September 1, 2001

 

A Down-to-Earth Solution to Airport Gridlock

 

By MICHAEL S. DUKAKIS

 

BOSTON -- Air traffic delays have reached epidemic proportions. With jets coming into airports every few minutes — at La Guardia, it's one every 110 seconds — the slightest hiccup in the system sends air traffic

controllers to Plan B: Hold everything.

 

Despite some temporary improvement, one-quarter of all flights in the country arrive late at their destinations. For the past five years, every time a new flight is put on the schedule by the airlines, one additional flight is

delayed. If you're an airline passenger, you just can't win.

 

But the answer to airport chaos is not forcing communities to accept more runways or new, expanded airports. The answer is high-speed rail.

 

Fully one-third of all flights out of American airports today are for 350 miles or less. That is true at O'Hare in Chicago, where a war has raged over plans for airport expansion. It is equally true in San Francisco, where people are at each other's throats over plans to fill in part of San Francisco Bay to build another runway.

 

If all those passengers were on a first-rate, high-speed rail system, the gridlock that our airline passengers experience every day would ease considerably. In the Northeast corridor, for example, 10 million travelers a

year have an option to take high-speed rail to New York, Philadelphia and Washington, and 70 percent choose the train over the plane.

 

Yet federal money continues to flow overwhelmingly to highways and airports. This year Congress spent $33 billion on highways, $12 billion on airports and only $521 million on passenger rail — and more than a third of

that went to a railroad industry retirement fund.

 

Why don't we invest more in high- speed rail service? The typical complaint is that people won't choose trains. But that's not true — if the service is fast, efficient and reliable.

 

Between Boston and New York last year, Amtrak carried enough passengers to fill more than 3,800 shuttle flights between Logan and La Guardia. With the introduction of the high-speed Acela Express this year,

those numbers are growing. In fact, in July Amtrak recorded its highest monthly ridership in 22 years.

 

Moreover, the popularity of rail is no longer just a Northeast phenomenon. In Washington State, Amtrak and the state have developed the Cascades service, which connects Seattle to Portland and Vancouver, producing a

fivefold increase in ridership since 1993.

 

In California, where the state has committed $250 million for more rail, the corridor between San Jose and Sacramento is the fastest-growing rail line in America.

 

Last November, Florida voters approved an amendment to the state constitution mandating a statewide high-speed rail system. The governors of Virginia, the Carolinas and Georgia want the Northeast Corridor to become the Atlantic Corridor, with high-speed rail service from Washington, D.C., to Atlanta. (Construction has already begun on the Washington-to-Richmond leg.)

 

In the Midwest, nine states have produced a high-speed rail plan that would link Chicago with the major Midwestern cities.

 

In short, people all over the country want high-speed rail service. Dozens of states, fed up with gridlock on their highways and winglock at their airports, are demanding a transportation system that includes rail.

 

Now the federal government must act. Congress is currently considering the High Speed Rail Investment Act, which would provide $12 billion in bond financing over the next 10 years to support high-speed rail projects that have been developed by 36 states. As much as $3 billion would be available for the Northeast corridor, allowing Amtrak to reduce the length of trips between Boston and New York to just three hours, and between New York and Washington to just over two hours — and serve many other communities in between.

 

The legislation has the support of 170 House members and 57 senators, including Tom Daschle, the Senate majority leader, and Trent Lott, the minority leader. With the support of a new president who says he wants to

tackle tough problems with bold solutions, we just might get the rail service we need.

 

Michael S. Dukakis, former governor of Massachusetts and Democratic presidential nominee, is a political science professor at Northeastern University and the vice chairman of the board of Amtrak.

.