OldPoleBurner Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Well well well!
>
> You sure do throw a lot of labels around - such as
> "Tea Party" and "Christian" and other ad hominem
> dismissals.

> No where did I mention anything remotely related
> to the tea party perspective, nor did I mention
> anything related to any religion. I believe public
> schools are useless because they actually manage
> to educate very few of the their graduates. They
> don't even dare to teach "critical thinking", or
> even how to do rigorous study. Nope - notta -
> nothing - not the sciences - not engineering - not
> mathematics - just social fluff! So, am I
> supposed to be impressed with your ad hominem
> dismissals, any more than I am impressed with the
> public schools? Nope - I'm not!

Sorry, but your verbiage comes straight out of the tea party/christian school of thought. As for your attitude toward public schools... that is a cross you will have to bear.
>
> Oh but of course, we should all know better than
> to offer an eye witness account of anything, or
> even an opinion as to what is killing all hope of
> passenger train revival in America.

My comments are based entirely on personal experience. I've been a passenger on those trains.

>Instead - we
> must (in a hobby forum) provide reams and reams of
> documentation along with it, or be dismissed.

Well, doh!!! If YOU are going to make GLIB statements, then, yes, support them. Hobby forum has nothing to do with it. Frankly, from the posts I've read over the years, this is a semi-professional board.

>
> So, you think that a public agency can go into the
> same market as private enterprise, and buy the
> same products (ie, track and construction
> materials, signals, controllers, similar enough
> locomotives, etc, etc), but have to pay several
> times more for them than does a private company.
>
And that is OK!

Doh!!! Where did I say it was OK? Again, you missed the whole point. Go back and read your own post, you were the one who complained about the high unit price of equipment. If Amtrak is going to purchase multiple orders of an item, then yes, Amtrak should get some sort of volume purchase price, however, if Amtrak is going to make a one time purchase of just a few items, say 10 electric locomotives, then accept the unit cost will be high. This is a basic truism of industry. And, until public/private passenger trains become mainstream, and volume orders increase, society will have to accept high per unit costs.

>
> You blow it off so glibly - they don't buy in
> volume you say. Hogwash! Nobody buys locomotives
> in bulk.

The major railroads seem to buy locomotives in bulk routinely. Enough so that EMD/GE can keep assembly lines, and etc open and continuously running. If Amtrak or whatever funded agency would purchase off the shelf locomotives, or the same type of locomotive, then, yes, they should derive the same cost benefits. Buying a small number of custom locomotives once every decade is not going to allow for low unit prices. You were the one who complained about Amtrak's unit costs. I merely pointed out that volume purchase should lead to lower unit cost.

Nor do private railroads build more miles
> of track than do public passenger agencies.

Well, this may be true. Here in Chicago, It is Metra that extended a third rail to Elburn, IL, not the UPRR. It is Metra that has proposed a new yard in NW Chicago (Jonesboro), not the UP.

>
> Forty years ago when I started out,

Thirty seven years for me...

UPRR, CRIPRR, ICGRR, CNWRR, CTA, Metra

the
> construction cost per mile for the public was
> almost ten times the cost to the private railroads
> per mile of track.

Can't speak for this, I was doing either government funded 4R rehabilitation (except UPRR which was privately funded) or government funded mass transit extensions. However, I have no reason to believe that the contractors involved got more than typical highway construction unit prices. Stone ballast is no different than stone subgrade, a cubic yard is a cubic yard.


As striking as that difference
> was, it is rapidly accelerating towards twenty
> times the the private rate. True enough, there
> are some things to account for some of this, such
> frills as electrification in some places, but that
> generally only doubles the cost per mile. Add in
> yet another 10-12 million a mile, and you can then
> get frilly grade separations and fencing to boot.
> But all that still accounts for but a tiny
> fraction of the difference. So what is causing
> this unsustainable explosion in public costs.

Again, I'm not sure about this.

Metra extended its third track from Geneva, Il to Elburn, Il. Metra used open bidding for the civil engineering design portion of the work (awarded to a reputable firm) and used UPRR B&B forces to do the actual construction. There was no stink in the press or anywhere about excessive costs. Since I did some of the original survey/drafting work for Metra/s proposed Jonesboro Yard, I pretty much can assure you there was no major money involved there.

>
> What is profoundly different is the obscene,
> absurd, and inept procurement rules that all
> public agencies much cowtow to, which are getting
> worse and worse hour by hour - it seems. And that
> is the avenue where the corruption I speak of is
> entrenched. It isn't called corruption because it
> is all legal. But those rules favor contractors
> and suppliers at the extreme expense of the public
> good; and do little to make public procurement
> actually righteous. To be fair though, some of
> these extreme costs charged by vendors, are used
> to offset the enormous costs imposed upon them by
> irrational gov't procurement rules.
>
> The fact is that public procurement at all levels
> is totally inept and corrupt, because the law
> itself is inept and corrupt, and is getting more
> so every day. So who made it that way - and why?
> And why won't either major party ever do anything
> about it. Well Duh!!!
>
> So here I go again - telling what I actually
> witnessed in my forty plus years as a public
> servant and consultant.

Yep, and I am responding the same way, as a 35+ year witness as an employee, consultant, contractor and consultant.

Too bad such eye witness
> accounts will be dismissed if they somehow
> contradict your world view.

Yep... as you dismiss mine!!!

Yep! I just can't stop
> questioning authority. But I survived - somehow.
> And I will get my well earned retirement - soon,
> when I choose to go!

As I said before... lucky you, take that socialist money and run!!!


> So will I still ask too many pesky questions of
> the powers that be? Or indeed too many questions,
> for someone who sees the world through ostrich
> feathers!

There you go!!! Back to sounding like a Tea Bagger. You were doing so well up to this point!
>
> You betcha!

Ah.... a Sarah Pallinism
so, you are a tea bagger!!!!!