Random Acts of Living


Friday, March 21, 2008

I Hear That Train A-Comin'

State agrees to study cost of passenger rail service
BY HURST LAVIANA
The Wichita Eagle
Those who have been working to restore passenger rail service to south-central Kansas are calling it the most significant development to date: a promise from the state to put a price tag on the plan.

The Kansas Department of Transportation said Thursday that it has agreed to underwrite an Amtrak study that will determine the cost and feasibility of a proposal that could bring passenger rail service to Wichita for the first time since 1979.

Read the whole article Here...

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WHAT DO YOU THINK?

How often would you use the Heartland Flyer, which would run from Fort Worth through Wichita and on to Kansas City?

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Sometimes
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Never

7 comments:

WichitaKsDailyPhoto said...

I missed seeing that article, thanks for bringing it to my attention. I think it's a neat idea, and I wonder it would help to rejuvinate and restore shopping businesses to downtown Wichita.

I've traveled by Amtrak to the southwestern United States, and enjoyed it. At the time the train pulled right up to Union Station in Las Vegas. I had to drive to Newton, to board.

Moonshadow said...

There was a time, not all that long ago, where all the little towns in Kansas connected via the railroad. People regularly made trips in the passenger cars from their hometown depot into the big cities. Most of those depots are now long gone, either torn down or hauled off to historical museums like...
http://www.cheneyks.org/souders.html
I'd like to try a trip by train. The only trip I've taken in a full size train I barely remember, I was in kindergarten and it was for our class field trip.

Anita said...

The only time I've been in a train was when I worked for the railroad, as a driver, and the train crew thought they could drive my van through the mud next to the tracks better than I could, and got it stuck to the running boards... I got a ride home on the freight train, in the engine with the crew...
Which is cheaper... driving to KC, or a train ride and renting a car when you get there?
Renting a car is impossible without a credit card, which I've never owned...
Train travel is greener... any form of mass transit is a good thing... you know how I feel about that... :)

Momo Fali said...

They've been talking about doing something like this in Ohio as long as I can remember (and I'm getting old, so that's a long time). I wish they would! A line from Cleveland, through Columbus to Cincinnati! It would be wonderful.

Moonshadow said...

Anita - With the cost of gas, I'm sure the price has gone up for driving to KC. One of the main complaints I've heard from people about taking Amtrak was the price. The bus was cheaper, but I've heard the bus rides from CA to KS refered to as "the Bus ride from hell". So there's more things to consider than money. There's also your point of transportation once you reach your desination. People used to walk a lot more, and it would do us good to get back to it. Wichita does have a public bus system, I haven't used it in many years so I can't report on pros/cons of it. When I was teenager, before I got the use of a car my brother rebuilt, I rode the bus all over Wichita. Then there are always taxis. I would think that if the train came through Wichita an enterprising person could come up with maybe some bicycle driven taxis?
http://tinyurl.com/ytm72z
That would be cool!

Momo - I don't know who you'd need to talk to. They need to bring back the public transport everywhere and people need to strart using them. There's certainly been interest in your area. http://tinyurl.com/274q62
I'd say contact Gov. Ted Strickland's office and see if you could get onboard with backing this. There have been other studies also... http://tinyurl.com/ytboyd
...and interest...
http://tinyurl.com/2gfhzb

Anita said...

(lets try that again, spelled right, shall we?)

The last taxi I took cost me a fortune, for less than two miles in a place I couldn't have found my way around in on foot...
I can't see me walking for miles and miles and miles around KC... lol
The bus would work as long as you could get to where you're going, in a reasonable amount of time... No form of transportation is without it's flaws...

Moonshadow said...

LOL! Now no one will know what you were talking about, I deleted the post saying you deleted a post.

Did you read my tinyurl? BicyTaxis would HAVE to be cheaper than regular taxis. Don't you think? Since they don't have to buy gas. They would be ideal to travel from train to stores and back again. And NO, I would not want to wander around KC or any other large town as far as that goes. In 1974 I flew out to San Francisco. I was on foot from the airport trying to get to where an aircraft carrier was drydocked. The few blocks before you got to the base was bad neighborhood. Some men in a gas station where I asked directions told me to drive down the street, I told them I had no car. They told me to take the bus, I told them I had no money. They GAVE me the money so I took the bus. Some places are not safe to walk.