On 05-09-97 LANCE HILLHOUSE wrote to DAVID EPLING... 
 
 LH> Sort of what I thought.  Amtrak is quick on the trigger to eliminate 
 LH> routes.  
 Well, our elected officals are demanding they break even.  
 
  
  They have temporarily suspended their shutdown of their St 
 LH> Louis to San Antonio route.  The state of Texas loaned Amtrak several 
 LH> million to keep things running six more months.  I don't understand, 
 LH> the 
 LH> Texas routes make money.  During holiday periods they have to add 
 LH> several cars to keep up with demand. 
That's the problem, they have excess demand during holiday periods, rest of 
the 
time, well........... 
Texas probably didn't loan them the money, they are no doubt doing the same 
as 
other routes and funding the train themselves.  
 
Doesn't make sense sometimes. My sister was saying that VRE was talking about 
cutting fares to get riders back. Asked where they'd gone, they have good  
service. Well, it seems they just opened up a new commuter lane on I 95 into 
Washington that took some of the riders away. Dumb. But people seem to look 
at 
the expenses in different ways. They view the cost of a monthly commuter 
ticket 
as "too expensive" but then will pay for gas and parking for their car and 
forget 
about the insurance, car payment and wear and tear.  
 
                                         K 
 
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 * OFFLINE 1.56 * In these matters the only certainty is that nothing is 
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