Part of the run-up to Hurricane Irma arriving in Florida was the stories about people trying to get out of her way. Traffic jams on the highways, gasoline shortages… seems like the American reliance on cars can be an Achilles heel. (Imagine if everyone was trying to get off Long Island ahead of a monster hurricane! They do get them.) Escaping by air? Good luck. See, there’s a problem with relying on transportation that is vulnerable to weather conditions to… escape a weather condition. Getting a ticket doesn’t mean there’ll be a flight — especially if labor issues complicate things.
Let’s not forget, not everyone has a car. Not everyone has the money to hop on a plane. And if you have medical issues, are disabled, elderly? It’s hard enough for healthy people to have their lives uprooted.
Well, the the International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI) at the Worldwide Socialist Web Site asks a question: Why Aren’t Trains Evacuating People From The Path of Hurricane Irma? Jeff Lusanne describes the situation.
...It is quickly exposing the abysmal, anarchy-filled state of transportation in America. Those hoping to fly out were confronted with sky-high prices, in the hundreds or thousands of dollars, and now over 4,000 flights have been canceled. Extra flights were added, but operations wound down Friday afternoon, more than a full day before the storm. Many have been left stranded at the airport, with all shelters filled up.
For millions, their only way to flee is by car. Gas shortages have spread across the state, and drivers confront extremely heavy traffic that burns through gas with little progress. From southern Florida, there is only Interstate 95 or Interstate 75 to head north, both of which have had extensive delays for days. On Friday, northbound delays covering hundreds of miles were visible on I-75 and I-95 even into Georgia and South Carolina.
This “fend for yourself” method of evacuation presents an enormous inequality, where working people must spend hundreds or thousands of dollars to head to safety, assuming they even have a car. As a retirement destination, Florida also has many residents over 65 years old. This includes residents in nursing care, or with physical or mental impairments, that make them unable to drive or fly.
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Lusanne makes point after point on how America has screwed itself.
Prior to Hurricane Gustav in 2008, there was a small successful example of this, as some 2,000 residents of New Orleans were taken to Memphis, Tennessee on special trains. A worker who participated in the rail operation noted that “At least 50% of the passengers were elderly, many in wheelchairs, on walkers or canes and generally unable to move very well without some assistance.” On a return trip, many passengers brought more luggage, as they could buy essential supplies in Memphis that would have been out of stock or priced-gouged in New Orleans. With baggage cars and plenty of space, the train accommodated this for free—compared to an airline that would charge $50 per bag.
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This could be easily replicated and expanded IF we had emergency plans to mobilize the equipment, added more locomotives and rolling stock, and had the trained emergency personnel needed to pull it off. We’ve invested billions in the highways, and let our rail systems decline.
...In 1960, dozens of trains served Florida, but now there are just three daily Amtrack round trips. One of the Amtrak trains, the Silver Star, has been referred to as the “Silver Starvation” after Amtrak cut its full dining service in 2015, leaving passengers to wait in a long line while a single food service worker prepares snack food on a trip that can take over 24 hours.
...Nationally, Amtrak has under 1,200 cars that carry passengers. In 1960, the three railroads serving Florida alone had about the same number. Little passenger rail investment in the South has occurred since then, leaving a minimal amount of equipment available for disaster relief.
The private sector hasn’t exactly been helping matters.
...CSX Railroad owns routes between Miami, Tampa, Orlando, Jacksonville, and points north, while Florida East Coast Railroad owns a route along the coast from Miami to Jacksonville. All of these routes have been cut back over several decades, with less capacity and fewer maintenance employees. As it is, CSX frequently delays the existing three Amtrak round trips that serve Florida.
...CSX was recently taken over by a hedge fund that is instituting even deeper cuts, including over 500 layoffs at its Jacksonville, Florida headquarters. In another cost-cutting move, train dispatchers who control traffic are being taken away from regional locations and consolidated in Jacksonville. Dispatching jobs based in Selkirk, NY, were to be shifted to Jacksonville this September. The move is remarkable, considering that Jacksonville is a city that could be in the path of a hurricane. If weather closed that facility, the entire network covering the east and south would shut down. There is little doubt that dispatchers will be told to risk their lives to come to work, and forced to work extra hours.
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Read the whole thing — Lusanne makes some good points.
The High Speed Rail America Facebook Group shows what Florida could put in place — if not for determined opposition from the usual suspects. (If you look at the comments, you’ll see stock anti-rail talking points: too expensive, big government, unions, etc. as well as some strong pro-rail opinions.)
Florida’s Bright Line system is less ambitious, but still an improvement. It too has faced opposition.
Texas Central is planning a HSR bullet train service out of Houston to the Dallas-Fort Worth region. Think that might have made evacuation easier?
Amtrak recently got a reprieve in a late-night vote in the House, spared from budget cuts that would have essentially killed it. In the massive rebuilding that’s going to be necessary after Irma and Harvey, will investing in passenger rail be on the table? Will it get included in any of the infrastructure plans floating around in Washington?
One thing’s for sure. Harvey and Irma are showing us that business as usual is not an option in a world being reshaped by Climate Change. Capitalism doesn’t seem to be coming up with the answers we need. Maybe those socialists aren’t entirely crazy after all.