Written Testimony of Jim Mathews to the Senate | Oct. 2020

[Click here for a PDF of Mr. Mathews' testimony]

Written Statement for the Record
of
Jim Mathews
President & Chief Executive Officer
Rail Passengers Association

Before the
United States Senate
Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation

Passenger and Freight Rail: The Current Status of the Rail Network and the Track Ahead
Wednesday, October 21, 2020

Rail Passengers Association
1200 G Street NW, Suite 240
Washington, DC 20005
202.408.8362

Overview

My name is Jim Mathews, and I am President and Chief Executive Officer of the Rail Passengers Association, the oldest and largest national organization giving a voice to more than 40 million people who ride trains and public transportation of all kinds in the U.S. Since 1967, our mission has been to improve and expand conventional intercity and regional passenger train services, support higher speed rail initiatives, increase connectivity among all forms of transportation and ensure safety for our country's trains and passengers.

The Rail Passengers Association would like to thank Chairman Wicker, Ranking Member Cantwell, and all of the members of this Committee for holding this hearing to focus attention on our nation’s intercity rail network at this critical juncture. The situation for passenger rail in this country today is more dire than it has been in decades. Our Association firmly believes that what this Congress decides to do about rail and transit in just the coming weeks will have important and lasting impact for hundreds of Amtrak-served communities and millions of Americans for years to come.

To put it directly and bluntly: despite the bi-partisan support Amtrak has received from this Committee and its members, Amtrak today faces a crisis to its very existence – a crisis imposed by the continuing coronavirus pandemic and its knock-off effects on travel and the larger economy, but made worse by decisions at Amtrak itself. Moreover, the effects won’t be confined to Amtrak. As I testified before the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee’s Rail Subcommittee on September 9th, our Association’s economic-modeling suggests that Amtrak’s COVID-coping tactic of dropping daily service will hurt Heartland America’s economies to the tune of at least $2.3 billion while saving Amtrak less than $213 million.

Worse yet, Amtrak may find it harder to restore daily service than management expects. Furloughs will force skilled employees who run the trains to re-qualify in their crafts before service can return, and some employees may not come back. Unless rolling stock is stored with great care and continuing maintenance, coaches, sleepers and baggage cars will deteriorate while parked, demanding reconditioning before return-to-service and potentially permanently removing some assets from the fleet. Host railroads over which Amtrak operates are free to thumb their noses at Amtrak’s insistence that the service reductions are temporary, treating them as “indefinite” or even permanent reductions. This would force Amtrak into a lengthy negotiation process that could even mean a trip to the Surface Transportation Board, imposing further expense and delaying service restoration for millions of Americans who rely on that service today. We have already shared with Committee staff one such host-railroad response, and we believe more may emerge soon.

Amtrak has also reduced capacity on long-distance trains in order to avoid paying for an extra crew member for added cars. Trains magazine recently reported that Amtrak is experiencing near-capacity or sellout ridership on long-distance trains as it begins its shift to triweekly operation, but even with sell-outs extending for many weeks and travelers clamoring for socially-distanced travel options like Amtrak Sleepers, Amtrak won’t add capacity. Management is choosing instead to forego badly needed revenue. While Amtrak has cut 57% of all long-distance departures, the numbers are actually much worse for sleeper car capacity. The Lake Shore Limited, for instance, has gone from 14 sleepers (NYP/CHI) per week to three per week—a 79% sleeper inventory reduction. Retired package-tour operator Carl Fowler, a former member of the Rail Passengers Association Board, argues that with the revenue generating potential of Sleeper car fares—a sold-out sleeper in normal times can gross 2-3 times the revenue of a coach car in normal travel conditions—Amtrak’s refusal to add Sleeper cars to consists is leaving money on the table.

Added to this are persistent technical glitches plaguing Amtrak’s online reservations system, which have the effect of further discouraging riders from booking trips at a time when Amtrak can use all the revenue it can.

