Nixon, Quinn launch campaign for high-speed rail, don’t discuss cost issues
By Audrey Spalding
Show-Me Institute
SAINT LOUIS — Gov. Jay Nixon and Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn announced Monday that they would be working together to compete for federal dollars to build a high-speed rail between Saint Louis and Chicago. The federal government has set aside $8 billion of stimulus money solely for the purpose of building high-speed rails, accommodating trains that operate between 110 and 150 miles per hour. States have until Aug. 24 to apply, and it is not certain which states will receive funding, or how much.
Though the governors did take questions during their joint press conference at the Gateway Amtrak Station, both tiptoed around the issue of how they would raise additional money to pay for construction and upkeep. It is likely that Missouri taxpayers would have to pitch in to help pay the initial construction costs, in addition to ongoing maintenance. A 2006 cost analysis of a proposed Midwestern high-speed rail system among nine states, including Missouri, suggested that the federal government would foot 80 percent of construction costs, with the states paying the remainder.
Quinn said Illinois has already spent more than $100 million on this project, and is “passing a bill that will invest $400 million directly in high-speed rail.”
This April, eight governors of the nine Midwestern states (Nebraska opted out) sent a letter to U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, in which they estimated that it would cost $3.4 billion to build track and purchase operating equipment for Saint Louis–Chicago, Chicago-Madison, and Chicago-Detroit connections.
Currently, Amtrak trains run from Saint Louis to Chicago five times per day and tickets cost anywhere from $23 to $65, depending on how crowded the train is. If Quinn had elected to take a train home after his joint press conference, he would have departed Saint Louis at 5:30 p.m. and arrived in Chicago nearly six hours later. Quinn said in a press release that the trip would take less than four hours in a high-speed rail system.
Though the infrastructure would be new, Amtrak would likely be in charge of the high-speed rail trains. “Theoretically, we’d be the ones running it,” said Marc Magliari, Amtrak’s media relations manager. “To and from here.”
In May, traffic writer Tom Vanderbilt wrote in Slate magazine that many Amtrak routes between major cities run much slower than they did more than 50 years ago. For example, the trip from Chicago to Minneapolis used to take four and a half hours, according to Vanderbilt. Today the Amtrak route takes more than eight.