The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act also had a bunch of money for, well, infrastructure investment and jobs, and a bunch of thst is earmarked for rail projects, so that's the carrot. The Amtrak passenger priority issue is the stick.
“Amtrak Joe” still at it. I enjoy imagining he’ll spend his retirement living in an Amtrak car riding the system jumping out to shout “Gotcha!” when he catches naughty freight train behavior.
Amtrak issues an annual report card; here's the most recent: www.amtrak.com/content/dam/... Zero of the long distance passenger rail lines meet the 80% on time performance the law specifies, so the Feds have a bunch of leverage over them.
Passenger rail is supposed to have dispatch priority on those lines, but they all fuck around with Amtrak scheduling in favor of freight, and previous administrations have mostly let it slide. The Biden administration has been really aggressively going after them for it.
The actual unions were a lot happier about that strike resolution than I would have expected them to be if it *was* fuckery, and from further developments, it's now pretty clear the White House promised aggressive action via Amtrak and the DOT if they didn't get contract amendments.
Union Pacific, also strongly resisting the contract amendment; Amtrak filed an action with the Surface Transportation Board about their passenger rail delay in 2022 (and it's been in procedural limbo ever since, which is why they went straight to the DOJ lawsuit with NS).
I nominate Tomah, WI. Small, but good highways and an Amtrak to Minneapolis, Milwaukee, and Chicago. Interstates directly to three cities with gay bars (Madison, La Crosse, Eau Claire). Climate-proof, state government is going bluer rather than redder. Good booze and food.
I wanted to take Amtrak to Richmond tomorrow night but it’s a long ride vs driving and I’d have to uber to my hotel anyway. 😞
ach narrow staircases i can handle, psyched about big seats and reclining though! i am doing a long europe train trip in a couple weeks (vienna -> brasov) but got a sleeper for that as its dirt cheap relatively if i am a pretty good long haul plane sleeper then amtrak coach sounds really doable?