Elon Musk is pressuring to privatize Amtrak, calling the service “embarrassing”, especially when compared to train services elsewhere.
“If you are coming from another country, please do not use our national railway. It can leave you with a very bad impression of America,” Musk said at a Morgan Stanley technology conference, reports NBC News. He discussed the driving of bullets abroad and returning to Amtrak’s sad situation.
Amtrak operates 15 lines across the US, with 32.8 million knights in 2024. The Biden administration invested billions in the improvement of service, which led to the opening of new lines, including the “Floridian” between Agoikagos and Miami. But there is a lot of work to do; Most of the country is still inaccessible by train, and the service often faces delays.
The Obama administration also made a major push for high -speed railways, but it faced the return of Republicans, funding deficiencies and other challenges.
Musk argued that these systems will not attract attention until there is “some chances of bankrupt”, adding, “We should try to privatize everything we can.”
The founder of the boring company said the same about the US postal service, adding that the country must move quickly to privatize “anything that can be privatized”. (President Trump recently sailed the idea of placing USPS under the control of the Department of Trade.)
‘Business performance is strong’
Funding models for high -speed trains vary by country. The Japan train system is largely privatized. France’s system was public until 2022, when the first high -speed private train enterprise, Le Train, began to operate. (In 2015, a PCMag writer even defended for the sale of Amtrak in Elon Musk.)
In a statement, Amtrak tells us “business performance is strong”.
“Fraud and income are at high levels of all time, and transformative projects are developing that will greatly improve the customer’s experience,” says Amtrak. He calls for “maintaining the moment”, apparently from the Biden administration, and maintaining the “train service we operate on our nationwide network, as it is mandated by law … in the right track to achieve operational beneficiaries for the first time in history. [the Trump] administration. ”
The Trump administration is expected to reduce railroad budgets and has ordered a summary of high -speed rail costs in California, The Los Angeles Times Reports.
In a chat in August with Musk in the X -spaces, Trump said Japan’s high -speed trains “go incredible quickly, [are] Incredible comfortable without problems, and we have nothing like that in this country, “according to Newsweek.” Nor near. And it doesn’t make sense that we don’t make it, it doesn’t make sense. “
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In a 2023 interview, the SVP of Amtrak for high -speed railway development programs Andy Byford said Japanese style trains in the US will require Congress support and more funding.
“In a place where the car is king, you need that political support,” Byford told us at the time. “One thing that drives me crazy is the people who rail against the railway. SH.BA spends trillions on the highway and pours billions at airports, so why don’t we have to do the same with the railways?”
In January, the Federal Railway Administration (FRA) sent a plan to Congress to improve the Amtrak Railway service, protecting for more roads that would reach 39 million more Americans, 75 natural recreation areas and over 3,000 higher education institutions. A study on the plan took two years to complete, with “over 50,000 stakeholders and public comments that showed great support for long -distance services or passenger railroads in general.”
“We look forward to working with President Trump, his administration and the Congress to build a world -class passenger railway system that represents extraordinary bridges, tunnels and new trains,” says Amtrak. “A new era of railways is on the right track as we serve more Americans than ever, from rural cities to large cities across the United States.”
The proposed FRR railway service (Credit: Final Study Report long distances FRA, 2025)
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About Emily Forlini
Old -man