I must share the growing sense of alarm among rail travelers, my own members and leaders in Amtrak-served communities over Amtrak’s diminishment of their essential service. Like many other transportation providers reeling from the coronavirus crisis, Amtrak warned that without additional federal support the railroad would have to make drastic cuts, in this case dropping daily service on its long-distance National Network in favor of truncated service three times per week.

This once-in-a-generation pandemic poses sobering challenges for America’s rail passengers, including the consequences that inaction by government pose to the cities, towns, and rural communities connected by our intercity rail network – more than 500 of them all across America’s Heartland. We understand well that Amtrak faces real and difficult choices, and that without financial aid there are far greater risks to the network than thrice-weekly (3x) service for long-distance routes—we could lose entire corridors, permanently.

We wholeheartedly endorse levels of investment like those we saw in the Moving Forward Act (HR 2) or the $10 billion in Amtrak grants in the FY 2021 transportation budget passed out of the House in July. This the right course for America’s passengers and the U.S. economy, and we continue to believe that this is the best way forward for our passenger-rail system.

We understand, however, that Amtrak can maintain existing service levels with a short-term supplemental request of $2.4 billion. We’re heartened to hear that Amtrak is working with Congress to establish a no-harm supplemental budget request. Our Association continues to believe that maintaining daily service across the National Network and preventing massive furloughs and layoffs of Amtrak workers should be the floor, not the ceiling. As Amtrak Chief Operating Officer Stephen Gardner noted in a March 22nd article in the Washington Post, “Eventually this will pass, but none of the bridges or [train] cars or any of the things we have that are old and need to be replaced will get younger as a result of this crisis.” We could not agree more, and we implore the Congress to make the investments we need so that rail service can help restore the U.S. economy.

Even with exogenous shocks to travel demand, the fact remains: Amtrak is an essential service for tens of millions of Americans and hundreds of communities. We were quite pleased with Amtrak President & CEO William Flynn’s May 25th statement to Congress that the railroad understands “how important Amtrak service is to the nation and, particularly, small communities across the nation where we play a unique role in connecting these communities to the rest of America.” However, reducing service on the 12 of the 15 long-distance routes—a vital transportation link to the 40 percent of the nation’s small and rural communities that it serves—to only three days per week speaks much louder than words. Whatever the reasons, reducing frequencies across the National Network will drop a $2.3 billion-dollar bomb on so-called “Flyover Country,” forcing our Heartland communities to bear a disproportionate share of the damage that will result.

Defining an Essential Service

It’s worth taking time to be explicit about what we mean when we say Amtrak is an “essential service” to the communities it connects. For many, it’s easier to understand why a service like the Northeast Corridor (NEC) is necessary; without the 2,200 daily trains and 260 million annual trips the NEC carries, the regions this corridor links would grind to a halt. How can a single daily train to a small town also be accurately described as “essential” to the people it serves?

To understand, you have to look at the dearth of transportation options faced by rural and small-town Americans. Over 62 million people live in so-called “Flyover Country,” a quarter of whom are veterans, another quarter are senior citizens over the age 65. Intercity rail plays an outsized role in these communities, with almost one-fifth of Amtrak’s passengers traveling to or from a rural station with no access to air service.

Think of what this implies for just a single use-case. Long-distance trains, frequently used by senior citizens and passengers with mobility impairments, provide access to healthcare facilities that would otherwise be too expensive or difficult to reach. In an August letter to the U.S. Senate advocating for daily service, the Station Host Association of California, an independent volunteer organization operated in cooperation with Amtrak, shared its frontline experiences helping passengers navigate our rail system:

“Particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic, long distance trains provide accessible bedrooms ensuring privacy and cleanliness for any passengers who may need to travel within or out of state, and for whom the more public setting of an airplane creates a health risk. The private rooms on the overnight trains provide an additional level of safety to travel during a pandemic while minimizing exposure to the virus. However, if the tri-weekly service intervals do not match the passengers’ needs, then the entire benefit is moot.”

So while travel demand is down broadly, coronavirus has actually made these passenger rail services more necessary for certain segments of the population.

