America’s Rail Infrastructure Falling Apart
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(Library of Congress via AP)
Civil War-era tunnels and century-old bridges are part of our decaying infrastructure.
Hundreds of miles of overhead wires that deliver power to locomotives were hung during the Great Depression.
The rails of the Northeast Corridor are decaying, increasingly strained – and moving more people than ever around the nation’s most densely populated region…
Still, the [Amtrak] crash refocused attention on the slow-motion deterioration of vital infrastructure with a seemingly endless to-do list. By one estimate, it would take $21 billion just to replace parts still in use beyond their intended lives.
“The stakes are enormous,” Amtrak’s president, Joseph Boardman, warned in his 2015 request to Congress for funding. He said the corridor was experiencing a “crisis brought on by decades of chronic underfunding.”
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gingerdog May 16th, 2015 at 1:08 pm
So, what did they do with the $1 billion of “stimulus” that they received? “Infrastructure” should receive no more taxpayer money until we find out what has been done with the money they have already spent…….oh, sorry…..”invested” in demarxist- (and RINO-) speak.
OldLefty May 16th, 2015 at 1:31 pm
They used it on infrastructure and tax cuts which Generated Up to 3.3 Million Jobs, CBO Says
causeican May 16th, 2015 at 1:32 pm
Rebuilt a road in my N.E. Florida community.
William May 16th, 2015 at 1:45 pm
Why not look it up yourself?
It’s really easy. You use your search engine to get a list of the projects authorized by the bill, then you plug those projects into your search engine.
See?
Easy.
Not as entertaining as the sinister tales of conspiracy and wrong doing AKA, drug soaked draft dodger show or Faux News, but it would help you to appear a lot less stupid.
Oh, who am I kidding?
Here’s a video.
https://youtu.be/DQM7O5NAvD8
Larry Schmitt May 16th, 2015 at 2:05 pm
Just how far do you think $1 billion goes? There are thousands of miles of passenger rail, hundreds of bridges that need rebuilding. Each job costs tens to hundreds of millions. Doesn’t take long to eat up a billion. Infrastructure is a continuing maintenance job, not something you can splurge on ever 100 years or so. Think of it like painting the Brooklyn Bridge. By the time you get finished, it’s time to start all over again.
tracey marie May 16th, 2015 at 2:40 pm
are you saying that a billion dollars has cured and fixed our infrastructure, or that it should have been enogh? Hell, bush lost 8 billion in cash, on pallets in Iraq.
labman57 May 16th, 2015 at 9:38 pm
Much of the originally planned stimulus funding for nationwide infrastructural upgrades was diverted into tax cuts during the bill negotiations, an unfortunate decrease in spending that was implemented in order to garner the Senate votes needed to prevent a GOP filibuster.
labman57 May 16th, 2015 at 9:39 pm
Conservative politicos have decided that the answer is to privatize Amtrak.
Next up, a call to privatize the nation’s interstate highway system … because delays in infrastructural maintenance of bridges and overpasses is, of course, not about inadequate funding.
robert May 17th, 2015 at 3:51 am
our toll roads have already been privatized
ask the indiana (R) governor who pioneered the idea to Australia
Dwendt44 May 17th, 2015 at 1:12 am
Why fix things when you can let them fail and THEN fix them?
Doesn’t matter if livers are lost.
Of course, you could sell them off, but anyone buying would demand you either fix them up or pay the buyer to fix them up and that ALWAYS cost more than fixing them in the first place.
whatthe46 May 17th, 2015 at 1:32 am
they take don’t fix what’s not broken, just a tad bit too literally.
rg9rts May 17th, 2015 at 6:01 am
Looks like another case of you get what you pay for…