one-way fare in the US in 2000 was $176 including taxes. Today it’s $196 including taxes. Adjusted for inflation the average one way fare in 2000 was $229.
Air fares declining since deregulation is part of the ongoing bankruptcy of the industry, which has not made a lick of money since 1979.
Oye. Another uninformed sweeping generalization of the industry.
Well, its true. The industry has lost buckets of money since 1979, almost every new entrant has gone out of business, and every old mainline carrier has gone bust, with many going to the great airport in the sky courtesy of the bankruptcy courts. This despite billions in subsidies, the free courtesy of endless military R&D and a chain of military trained pilots fed into the industry.
As a kid I used to fly TWA, Eastern, Piedmont, and Northwest Orient. Tell me how things have worked out for them.
All the airlines you mention still exist. They just have different names.
Also 60% of pilots come from civilian sources. Never mind the fact you could teach an imbecile to drive a train. Not much skill involved there.
Just so we’re on the same page… How many billions of direct taxpayer dollars are flushed down the rail toilet each year? What was it $8 billion last year between FRA costs (which were about the same as FAA costs to the General Fund by the way) and direct rail subsidies from the general fund because unlike the airline industry, rail doesn’t have a self funding mechanism like the AATF?
A bit more education for you.
The FAA budget last FY was $16.1 Billion.
The General Fund Contribution was $4.6 billion.
The Airlines and their passengers generated $11.5 billion through user fees and fuel taxes.
That $11.5 billion is 71.4% of the FAA budget, yet the airlines only consumed 58.8% of the FAA resources.
Let me know when passenger rail can support 71.4% of the FRA budget and consume only 58.8% of its resources. Otherwise, don’t even begin to try and yap about aviation subsidy.
The tanking of air fares is another sign of distress in the industry in the NEC.
The average one-way fare in the NYC/DC corridor specifically was $135 in 2000 and it was $184 year end 2011. The $135 in 2000 is worth $176 today. In other words, the air fares between NYC and DC have actually increased 4.5% in real dollars since 2000.
Any other myths I can debunk for you today?
The whole point of the Northeast Corridor is to act as a commuter railroad for the rich and politicaly connected opinion elite who live along it. It is corporate welfare for wealthy lawyers, financial sector workers, and bueraucrats who have a ready need to commute between New York and Boston, and New York and Philadelphia, Washington or Baltimore. It also gives the Thomas Friedman set something to point to and say how the whole rest of the country needs to look. That along with the classic myth that eliminating passenger trains would be a massive political disaster for anyone who allows such discontinuences to occur makes the corridor one of America’s sacred cows. It isn’t going anywhere, and anyone who says it and Amtrak are is a tool.
Speaking of the rich, I had to sit next to a rich guy at a very expensive waterfront restaurant and listen to him proclaim how Amtrak makes a profit on the Northeast Corridor. That and a lot of other steaming crap.