These are just a few of the many reasons Amtrak’s long-distance routes have proved to be the most resilient business line in the face of the pandemic. Amtrak’s own ridership numbers back this up. Since the crisis began through the end of August, NEC revenues are down 90 percent from the same period last year, compared with a 63 percent decline for the National Network. Ridership has also flatlined across the NEC, down 87 percent. By contrast, ridership on the long-distance routes is down only 67 percent during the COVID Period.

Perhaps one of the more significant statistics is that during the COVID Period, Amtrak’s National Network of long-distance intercity passenger routes has contributed 46 percent of Amtrak's revenues, compared with 22 percent a year ago. Moreover, the so-called "money-losing long-distance routes" have contributed the largest single share of revenues in every month since March.

Make no mistake: these trains are essential to the communities they serve. Congress didn’t let the Federal Highway Administration close highways four days out of seven when gas tax revenues flatlined, and it shouldn’t stand by and allow Amtrak to introduce 3x service to hundreds of communities across the U.S.

Airlines Eliminating Service to Amtrak-Served Cities

These cuts will fall especially hard on a subset of Amtrak communities that saw a simultaneous reduction in rail service and air service on October 1st. Several major airlines announced in August that they would drop service to dozens of cities upon the expiration of the CARES Act. Rail Passengers looked at service reduction announcements released by 11 air carriers and found that of 67 cities seeing air services cut, 31 would also see cuts to passenger rail service (see: Appendix B).

Airlines have been walking away from mid-sized markets for decades, and it is clear that this trend will only accelerate in the wake of COVID-19 as passengers shy away from a mode of travel they fear is unsafe. An August survey of consumer sentiment conducted by Boston Consulting Group found that 60 percent of U.S. consumers worry about being infected from flying, and 70 percent of respondents expect travel spending will not return to normal for more than a year. This will further erode the business model for midsized airports, leaving more and more Americans disconnected from job opportunities, educational institutions, and critical health services.

Rail Passengers firmly believes that running daily trains could put Amtrak in a position to expand its market share in this environment. Amtrak offers a unique product: a socially distant way to move around the country. Our government should be increasing access to rail service, not diminishing it.

Quantifying the Economic Benefits of Daily Service

Too often the public conversation about Amtrak falls into the framing that Amtrak is supposed to behave like a private company, seeking profit. Amtrak is not required to make a profit, not in law nor in fact. The pursuit of profit leads to inevitable, and misguided, conversations about eliminating “unprofitable long-distance routes.”

It is abundantly clear that Amtrak trains make money. The question is not about if trains make money, it’s about who trains make money for. Rail corridors generate value by acting as economic engines in the communities they serve—through jobs, retail, mobility, tourism and real-estate development. The “profit” does not go to Amtrak, but to the communities served, often to the tune of billions of dollars. Taken as a whole, Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor, state-supported services and long-distance National Network together create, our Association estimates, between $7 billion and $8 billion in value for the U.S. economy without even counting the $2 billion of direct spending in which Amtrak engages.

We decided it’s not enough to say it, we’ve got to put our money where our mouth is. That’s why I invested our association’s resources in 2018 to co-develop a rigorous economic model with the University of Southern Mississippi’s Trent Lott Center. We’ve used that model to quantify the economic return on passenger rail corridors in a way that hasn’t been done previously.

Our Association modeled a preliminary, high-level analysis of the economic consequences of Amtrak’s decision to cut its daily intercity passenger services back to only three runs per week. Unfortunately, even the most conservative assessment is dire: to save $213 million, Amtrak's nine months of daily service cuts could drop at least a $2.3 billion bomb on Flyover Country, a figure that could rise above $3 billion if the cuts remain in place for the full year.

This is tied directly to passenger-rail’s role as an economic engine in the communities it serves. The existence of Amtrak buoys the economies of hundreds of towns and cities all across America. Degrading that service means withdrawing those benefits from millions of Americans, even those who don’t necessarily ride the trains themselves, because in many cases lives and livelihoods depend on the routes’ operation.

