Why Amtrak Trains Are So Ramshackle

America’s rail service Amtrak has installed an automatic safety system to reduce accidents.

The technology is there, but money is lacking for the license for their wireless data transmission.

The number of passengers using the national rail system climbs each year, but the budget has not.

In the past year Amtrak lost more than a billion dollars.

Many Republicans believe the trains are a waste of money in automobile-land America.

Shortly after the accident the House of Representatives reduced the state’s contribution from $1.4 billion to $1.1 billion.

He almost made it. Only a few months left. After years of back and forth Joe Boardman, head of the national rail service Amtrak, wanted an automatic safety system to be installed in all of his trains. It could have prevented the accident on the regional train that derailed Tuesday on its way from Washington to New York. “We’re very close to being able to cut it in,” Mr. Boardman said. “We will complete this by the end of the year.”

The system called Positive Train Control combines hardware such as antennas, and software that is installed in the trains and on the tracks. It transmits information about the trains’ speed and, for example, foreign objects lying in the train’s path to the engineer on board and to the central control center and can, in turn, automatically enable the breaks. In 2008, Congress stipulated that it will need to be installed in every train by the end of 2015. The problem: The system costs money — and exactly that is what is chronically missing from the financially deficient national railroad. Meanwhile, the technology itself has actually been installed, but missing their wireless transmitting licenses.

Because the lawmakers were not able to agree on issuing a frequency, Amtrak had to negotiate with a private firm for the purchase, which has stretched over four years. With eight deaths, this accident has been the worst for Amtrak since 1999. What exactly happened is still unclear.

According to records from the speedometer, the train was moving at a speed of 106 miles per hour; however, only 50 mph is allowed at this location on the north side of Philadelphia. The engineer activated the emergency brakes, says one investigator from the transportation safety board NTSB, but that only reduced the speed by about four miles per hour. The engineer survived with a concussion and broken bones, which indicates that he will not be able to remember what happened. More than 200 people were injured in this accident.

Losses of Billions and Debt

Amtrak is a giant company, which is due above all to the amount of track. Forty six states, the District of Columbia in the capital city Washington, and three Canadian Provinces, it amounts to 21,000 miles of track between Canada and Mexico, between Pacific and Atlantic. In the 2014 business year, which ended in September, the company transported almost 31 million passengers, a record. Boardman is in charge of almost 400 locomotives and 1500 passenger cars. But he is also in charge of debt and losses on the order of billions. With a revenue of $3.3 billion a loss of $1.1 billion remains on the balance sheet, which the government has to make up for. The line between Washington and New York is one of the few that is financially viable for Amtrak.

The number of passengers on the national railway climbs every year, but the budget is not growing with it — and has failed to cover maintaining the existing tracks and the fleet in good condition more than once. Every larger investment, every technical innovation, is a problem. Despite the setbacks, travel by train has become safer over the years. Between 2000 and 2014 the number of accidents per million passengers has fallen from 4.1 to 1.7. Collisions with cars are not contained within the statistics of the train authority, the Federal Railroad Administration, because they are mostly not due to the fault of Amtrak.

Average Age of the Trains: 30 Years

Most reduced is the number of accidents that can be sourced to track or human error. Amtrak has invested in tracks and education. In contrast, accidents due to technical problems with the trains have hardly been reduced, which indicates their ramshackle condition. The fleet is about 30 years old on average.

Many Republicans believe the trains are a waste in automobile-land America – and for them a state-run rail system stinks of socialism. On Thursday, shortly after the fatal incident in Philadelphia, the House of Representatives took up the Amtrak budget and reduced the state contribution amount from 1.4 to 1.1 billion dollars with votes from Republicans. The Federal Railroad Administration has already tried twice to obtain a special subsidy for the automatic safety system, but is so far unsuccessful. The technology costs $52,000 per track-mile. Amtrak and the other rail companies in the country that likewise have to install the system arrive at a total cost of $9 billion, of which they would have already spent $5.2 billion by this point. Amtrak, according to statements by the transport authorities, is further along with the installation than the other rail operators. The Federal Communications Commission, which oversees the radio channel frequencies, has also contributed to the delay, rail authority representatives told The New York Times.