Make your voice heard and call on Congress to bring long-denied mass transit to South Dakota — The South Dakota Standard

The last round, round 4, workshops of the FRA Amtrak study on long-distance transport have packed!

All of the proposed new long-distance routes are feasible and viable, including the routes through South Dakota. Now it is up to us to ensure that Congress works to authorize these nationally important and vital passenger rail routes. The routes through South Dakota will likely follow a similar pattern to other long-distance routes.

The concept of expanding passenger rail transport has continued to attract widespread attention and support. The project team received over 47,000 comments in the month following the third round workshops, with 99% supportive of rail passenger transport.

The Minneapolis/St. Paul-Denver route was one of the most commented routes after the workshops and generated almost 300 Comments alone. As we have seen over the past few months, South Dakota residents are very interested in the Amtrak opportunity and understand how this investment could also benefit freight transportation and economic development opportunities across the state. That interest has been echoed by comments elsewhere.

Although a significant amount of coordination and construction effort would be required, both routes through South Dakota are in the middle of the weighted priority list developed by the project team. Support from our congressional delegation (Senator John Thune, Senator Mike RoundsAnd Representative Dusty Johnson) would implement these routes after discussing them (but not realized) for decades.

Construction activities alone would billion dollars of economic benefits in addition to the ongoing direct and indirect economic benefits once the services are in operation. The economic incentive could well rival the construction of the US Interstate Highways or the Missouri River Dams. Again, these routes would be comparable in performance to other long-distance routes.

It is important to emphasize how federal investment (or lack thereof) has long disadvantaged South Dakota’s rail system (as seen above on an early Amtrak route map, a public domain image posted on Wikimedia Commons). Beginning in the Territorial Era, generous Land allocations (Subsidies) were given for the construction of railroad lines through what are now the states of North Dakota and Nebraska. South Dakota, on the other hand, received almost nothing.

In the 1970s, Congress rescued the Northeast Corridor and the railroad network in the northeastern United States (after the glorious implosion that Penn Central Railroad), but allowed the still-viable but terribly mismanaged Milwaukee Road Railroad to collapse, with serious consequences for South Dakota (and even forcing Governor Bill Janklow to call a special session of the legislature to Pierre in August—without air conditioning!—to respond to the crisis).

In 2007, the The Federal Railroad Administration refused The $2 billion loan (about $3.5 billion today; a loan mind you) for the DM&E Railroad to build its Powder Basin coal line. This would have greatly improved much of the route the Twin Cities-to-Denver train would travel through South Dakota. Ironically, FRA Administrator Joe Boardman, who turned down the loan, would later run Amtrak.

The chronic cost increases for projects on the Northeast Corridor and other national projects would have more than paid for the route through South Dakota many times over. The need to complete important (but costly) projects elsewhere does not diminish the needs we have in rural America. We don’t just deserve service, we deserve Good Service. And we deserve it as soon as possible! Over 50 years is too long to wait for what we are already paying for. The amount of federal funding this would mean for South Dakota would exceed the meager STC Grants no more water.

An attack on a current or planned route is an attack on all routes. This also includes the routes through South Dakota.

There has never been a better time in Amtrak’s 53-plus years to demand federal investment in our railroads. It is up to us to ensure Congress commits to passing these critical rail services.

Ongoing economic development projects such as Swan’s in Sioux Falls and the Black Hills Industrial Center deserve public investment, as do their government-subsidized highway and air links. If we want to accelerate these economic opportunities for our state, we should demand the implementation of these passenger rail lines that upgrade the rail lines while improving freight and economic development opportunities.

With the eventual construction of a state-supported US highway Interstate 27 via the Heartland Expressway (Highway 79/85 West River), our crucial and growing importance to Washington DC is well known!

Please resend your supporting comments to the FRA Project Teamour congress delegation, State legislatorsand that State Railway Board and Railway AuthorityTell them to support these investments in our future.

Federal funds go far and can be used more effectively to create lasting and sustainable opportunities if they are spent on expanding long-distance rail service in rural America or in places like South Dakota.

“People live here!” It is time we demand the federal investment that has long been withheld from us!

Dan Bilka of Sioux Falls is co-founder and president, All aboard, NorthwestYou can reach him at [email protected]