We examined six National Network services -- the City of New Orleans, the Empire Builder, the combined Silver services, the Southwest Chief, the Texas Eagle and the Crescent. Together, these six intercity passenger rail routes serve 30 states plus the District of Columbia, and Rail Passengers estimates that they produce $2.4 billion every year in economic benefit. In fact, Amtrak’s existing group of daily long-distance trains (excluding the Auto Train) collectively produce nearly $5 billion in economic benefits which are widely distributed throughout America’s heartland.

These benefits take many forms, which our model attempts to capture. Whether traveling for vacation, personal reasons or business, visitors spend money at their destinations, paying for hotels or other lodging, patronizing restaurants, shopping or buying local items. By doing this they support the hotel workers, the restaurant waiters and cooks, retail and entertainment outlets, and they generate sales tax revenues for the communities they visit. The local workers also contribute to the local tax base, further spreading the economic benefit. Meanwhile, because those visitors have left their cars behind, they're not imposing wear and tear on highways and roads, and they're avoiding the risk and cost of injuries or even death from car crashes.

Cutting service reduces these benefits. Rail Passengers’ model estimates that Amtrak’s plans would slash the $2.4 billion produced by the six services we examined down to just a little more than $800 million – a more than $1 billion hit on just those routes alone during the proposed nine-month period of reduced service, or $1.5 billion on an annualized basis. Systemwide on an annualized basis, Heartland communities served by long-distance trains could absorb a $3.1 billion body-blow. This after already reeling from the effects of a deep economic recession.

Some of the poorer states will be among those hit hardest. In the case of the Silver services, Amtrak decided to degrade service months ahead of the October 1st plan outlined for the rest of the system, leaving some of the South's poorest communities to absorb an even harsher punishment than the rest of the country. Combining the Silver Star and Silver Meteor into a single route and then cutting back daily service means many Star-served stations have already seen a 50% reduction in service – communities like Southern Pines and Hamlet, N.C., or Camden, Columbia and Denmark in South Carolina. Those stations account for 13% of the Star's ridership. The Census Bureau reports that more than two-thirds of Southern Pines' population is non-white, and some 14% of the town's residents are estimated to live below the poverty line. So, too, Denmark, SC, is majority non-white, and 15% of residents are below the poverty line.

But make no mistake. The damage is not confined to a handful of towns or just one region of the country. Amtrak’s National Network touches nearly every corner of our country, and the economic pain will be felt in 30 states and the District of Columbia. Communities in eight states served by the popular Empire Builder route from Illinois to Washington State (with a portion of the train split to Oregon) will absorb a $391 million annualized economic loss. The seven states traversed by the Texas Eagle will lose $318 million, and states from New York to Florida and in-between will feel the hit twice, from losses of service on the Crescent ($153 million) and the Silver services ($251 million).

The annual losses for states will be steep. Mississippi, for example, can expect to suffer a $24.2 million economic blow driven by the loss of nearly 81,000 riders. Washington state’s losses could top $100 million. Louisiana could see $27.7 million in losses, Colorado nearly $73 million. Illinois, the hub of Amtrak’s long-distance operation, could see losses of more than $403 million. We have included a state-by-state breakdown of the estimated impacts in Appendix C of this statement.

The problem will be exacerbated by missed connections. The devilishly tricky math of ensuring that one set of trains that only runs three days a week can connect reasonably to another set of trains also running three days a week guarantees that many thousands of journeys simply won’t be taken. This is because a passenger planning on a connection would have to work backwards from her planned arrival date while taking into account not only that her original train is running only three out of seven days, but that so, too, is her connecting train. And in many instances, those trains will not mesh.

Some $39 million of connecting revenue flows through Amtrak’s Chicago Union Station alone, and the 3x schedule disrupts all of these connection patterns.

