Amtrak

Amtrak is the name of a American Railway company public, specialized in the passenger transport. Created on May 1st 1971, Amtrak has the statute of a business enterprise, but is entirely controlled by the government of the the United States. The name of Amtrak was created by the contraction of the words AMerica , TRAvel (the voyage) and tracK (the railway). The company name of the state enterprise which manages Amtrak is National Railroad Passenger Corporation (National company of the rail-bound transports travellers).

In the initial design, Amtrak did not have any railway and was thus not an integrated railroad company. She rather answered the definition of the railway company adopted by the European commission, with the difference close Amtrak does not have any competitor on the rails. The company was created in 1971 by the will of the government to maintain passenger services on rail, whereas the private companies of railroads preferred to be centered on the activity, more advantageous, of the transport of the goods, in spite of the legal requirements which forced to them to offer services travellers as public conveyers. It was expected that the trains of Amtrak would continue to borrow the existing networks. This diagram prevails still today in the majority of the cases, the trains of Amtrak dividing the lines and the schedules with the trains of freight, with the disadvantage which the network is often badly adapted to the movement of travellers (comfort, speed…).

Corridor of the North-East

The Corridor of the North-East is one of the most important zones of the Amtrak network. It is a whole of electrified lines connecting Washington to Boston via New York. This corridor is largely composed of lines belonging to Amtrak, lines acquired in 1976 at the time of the liquidation of the company Central PEN Transportation. Amtrak has, in this corridor and other zones, on the whole 730 miles of lines (including 17 tunnels for 29,7 miles and 1.186 bridges, including celebrates it Hell Gate Bridge) for 42,5 miles. But while in the majority of the zones of the United States, Amtrak must negotiate the time slots with the companies of freight owners of the networks, in the corridor of the North-East, coordination is done with the agencies of public transport which play the part of organizing authorities on the level of the States or the agglomerations.

Some figures

Amtrak employs more than 19.000 paid. The served network extends to the national scales on 22.000 miles and serves 500 agglomerations in 46 States, plus some agglomerations of the Canada along the American border. The only States not served by the trains of Amtrak are the Alaska, Hawaii, the South Dakota and the Wyoming.

Amtrak transported nearly 23,4 million travellers in 2002 (against approximately 23,5 million in 2001).

Services of suburbs

Amtrak ensures various services of suburbs, of coordination with the regional authorities in California, in the Maryland, the Connecticut and in Virginia.

This traffic annually represents approximately 61 million travellers.

Federal financing

From its creation in 1970 and to 2001, AMTRAK received nearly 24 Billion $ the Federal state, without the financial position of the company for being stabilized as much. In 2000, AMTRAK still received thus 571 million $ of the Federal state and recorded an operating deficit of 5 million $. The total losses are estimated at 943 Million $, that is to say 100 Million $ of more than what AMTRAK had provided in is “plane budgetary strategic”.

The insolvency of AMTRAK is a subject of recurring debate to the Congress, which, in 1997, has emitted a law granting an additional time of five to AMTRAK to arrive at financial balance, or else any federal financing will be suspended as from 2002.

On its side, AMTRAK proposed a capital spending program to develop the passage with the high speed of 11 lines, requiring a help of the Federal state of 1,5 Billion $ per annum during 20 years.

Thirty four States also take part in the development of these projects and already invested 1 Md$. A passage to very high speed would require means much more important for these 11 lines, about 150 Billion $.

Served lines

Nearest opening

The Saluki and the Lincoln Service will carry out the connection of Chicago towards Carbondale and Saint-Louis. The service should begin the October 30th 2006.

Projects

Several express trains are also being studied:

Montreal - Boston

Vancouver - Seattle

Las Vegas - Los Angeles

See too

List of the stations of Amtrak
List of the railway companies
List of the American railroads
Acela

External bond

Amtrak, official site (in English)
Justin Bur and Luc Side, INFORMATION 2000 13: April 1st, th and th 2002 (http://jbb.poslfit.com/Pages/transportation/2002-04_mtl-boston.html)
http://dsp-psd.communication.gc.ca/Pilot/LoPBdP/BP/bp390-f.htm#2.%20Liaison%20ferroviaire%20rapide%20entre%20Vancouver%20et%20Seattle(txt)

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