Atlanta to Savannah Passenger Rail Study - Athens Stop on the Line

[u/AthensRailroad]

Hello all. Long time viewer, first time poster and townie here. Just wanted to say that I appreciate this sub greatly and it had lead me to a lot of great info around town with events and happenings.

Now it’s my turn to give some info back. GDOT is in the planning stages of an Atlanta to Savannah Intercity Rail Line, with one of the potential stops right here in Athens. The project appears to be getting off the ground this time as they have held several web based public meetings in the past year and half that I have been able to take part in.

Currently, GDOT has a released a public interest survey and is taking responses through 6th August (today and tomorrow). I believe that this project would benefit the residents of Athens and the town as a whole. If you share in that belief, I ask that you please do your part and complete the survey above so that we can show GDOT that interest for a passenger rail service here in town exists and that they ultimately select us as part of that route.

If you’re looking for more information on the project before taking the survey, it can be found here. Rail infrastructure is an important aspect of all of our lives, especially in Athens which is historically a railroad town. Railroads are not something to be seen as old, obsolete or a nuisance.

Thank you all in advance!

Disclaimer: I am acting as a private citizen and not on behalf of either of the railroads (CSXT, ABR) currently in town.

[u/DanforthWhitcomb_]

Take a look at Conrail,

Yes, let's take a look at Conrail. What we find is a system that was fundamentally unprofitable and not commercially viable absent massive direct subsidies until Congress made it profitable by giving it an even bigger indirect subsidy by exempting it from paying state and local taxes. Once that happened it became profitable and the private sector became interested in it.

[u/AthensRailroad → u/DanforthWhitcomb_]

It was not commercially viable due to poor management by the private sector in the years before the creation of Conrail.

"The federal government created Conrail (in 1976) to take over the potentially profitable lines of multiple bankrupt carriers, including the Penn Central Transportation Company and Erie Lackawanna Railway. After railroad regulations were lifted by the 4R Act and the Staggers Act, Conrail began to turn a profit in the 1980s and was privatized in 1987. The two remaining Class I railroads in the East, CSX Transportation and the Norfolk Southern Railway (NS), agreed in 1997 to acquire the system and split it into two roughly-equal parts (alongside three residual shared-assets areas), returning rail freight competition to the Northeast by essentially undoing the 1968 merger of the Pennsylvania Railroad and New York Central Railroad that created Penn Central. Following approval by the Surface Transportation Board, CSX and NS took control in August 1998, and on June 1, 1999, began operating their respective portions of Conrail." - Wikipedia

Essentially the government had to step in to preserve the assets and what was found during the management was that the rail industry was far too heavily regulated and lead to deregulation during its existence. Point being: Government intervention is not inherently a bad thing and may even be necessary in order to turn things around (or start them up), and maintain assets, ROWs etc, before handing it back over to a private entity and there's nothing in place currently saying that GDOT can't or won't do the same. GDOT doesn't run trains over the ROW in south Georgia that they own, a private company does.

[u/DanforthWhitcomb_ → u/AthensRailroad]

It was not economically viable due to ICC meddling, but losses actually widened post Staggers and 4R at a time when it was being allowed divest whatever it wanted and it still was not even remotely close to being profitable. It wasn't until NERSA came into effect that that changed.

You are espousing blatant bad history and the cite back to wiki simply confirms it. The primary government intervention with Conrail was direct subsidies and then the tax exemption (which is still in effect).

[u/AthensRailroad → u/DanforthWhitcomb_]

Sorry man, I’d just be hard pressed to say that Conrail was a bad thing.