The California Zephyr and the Texas Eagle are particularly hurt. For example, travelers taking the Eagle to Chicago hoping to connect for a further eastbound trip on the Capitol Limited or the Lake Shore Limited can only make a same-day connection on Mondays and Saturdays. Going westbound it’s even worse – with the exception of a single connection from the Cardinal on Tuesdays, not a single Amtrak long-distance train will offer a same-day connection in Chicago to the westbound Eagle. All passengers will have to assume a hotel stay in Chicago, perhaps even a multi-day stay. That will be enough to lead most passengers to forego the trip. Eagle connections from other routes accounted for nearly 12% of connecting travel through Chicago in Fiscal 2019, and this plan would largely eliminate those connections. On Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays and Sundays, westbound passengers hoping to connect to the California Zephyr would be out of luck. The Cardinal will only have a same-day Zephyr connection on one day each week, Saturdays, and passengers from the Capitol, Lake Shore and City of New Orleans will only get a same-day connection on Saturdays and Mondays.

If this seems complicated in written testimony, think of how complicated it will be for the average passenger trying to work out the best departure day to take a journey connecting to another train. The utility of a schedule like this to the traveling public quickly approaches zero for all but the most leisurely of trips. And as we know, despite a popular narrative, pure leisure trips are not the majority of trips on Amtrak.

The drastically reduced utility of a nationwide network of trains operating only three days a week on schedules that make connections difficult or impossible helps to explain why ridership will plummet even more than many observers would expect, driving catastrophic economic losses to the communities served. The estimated loss of as much as $3.1 billion to the U.S. economy dwarfs the $150 million in savings from 3x service Amtrak has identified.

(Rail Passengers would like to acknowledge our volunteer members and our partners at Transportation 4 America, who participated in the preliminary research we needed for this rapid-response study and helped to gather and collate the state-level tourism data we needed for our modeling exercise.)

A Better Route Forward

Even if we are to analyze 3x service proposal narrowly, we still can’t support it as an operating plan based on its merits. The U.S. has been down this path before, and it didn’t work.

In the mid-1990s, Mercer Consulting advised Amtrak leaders to eliminate several long-distance routes, shorten others, and take 11 routes down from daily to three and four times per week. In Fiscal Year 1995, the first year of diminished operations, Amtrak’s network saw a decrease of 13 percent in total route miles and saved $54 million. However, the General Accounting Office (the government watchdog now known as the Government Accountability Office) reported to Congress that the very next year Amtrak lost 1.1 million riders—a 5 percent drop in ridership—and never saw the savings they had projected for the 11 routes with less-than-daily service. A functioning passenger transportation service requires reliable and frequent connections. And there is nothing to suggest that the buying and traveling habits of today’s riders are much different from those in 1994.

One of our members, former BNSF Railroad train dispatcher Mark Meyers, performed an analysis of 3x on the present-day network. He found that three-times weekly service—a 57 percent cut in overall service—only cuts the number of on-board crew starts by 38 percent and engineer-crew starts by 36 percent, while producing large compensable layovers for some of the affected crews. Equipment use is only cut 40 percent. Staffing at stations would be cut only minimally because even 3x weekly trains arrive over the course of more than five days, which would require a second station staff position to continue to be filled. Lost revenue and missed connections will drive lower ridership and revenue while crew layovers will grow.

Amtrak has acknowledged this fact in the construction of its 3x schedule, with railroad management explaining that the decision to run the Star/Meteor on successive days “was made to allow for more efficient use of operating crews while assuring availability of crew resources for all journey segments… While from a marketing standpoint alternating days may have had some utility for some customers, our overall demand patterns by day of week do not differ materially and do not justify the operational risk."

We’ve already seen the negative effect this has on ridership. Before the 3x change, the Silvers were holding their own in the Age of COVID, both in revenue and ridership. In fact, when ranked by the degree to which monthly ridership fell compared with prior years, the Silvers were in the top half of the table. As ridership began to recover from the April troughs, some routes recovered more than others, and their declines versus the same month in 2019 were smaller.

Using that yardstick, for the month of June, out of 14 National Network services the Star was in third place, behind only the Auto Train and the Texas Eagle. The Star actually edged out the very popular Empire Builder, and the Meteor wasn’t far behind in sixth place. In other words, when compared with the same period a year earlier, the Silvers’ ridership declines were better than those experienced on the Lake Shore, the Sunset, the Coast Starlight, the Crescent, the Zephyr, the Palmetto, the Chief, the City of New Orleans and the Cardinal.

