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eridani

(51,907 posts)
Sat May 23, 2015, 04:28 AM May 2015

Amtrak’s Spectrum Gap

http://www.nationofchange.org/2015/05/22/amtraks-spectrum-gap/

In a December 2012 report, Amtrak’s inspector general wrote that “formidable” and “significant challenges” were delaying deployment of a safety system known as Positive Train Control, which identifies cars that are traveling at excessive speeds and automatically slows their progress. Four years earlier, Congress had required that Amtrak and other American rail companies add the technology to their operations, but only a fraction of the rail systems were by then covered. Had the PTC technology been in place in Philadelphia, federal regulators say, the derailment might well have been prevented.

The inspector general’s 2012 report zeroed in on one missing element that was crucial to the broader deployment of the safety system: Amtrak had for years failed to acquire adequate rights to broadcast communications signals through the public airwaves. Without these so-called spectrum rights, Amtrak’s trains could not communicate with the electronic brains of the safety system, preventing its use along key stretches of track. This lack of spectrum had become the “most serious challenge” in the railroad’s efforts to deploy the safety equipment more broadly, Amtrak’s watchdog warned.

The failure to more quickly address this challenge seems like a story that the political world can oversimplify into a standard tale of cut-and-dry blame, featuring singular villains.

But in this saga, many factors appear to have contributed to the disaster.

For one, there was a lack of adequate resources. Flush with profits, private freight companies had the cash to buy the spectrum they needed for their own PTC system. By contrast, Congress did not provide Amtrak with the same resources.

There was also a lack of political will. When public transportation officials begged Congress to pass a bill ordering the FCC to give the railroad unused spectrum for free rather than selling it to private telecommunications firms, lawmakers refused.
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Amtrak’s Spectrum Gap (Original Post) eridani May 2015 OP
Congress is hell bent on strangling Amtrak to death financially davidpdx May 2015 #1
Insane. Wilms May 2015 #2

davidpdx

(22,000 posts)
1. Congress is hell bent on strangling Amtrak to death financially
Sat May 23, 2015, 04:47 AM
May 2015

just like it is with the post office and slowly but surely it is working (I'm sure there are other examples as well). In Oregon if I want to travel between Portland and where my mother lives I have very few options when I go to visit.

Here are my options from most expensive to least expensive:

1) Fly into a small regional airport price: $300-400
2) Rent a car price: $250 (for 3-4 days plus gas)
3) Amtrak price: $60-75 (note this also requires a one hour drive to the station by my mom)
4) Greyhound: I don't have a deathwish, no thanks...........

As you can see Amtrak is the only moderately priced option (unless you want to risk your life and get on a bus with the psychopaths).

 

Wilms

(26,795 posts)
2. Insane.
Sat May 23, 2015, 04:52 AM
May 2015

When public transportation officials begged Congress to pass a bill ordering the FCC to give the railroad unused spectrum for free rather than selling it to private telecommunications firms, lawmakers refused.

"Lawmakers". I'd like to know which ones.
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