“New Hampshire politics just threw a wrench into this,” Heck, I wish it was the final nail... - Granite Grok

“New Hampshire politics just threw a wrench into this,” Heck, I wish it was the final nail…

No, not as in this picture:   

Transcontinental railroad last spike        

This one:  

Last Nail In the Coffin

Headline:  Executive council derails rail study

Railroads, at least passenger ones, are a waste of time and a waste of taxpayer money.  Face it – the rolling stock is old, the infrastructure sucks, and even in the best place in the country, the Northeast Corridor where the Acela runs, there are often delays, malfunctions, and now the TSA wants to start doing security there as well.  In addition, Acela’s and The Downeaster’s (which runs from Maine through NH to Mass) parent, Amtrak run on huge taxpayer subsidies.  Like this (US DOT data from Jan 2011):






Subsidy



Occupancy Fare / Per
City State Train Name % Trip Trip






Portland ME Downeaster 19.6 $14.07 $19.49

.

See that?  Taxpayers have to subsidize more than 58% of a fare to make a go of it.  And yet, there are those that are proclaiming that this a roaring success!  And yet, there are some “stalled in the Golden Age of Railroad” politicians that even want to do more spending of “money of the more for the rides of the few”.  Glad to see this follow on has got these folk’s panties in a wad:

CONCORD — A $3.65 million contract to study a Concord-to-Boston rail line was rejected by the Executive Council Wednesday on a 2-3 vote.

Executive Councilors David Wheeler, Chris Sununu and Dan St.Hilaire all voted to oppose the project, which was favored by Nashua officials and rail advocates who had gone to Washington to secure the funding.

And the panty-wadder?

“New Hampshire politics just threw a wrench into this,” said Peter Hoe Burling, former chair of the state rail authority board.

Problem is, instead of being the final nail in the coffin of this dinosaur of a transportation monstrosity (building a new line), “throwing a wrench into this” is viewed as a temporary situation – the proponents of throwing everyone else’s cash into that coffin are going to pull a Jeanne Shaheen.  Not content to abide by the decision of duly elected State level officials, Burling, a former State Senator who had sworn an oath to the NH Constitution, has decided that NH based decisions just aren’t going to be good enough for him.  Like a true blue Statist Democrat, he’s just going to go to DC – after all, there’s nothing special about Federalism, eh Peter?  NH?  Not so much.  DC – c’mon dude, stop drooling”

He said there will be an effort to get the federal government to take on the study without New Hampshire’s participation. Burling also said the rail line is an important national link and there could be efforts to fund the 12 percent locally or transfer the grant to some non-political group.

Right – and this is going to endear you to New Hampshireites – how?  Once again, we see a Democrat not willing to abide by the decisions of his peers.  As far as local funding, if Nashua taxpayers want to ante up, fine by me.  Hey Peter, how about your OWN money on the line – get a bunch of entrepreneurs together if your vision is so right and the profit margin large enough.  But it seems that with the crack of “non-political group”, he’s intent on pushing this through.  But I also note, with very dry irony, that when you start dealing with large amount of tax payer money, NO group is non-political and neither is it going to be non-partisan.  And once again, we see that fallacy of “free money” as in “hey, its Federal money – no cost to NH, right?” (Federal funding represents 88 percent of the contract).

And then a voice of sanity emerged:

Wheeler, who represents the Nashua area, said he put a lot of thought into his vote.

“I have talked to business people in Nashua and I think this $4 million is way too much money. We are spending money we don’t have for a project we can’t afford,” he said. “ We have been successful in Nashua with buses … It has been very successful to the point it is no longer subsidized.

THAT is success – it shows that a market need exists and at a lower capital cost /lower operational cost than a train system.  It also is much more flexible – it would be far easier to change capacity and buses can do something that trains can’t which is go where the people are where trains depend on people coming to it.

But I guess some have this hankerin’ to have something that others don’t have.  Problem is, are they willing to spend their own money?

Nashua Mayor Donnalee Lozeau attended the hearing and pleaded for support from councilors, noting it had the full support of the Nashua City Council.

Right – willing to support, but she’s KNOWS that her own taxpayers would fire her if she used their tax money.

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