By the end of August, when the Silvers had spent two months operating on an inconvenient 3x schedule, the Star and the Meteor quickly fell to dead last, losing a greater percentage of year over year ridership than any other National Network route

We understand that Amtrak leadership sincerely believes that this is the only choice available to the railroad. But the facts we’ve just outlined demonstrate that this choice is bad public policy for the country. Amtrak will throw away a little more than half the daily frequencies but will lose two-thirds of the ridership and save only 38 percent of the crew costs, squeezing out at most $213 million of savings while hurting the taxpayers in 30 states to the tune of as much as $3 billion.

The decision will also hobble the railroad’s ability to restore service even if it believes the time is right to do so. Requalifying crews, restoring deteriorated rolling stock and – most challenging – getting back the operating slots Amtrak walked away from on October 1 all could extend the economic damage from lost service by many billions of dollars.

Rail Passengers instead proposed an alternative: run daily long-distance trains with shorter equipment consists for the duration of the pandemic. This has been the compromise in place since the crisis began in March, and until this month it had served Amtrak well. As we’ve noted above, operating every day with shorter consists the 12 daily intercity passenger trains Amtrak plans to cut back have contributed the largest single share of Amtrak’s revenues in every month this year since the pandemic began. Slashing daily frequencies to three times per week would only ensure that the long-distance trains would sink to levels similar to those being seen in Amtrak’s other business lines. By contrast, running shorter consists but maintaining daily frequencies would preserve connections and jobs and allow Amtrak’s National Network ridership to return to previous levels organically, all while still lowering some operating costs.

Conclusion

Amtrak is a taxpayer-supported public service. Its object is not profit, but to serve the Nation. It cannot fulfill its mandate by cutting service for half the country during one of the most severe economic crises our nation has experienced and during a pandemic that has made air travel a perilous gamble for millions of Americans. Our Association, our 28,000 members and the millions of American passengers call upon Congress to provide Amtrak with the necessary financial relief to operate a full network in this pandemic, and to include safeguards for all Amtrak-served communities and Amtrak’s workers facing cutbacks and furloughs.

Appendix A – Economic Analysis of Long-Distance Route Service Cuts

Appendix B – Announced Airline Service Cuts to Cities

Cities highlighted in yellow are projected to see cuts to both air service and Amtrak service (long-distance and/or State-supported trains) on October 1st following the expiration of CARES Act service protections.

American Airlines American Airlines will be dropping service to the following 15 cities: Sioux City, IA New Haven, CT Springfield, IL Del Rio, TX Dubuque, IA Florence, SC Greenville, NC Huntington, WV Joplin, MO Kalamazoo-Battle Creek, MI Lake Charles, LA New Windsor, NY Roswell, NM Stillwater, OK Williamsport, PA Alaska Airlines Alaska Airlines will be dropping service to the following five cities: Charleston, SC Columbus, OH El Paso, TX New Orleans, LA San Antonio, TX Allegiant Air Allegiant Air will be dropping service to the following six cities: New Orleans, LA Ogdensburg, NY Palm Springs, CA San Antonio, TX Springfield, IL Tucson, AZ Cape Air Cape Air will be dropping service to the following city: Portland, ME Delta Air Lines Delta Air Lines will be dropping service to the following 11 cities: Aspen, CO Bangor, ME Erie, PA Flint, MI Fort Smith, AR Lincoln, NE New Bern/Morehead/Beaufort, NC Peoria, IL Santa Barbara, CA Scranton/Wilkes-Barre, PA Williston, ND

