All Aboard

Today we took the train from London to Windsor to visit one of the Queen's castles. What struck me about the entire experience was just how easy and efficient it was. We took the tube directly to the train station and then hopped on our comfortable express train. The entire journey took less than an hour. The train was clean, spacious, and fast. All in all, it was an extremely pleasant experience.

Transportation managers and policy makers in the states could learn something from the Europeans. Amtrak, our national rail service, is a mess both fiscally and operationally. On the operations side, only 42% of Amtrak's trains arrive on time. That is a pretty horrible average. As for Amtrak's finances, they operate with 500 million dollars in losses each year. Our fastest train goes 88 miles per hour, while the French TGV goes 357 miles per hour. With highway congestion at an all time high, extremely high gasoline prices and airline ticket prices soaring, maybe it is time that we have a rail network that serve the needs of the nation in a cost efficient manner.