Comments on: Pawlenty lends support to Obama high speed rail plans

By: bpalmen

bpalmen — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 02:48:44 +0000

Unfortunately, there are some who are pushing for a flawed route in Minnesota that excludes Rochester, the state’s largest city outside of the Twin Cities area, in favor of small river towns like Winona. Legislators from these small towns control a committee in the state legislature that has repeatedly thwarted requests for funding to study the impact of a Rochester route, which most people, including Pawlenty, believe makes the most economic and common sense. These same lawmakers have allocated millions of dollars to study routes which pass through their home towns, and they are now using the short deadline for federal funding applications as a trojan horse for their pork-barrel plan.

Please do NOT support the OnBoardMidwest advocacy group which represents this flawed plan – it would be utterly wasteful of taxpayer money to exclude Rochester from Minnesota’s High Speed Rail plans.

By: mill

mill — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 03:07:58 +0000

Same governor who was encouraging Obama to cut taxes and spending? I’m glad his pragmatism prevails.

By: Mike Skehan

Mike Skehan — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 02:38:18 +0000

Washington and Oregon, through our own DOT’s have been deploying HSR along the Cascade Corridor between Eugene, OR and Canada since 1999. Tilt trains, capable of 125 mph, have been gradually defining a market share and offering an alternative to driving or flying. Results so far are impressive. Trains carry many more travelers between Seattle and Portland than do airlines, using half the fuel and producing half the pollution per passenger mile at a lower cost. This is an amazing statistic, considering our fast trains are still limited to just 79 mph for lack of federally mandated safety, signal and track improvements. Reducing bottlenecks with freight trains, gets us there.

We look forward to working with Sec. LaHood to offer America an additional option for travel, while reducing our needs for imported oil and polluting our atmosphere less.

Mike Skehan, Member, All Aboard Washington