Frontier Airlines Frontier Airlines will be dropping service to the following five cities: Greenville/Spartanburg, SC Mobile, AL Palm Springs, CA Portland, ME Tyler, TX JetBlue Airways JetBlue Airways will be dropping service to the following five cities: Albuquerque, NM Palm Springs, CA Sacramento, CA Sarasota/Bradenton, FL Worcester, MA Silver Airways Silver Airways will be dropping service to the following five cities: Charlotte Amalie, VI Huntsville, AL Key West, FL Tallahassee, FL Tampa, FL Spirit Airlines Spirit Airlines will be dropping service to the following five cities: Asheville, NC Charlotte Amalie, VI Christiansted, VI Greensboro/High Point, NC Plattsburgh, NY Sun Country Airlines Sun Country Airlines will be dropping service to the following five cities: Madison, WI Philadelphia, PA Portland, OR Sacramento, CA St. Louis, MO United Airlines United Airlines will be dropping service to the following 11 cities, tied for the most of any airline: Allentown/Bethlehem/Easton, PA Charlotte Amalie, VI Chattanooga, TN Fairbanks, AK Hilton Head, SC Ithaca/Cortland, NY Kalamazoo, MI Key West, FL Lansing, MI Myrtle Beach, SC Rochester, MN

Source: One Mile At a Time, https://onemileatatime.com/us-airlines-will-stop-flying-to-dozens-of-cities/

