Passenger Rail Money May Be Coming To Ohio

[woozle]

Great pictures towntalk!!!!

[Rick Rowlands]

Towntalk, your second picture certainly will never be seen again, as the lead unit on that train is in the spot currently occupied by the YHCIL.

[Towntalk]

Food for thought from CNN:

COOPER: Well, spending your money to safe the economy, President Obama swears it makes sense. That was his message today at a town hall meeting in Tampa.

Now, he insists that $862 billion to get the country on the right track again is working. But do you think it's working?

All this week, we have been digging deeper, giving you the facts on the Stimulus Project, so that you can get a sense of where the money is going and if it's actually helping.

Tom Foreman tonight is at the CNN stimulus desk, been poring over the latest information.

Tom, what have you learned?

TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Anderson, I have learned it's a big, big task. That's for one thing.

Look at this. We stacked this up so you could see this. This is all of the projects that are in this stimulus plan right now. We have got roughly 15,000 pages of projects here. That's considerably longer than "War and Peace," as you might notice.

And, all week long, our folks on the stimulus desk here have been poring through these projects, trying to see what they're worth, and whether you're really getting what you want from your tax money.

And, tonight, we're turning our attention on two really important ones, one very big, one not so big, but worth talking about.

One is this notion of a high-speed rail system throughout the country. The president announced today $8 billion worth of stimulus money to put high-speed rail systems connecting all of these communities. You can see that all over the country there, $8 billion, plus $5 billion more in just general federal spending, not part of the stimulus, to help make all of this happen.

We have been looking into the feasibility of whether or not this could actually happen, what $8 billion would do.

And I will give you one hint to think about here. That's the Acela. It was started back in the 1990s. And there were very significant issues about how much it cost, how soon it could work, and whether or not it would work. And, in many ways, people have always said it underperformed all of the predictions in many ways.


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Does anyone seriously think that $400 million would be sufficient just for stage one given all the things that must be factored in?

Can a high speed train run over present trackage? What if new tracks had to be laid that would accommodate modern high speed trains? Land acquisition? Bridges? Wages for those who would build the system? How long would it take to construct?

Obviously such a system would take years to build.

Then there is the problem of cost overruns.

[AllanY2525]

If the "Three C's" route were improved and re-opened to passenger
service, what would be the chances of trying to tie in a connector
route from Youngstown and the surrounding areas?

How far are the existing tracks from Youngstown at their closest point,
and in what direction - East, or West?

[Towntalk]

The days of sights like these are long gone.

[Towntalk]

Ohio getting $400M for rail service

"Strickland confirmed Wednesday that Obama administration officials told him Ohio will get $400 million to resume passenger train service between Cincinnati, Dayton, Columbus and Cleveland, known as the 3-C Corridor. Passenger rail along the 260-mile route ended in 1971."
Cincinnati Enquirer
1/28/2010

[Towntalk]

The trouble is that all the money will go to building the Columbus-Cincinnati-Cleveland route. Not a dime will come our way.

[Elmo-Ytown]

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/01/28/white-house-dole-billion-grants-fast-trains/

[jay]

There's a report circulating that Ohio might receive $400 Million from the Federal Government for passenger rail projects.