Railroaded

When the incoming governors of Ohio and Wisconsin refused federal money for high-speed rail projects citing potentially heavy operating costs and, in Wisconsin at least, a preference for highway improvements, I thought to myself that at least there was still Florida. Not . . . any . . . more. Yesterday, the Sunshine State's new governor, noted Medicare ripoff artist Rick Scott, canceled the proposed Tampa-Orlando high-speed rail line that was announced with such great fanfare only a year ago, insisting that Florida can't afford it. (This, by the way, comes on top of his decision not to implement the new health care law until and unless its constitutionality is settled once and for all.) What do high-profile Florida politicians who support the rail line think? Who cares, most of them lost at the ballot box in November.

The governors of these three states are all Republicans, raising the obvious point that the Grand Old Party has an utter disregard for any sort of mass transit projects. (Florida's earlier attempt at high-speed rail was canceled by Republican governor Jeb Bush.) But it's become obvious that incompetence with passenger rail is an American, not a partisan, phenomenon, and that we're no better at it than we are at stopping gun violence in our cities and schools, educating our children, or dealing with climate change. Consider Illinois. As soon as Scott canceled Florida's high-speed rail project, Richard Durbin, Illinois's senior senator and the Democratic whip in the U.S. Senate, wrote to U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, a fellow Illinoisian and a Republican, requesting that money intended for the Florida project go to the Prairie State's high-speed rail project.

How fast will Illinois's passenger trains go? 110 miles an hour.

Wow, how cutting edge is that? Not very. Florida's Tampa-Orlando line would have had trains going twice as fast, and trains in France and Japan already run at such speeds. California's high-speed rail project is so far the only one still on track (no pun intended) that's designed for speeds taken for granted in those countries and in others. Even Amtrak's Acela has a top speed of 150 miles an hour, though it rarely reaches it and never actually sustains it.

I give up. If I want to ride a bullet train, I'll have to wait until I go overseas, which is as likely as Scott changing his mind on the rail issue. But even if there were genuine high-speed rail in this country, it begs the obvious question: Where would I ride such a train to? I can't afford to travel anywhere these days. And quite frankly, the lack of a high-speed train between Tampa and Orlando doesn't concern me. I'd rather be in hell than in Orlando . . .. Wait! Orlando and hell are one and the same! :-p

No Railway or the Highway

A report from Tampa, Florida on The PBS NewsHour re-affirmed my lamentable conclusion about the utter stupidity of this country's federal transportation policy.

Tampa wants to build a light rail line to serve the central city and the surrounding suburbs in Hillsborough County, and it has the strong backing of the city's Democratic mayor. It would increase mobility and create more jobs Local Republican leaders, citing the tax increases and extra spending this would involve, oppose it, and they have similar reservations if not outright hostility toward a high-speed rail line to connect Tampa to Orlando. The Republican mayor of nearby St. Petersburg, to his credit, supports it so long as his city is also included in this line, which would mostly run down the median of Interstate 4.

One local Tea Party member insists that the federal government only has basic duties, such as the common defense and a national highway network. He didn't come out and say the government does not have the responsibility to build a railway network - which is of course public transportation, not like a highway, which is a public right of way for private vehicles - but that's pretty much what he intimated.

And I could have sworn he said the Constitution provides for the Interstate Highway System, although I don't recall the Founding Fathers suggesting a need for concrete roads for motorized vehicles. As for the idea of the Constitution mandating a national road system, Henry Clay repeatedly tried for a national road and canal network in the early nineteenth century, but his opponents kept thwarting him, insisting that transportation was a state issue that the federal government had no right to be involved in. President Andrew Jackson, for one, didn't think Clay's proposal constituted interstate commerce and so wasn't covered by the Commerce Clause of the Constitution, which states that Congress shall have the power "To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes."

And oh yes, "Interstate" 4 only goes through Florida. As with any other mainline Interstate, its construction was funded federally with money shared by the states. Did this help interstate commerce? Or was this highway, which crosses the Florida peninsula between Tampa and Daytona Beach, just built to encourage development in central Florida?