Appendix C: State-by-State Economic Impacts from Three-Times Weekly Service Cuts

	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		ALABAMA
	Direct Losses	$ 2,418,904
	Indirect Effects*	$ 3,555,789
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 5,974,693
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		ALABAMA
	FY2019 Ridership	51,195
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	17,553
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	33,642
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		ARIZONA
	Direct Losses	$ 6,660,220
	Indirect Effects*	$ 9,790,524
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 16,450,744
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		ARIZONA
	FY2019 Ridership	99,600
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	34,149
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	65,451
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		CALIFORNIA
	Direct Losses	$ 210,445,669
	Indirect Effects*	$ 309,355,134
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 519,800,803
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		CALIFORNIA
	FY2019 Ridership	824,473
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	282,676
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	541,797
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		COLORADO
	Direct Losses	$ 29,410,573
	Indirect Effects*	$ 43,233,542
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 72,644,114
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		COLORADO
	FY2019 Ridership	270,242
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	92,654
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	177,588
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		DELAWARE
	Direct Losses	$ 672,794
	Indirect Effects*	$ 989,007
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 1,661,800
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		DELAWARE
	FY2019 Ridership	42,332
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	14,514
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	27,818
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		FLORIDA
	Direct Losses	$ 112,730,248
	Indirect Effects*	$ 165,713,465
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 278,443,713
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		FLORIDA
	FY2019 Ridership	905,356
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	310,408
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	594,948
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		GEORGIA
	Direct Losses	$ 13,889,443
	Indirect Effects*	$ 20,417,481
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 34,306,923
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		GEORGIA
	FY2019 Ridership	141,722
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	48,590
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	93,132
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		IDAHO
	Direct Losses	$ 155,165
	Indirect Effects*	$ 228,093
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 383,258
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		IDAHO
	FY2019 Ridership	6,726
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	2,306
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	4,420
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		ILLINOIS
	Direct Losses	$ 163,431,910
	Indirect Effects*	$ 240,244,907
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 403,676,817
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		IOWA
	Direct Losses	$ 2,880,721
	Indirect Effects*	$ 4,234,659
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 7,115,380
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		IOWA
	FY2019 Ridership	51,499
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	17,657
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	33,842
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		ILLINOIS
	FY2019 Ridership	1,292,361
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	443,095
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	849,266
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		INDIANA
	Direct Losses	$ 7,155,578
	Indirect Effects*	$ 10,518,699
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 17,674,277
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		INDIANA
	FY2019 Ridership	88,307
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	30,277
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	58,030
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		KANSAS
	Direct Losses	$ 3,303,087
	Indirect Effects*	$ 4,855,539
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 8,158,626
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		KANSAS
	FY2019 Ridership	46,483
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	15,937
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	30,546
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		LOUISIANA
	Direct Losses	$ 11,242,324
	Indirect Effects*	$ 16,526,217
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 27,768,541
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		LOUISIANA
	FY2019 Ridership	176,514
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	60,519
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	115,995
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		MARYLAND
	Direct Losses	$ 6,298,489
	Indirect Effects*	$ 9,258,779
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 15,557,269
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		MARYLAND
	FY2019 Ridership	119,875
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	41,100
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	78,775
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		MINNESOTA
	Direct Losses	$ 9,231,198
	Indirect Effects*	$ 13,569,861
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 22,801,058
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		MINNESOTA
	FY2019 Ridership	131,973
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	45,248
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	86,725
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		MISSISSIPPI
	Direct Losses	$ 9,794,959
	Indirect Effects*	$ 14,398,590
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 24,193,548
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		MISSISSIPPI
	FY2019 Ridership	123,046
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	42,187
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	80,859
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		MISSOURI
	Direct Losses	$ 12,562,440
	Indirect Effects*	$ 18,466,787
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 31,029,227
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		MISSOURI
	FY2019 Ridership	183,300
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	62,846
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	120,454
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		MONTANA
	Direct Losses	$ 15,448,709
	Indirect Effects*	$ 22,709,603
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 38,158,312
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		MONTANA
	FY2019 Ridership	121,352
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	41,606
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	79,746
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		NEBRASKA
	Direct Losses	$ 3,569,653
	Indirect Effects*	$ 5,247,390
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 8,817,043
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		NEBRASKA
	FY2019 Ridership	49,679
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	17,033
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	32,646
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		NEW MEXICO
	Direct Losses	$ 9,183,181
	Indirect Effects*	$ 13,499,276
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 22,682,457
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		NEW MEXICO
	FY2019 Ridership	116,788
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	40,042
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	76,746
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		N. CAROLINA
	Direct Losses	$ 31,576,014
	Indirect Effects*	$ 46,416,741
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 77,992,755
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		N. CAROLINA
	FY2019 Ridership	243,896
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	83,621
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	160,275
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		NORTH DAKOTA
	Direct Losses	$ 7,600,964
	Indirect Effects*	$ 11,173,417
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 18,774,381
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		NORTH DAKOTA
	FY2019 Ridership	101,100
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	34,663
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	66,437
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		OREGON
	Direct Losses	$ 17,583,526
	Indirect Effects*	$ 25,847,783
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 43,431,309
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		OREGON
	FY2019 Ridership	276,900
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	94,937
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	181,963
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		PENNSYLVANIA
	Direct Losses	$ 19,803,256
	Indirect Effects*	$ 29,110,786
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 48,914,041
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		PENNSYLVANIA
	FY2019 Ridership	262,110
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	89,866
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	172,244
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		SOUTH CAROLINA
	Direct Losses	$ 22,291,096
	Indirect Effects*	$ 32,767,911
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 55,059,008
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		SOUTH CAROLINA
	FY2019 Ridership	179,083
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	61,400
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	117,683
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		TENNESSEE
	Direct Losses	$ 1,556,827
	Indirect Effects*	$ 2,288,536
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 3,845,363
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		TENNESSEE
	FY2019 Ridership	64,851
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	22,235
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	42,616
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		TEXAS
	Direct Losses	$ 103,819,655
	Indirect Effects*	$ 152,614,893
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 256,434,548
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		TEXAS
	FY2019 Ridership	298,692
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	102,409
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	196,283
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		WASHINGTON
	Direct Losses	$ 43,249,461
	Indirect Effects*	$ 63,576,708
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 106,826,168
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		WASHINGTON
	FY2019 Ridership	361,747
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	124,028
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	237,719
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		WISCONSIN
	Direct Losses	$ 11,542,696
	Indirect Effects*	$ 16,967,763
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 28,510,460
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		WISCONSIN
	FY2019 Ridership	95,410
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	32,712
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	62,698
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	ESTIMATED ECONOMIC LOSSES BY STATE
		VIRGINIA
	Direct Losses	$ 57,561,743
	Indirect Effects*	$ 84,615,762
	TOTAL STATE IMPACT	$ 142,177,506
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate
	*Indirect effects include community-level effects such as sales taxes, real-estate, local employment and other similar factors
	ESTIMATED RIDERSHIP DECLINES (annualized)
		VIRGINIA
	FY2019 Ridership	496,646
	RPA-Modeled 3x Ridership	170,279
	ANNUALIZED RIDERSHIP LOSS	326,367
	Source: Rail Passengers Association modeling estimate