On track, at last

Once seen merely as a way to move people efficiently between Boston and Portland, the decade-old Amtrak proposal has grown to such mythic proportions in the minds of some Mainers that even the usually calm Gov. Angus King called the train service “a great event in the history of Maine.” Given the years of persistence needed to finally get an arrival date for the first Amtrak train to a small portion of the state, he may be right, unfortunately.

This was never meant to be a great event. It was a modest plan that began fully in 1991, when Amtrak officials studied the route and concluded in their best official language that the Portland-Boston service “could be a first step in providing balanced transportation options for the citizens along this heavily traveled corridor, and provide an important link for passengers from Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts.” Clean mass transit for an overburdened, air-polluted route – a thoroughly sensible remedy that should have been an easy sell.

But it wasn’t. There was the debate over how to connect between the north and south stations in Boston, the reluctance of New Hampshire to participate and the years-long debates between Amtrak and Guilford Transportation, which owned the tracks, over the repair and maintenance and the speed of the trains. Meanwhile, a proposal to widen Maine’s turnpike went to voters and was rejected, the Big Dig started and put Boston in a hole it never anticipated, Congress approved new air-pollution rules affecting the train route, the turnpike proposal came back and passed. Through it all, passenger train advocates in Maine held tight to their dream of seeing Amtrak here and now they have the Downeaster, a train named after a region it should see, at the current pace of expansion, around 2075.

Amtrak itself has become understandably more popular since Sept. 11, although it would be repeating a mistake made 30 years at Amtrak’s beginning to count on the service to turn a profit. Just as the government subsidizes travel by car and plane, it will need to continue to subsidize rail. And even before Sept. 11 the benefits of rail were being recognized more and more by states, which are finding that no amount of highway construction can relieve traffic congestion. So California has a $10 billion expansion plan, Virginia has committed to spending $370 million on building a new rail line, the corridor between New York and Boston was recently upgraded with faster Acela Express service.

The Downeaster could have at least some effect on traffic congestion in Southern Maine, and, as important, it gives Mainers an easier way to travel by train to the rest of the country. As great events in history go, the Amtrak may not stand out over the coming years, but it is a relief to finally have a date for this service after all these years.