Derailing Amtrak's Monopoly?

The Bush administration is aligning itself with critics who want to end Amtrak's role as the nation's sole operator of intercity passenger trains.

Transportation Secretary Norman Y. Mineta was outlining a plan Thursday that would open the door to competition while giving states more authority over rail service, as well as more responsibility to pay for it.

The administration's long-awaited Amtrak plan would gradually remove Amtrak as owner of 366 miles of tracks in the Boston-Washington corridor and put them under the control of an unspecified public partnership.

Some Amtrak jobs eventually could be assigned to outside companies by contract, and failing routes could be eliminated unless states want to pay for them.

Congressional officials who learned about the administration's ideas on Wednesday said they reflect the suggestions of the Amtrak Reform Council, which Congress formed in 1997 to monitor Amtrak's finances.

The council, a major critic of Amtrak's current structure and management, recommended breaking up the rail company and shifting much of its duties to states and private companies, effectively ending Amtrak's three-decade monopoly over intercity train service.

While the White House plan would give the nation's governors more authority over passenger train service, it also may force them to pick up more of the tab. According to the Amtrak Reform Council, Amtrak spent roughly $2.3 billion to operate its trains last year, and states kicked in about $123 million.

The idea of breaking up Amtrak has not proved popular in Congress, however. Amtrak President David Gunn, in testimony prepared for delivery Thursday to a Senate subcommittee hearing, said the current Amtrak model "can and should work."

"No amount of councils, commissions, study groups, panels or symposiums will find a painless answer to what to do about Amtrak," Gunn said. "Recent proposals to privatize or restructure are exercises in problem avoidance."

Lawmakers have pressed the White House for months to outline its ideas for Amtrak and for passenger rail. Congress is to vote this year on Amtrak's future.

Amtrak's immediate survival is a more pressing matter. The railway is preparing for a possible nationwide shutdown in July if it fails to close a $200 million budget shortfall.

Gunn this week asked the Federal Railroad Administration to help it get the money by granting a loan guarantee. He said Amtrak and the FRA are still working on the idea.

Rep. Jack Quinn, chairman of the House Transportation railroads subcommittee, met with Mineta on Wednesday about the administration's plans but also urged a solution to the immediate crisis, Quinn's spokesman, Michael Tetuan, said.

Quinn "knows there needs to be reform and will work with the administration," Tetuan said, "but Amtrak needs money now."

He said Quinn, R-N.Y., left his meeting with Mineta satisfied that the administration also wants to avert a passenger rail shutdown.

Amtrak tried but failed to meet a 1997 order by Congress to wean itself from the government subsidies it has needed for its entire 31-year existence.

Amtrak is seeking $1.2 billion from the federal government in the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1, a big increase over previous years.