RATON, N.M. — Amtrak will not operate passenger trains on lines without positive train control after Dec. 31, 2018, a top official for the passenger railroad says — a decision which could lead to the discontinuance of eight trains, not just the Southwest Chief.

Senior Vice President and Chief Commercial Officer Stephen Gardner told this to officials at a meeting in Raton, N.M., on the future of the Chief, according to individuals in attendance at the meeting. He also said that the Amtrak board of directors has mandated the policy, despite exemptions for the technology’s implementation granted by the Federal Railroad Administration.

The policy means the Amtrak Board would insist the following trains on FRA-exempted routes be discontinued:

Southwest Chief: between La Junta, Colo., and Dailies, N.M., and through Topeka, Kan.



Cardinal: over the Buckingham Branch Railroad between Orange and Clifton Forge, Va.

California Zephyr: 152 miles of UP’s Green River subdivision west of Grand Junction, Colo.

Texas Eagle: 110 miles of UP’s Desoto subdivision south of St. Louis, Mo.

Downeaster: north of Haverhill, Mass., to Brunswick, Maine., on Pan Am Railways

Vermonter: north of Springfield, Mass., on the New England Central

Ethan Allen: on Vermont Railway east of Whitehall, N.Y.

City of New Orleans: a total of 18 miles on Canadian National around Memphis, Tenn., and New Orleans



Amtrak has subsequently called Trains News Wire's reporting on the meeting "inaccurate" and says its position on positive train control has not changed since CEO Richard Anderson's congressional testimony in February. At that time, Anderson said the passenger railroad "would reconsider whether we operate at all" on routes without PTC. [See "Amtrak CEO says passenger trains will not run over track without PTC or PTC waiver," Trains News Wire, Feb. 15, 2018].





In a statement Monday, Amtrak spokesman Marc Magliari described the PTC policy:





"Where PTC is not implemented and operational, it is expected that nearly all carries will qualify for an alternative PTC implementation schedule under law.





"For those carriers and routes operating under an extension or under an FRA-approved exemption, Amtrak is performing risk analyses and developing strategies for enchancing safety on a route-by-route basis to ensure that there is a single level of safety across the Amtrak network.





"For those very limited routes where a host may not achieve an alternative schedule by year's end, Amtrak will suspend service and may seek alternative modes of service until such routes come into compliance."

Gardner was speaking at the meeting in Raton last week hosted by Colfax County, N.M., for more than 40 officials whose cities and states have already invested millions of dollars in matching funds to three approved federal grants designed to shore up the Southwest Chief’s route.

Steve Cottrell was there. He’s the Assistant City Manager of Garden City, Kan., the sponsor of the first Transportation Infrastructure Generating Economic Recovery grant to improve the roadbed and replace 1955-vintage rails on the line. Cottrell tells Trains News Wire that Gardner claimed several times that Amtrak “had no preconceived end game in mind” when he delivered a presentation that outlined exactly that: a bus bridge from either Dodge City, Kan., or La Junta, Colo., to Albuquerque, N.M.