Patrick Guinane has a story in the Northwest Indiana Times (warning – known for links going stale) reporting that advisers have told Governor Mitch Daniels that the State should consider selling off or lesing the South Shore Line – the commuter railroad from South Bend to Chicago.
The state should consider selling off or leasing out the South Shore Line, advisers have told Republican Gov. Mitch Daniels.
And the state already has begun to explore privatization of the South Bend-to-Chicago commuter railroad, the South Shore’s top executive told The Times on Tuesday.
“We’ve had a very preliminary conversation (about a month ago) with (state Transportation Commissioner) Tom Sharp,” said Gerald Hanas, general manager of the Northern Indiana Commuter Transportation District — the state entity that owns and operates the South Shore Line.
“I think he wanted us to kind of just do a general scoping to see if there’s anything similar to the toll road that we could do — in terms of leveraging a long-term lease,” Hanas said. “We certainly are looking at it. There are certain models in Europe where certain parts of railroad have been privatized, but, in all cases, we find that there’s still a significant public involvement in all the railroad, whether they be commuter or national railroads.”
Meanwhile, Indiana Department of Transportation spokesman Gary Abell flatly denies that a privatization conversation ever took place. Jane Jankowski, the governor’s press secretary, was asked about the South Shore suggestion but offered only a general statement on the findings the Government Efficiency Commission delivered on Monday.
Not really a surprise. As was discussed months ago on this blog sell off everything not nailed down, then tell us how well the state is doing. Typical Daniel’s. Perhaps he will find a way to lease the Statehouse to Wal-Mart.
So Doug, have you’ve taken the boy on that Amtrak adventure yet? If not, ya might want to think about doing so sooner than later … before the Daniels privatization screws get to firm a hold.
Not yet. You know, you always think the limiting factor is going to be the kid growing up too fast; not the Governor wanting to sell stuff.
There is a great difference between the South Shore line and Amtrak. Mainly, no private operator would want Amtrak unless it could take the one area that is profitable- the Northeast Corridor. The rest is a money pit, which is why the private railroads shed their passenger services in 1971.
Given how the Daniels people operate I suppose we have to parse their statements very carefully to see what artful dodge they are cooking up this time. The InDOT “denial” has the usual Daniels’ stamp of worminess and evasion written all over it. As we all now know, saying that all of Indiana should preferably be on northwest Indiana time is (somehow) not the same as thing as endorsing statewide Central Time.
But to stay on point, Hanas (GM, NICTD) is quoted in the story as saying: “I think he (Tom Sharp, Transportation Commissioner)wanted us to kind of just do a general scoping to see if there’s anything similar to the toll road that we could do — in terms of leveraging a long-term lease,”. InDOT spokesman Gary Abell responded when asked about this that: “A privatization conversation never took place. Their discussion dealt with trying to find more federal funds to purchase additional passenger cars.”
I suppose we are to think that privatization wasn’t discussed. But I picked up on the words “conversation” and “their discussion”. What Hanas seems to have said, in essence, is that the South Shore was told to look into leasing itself out. He doesn’t say how, or if he responded at the time. InDOT spokesman Abell doesn’t deny that, he only denies that a “privatization conversation” took place. What I think one can read into this is that the South Shore came looking for help finding money for rolling stock and the State told them to look into privatizing themselves. There was no “back and forth” that might be called a “conversation” on privatization. The South Shore was told what to do. After all, the Daniels’ adminstration, already having all the answers, doesn’t listen, it tells.
Regarding Mike Kole’s remarks, I’m not sure that passenger rail would have become a money pit had the federal government not built the interstate highway system. Because most of the cost of highways and private automobiles is sunk, and the marginal costs of operation low, many people don’t seem to understand what a “money pit” private cars are.
I have used the South Shore on occasion when we went to the Dunes from Chicago…NW Indiana is certainly suburban chicago and it would greatly help to have the South Shore as part of Metra and gradually incorporate more of the old abandoned railroads into a wider NW Indiana commuter ralroad system. Im sure it would be called ‘socialism’ and it would take the State of Indiana to contribute into a Metra system primarily controlled in Chicago area,but as I said, NW Indiana IS greater Chicago .It’s currently very difficult( given the relative proximity) to commute to Chicago from cities such as Dyer and Valparaiso or Schererville.A railroad connection would greatly benefit NW Indiana.
Metra is currently expanding railroad service to the suburbs with one new line in the planning stages that would go straight south from Chicago within 10 miles of Indiana state line.
I instinctively mistrust private ownership of anything that serves people since service is aways secondary to profit in the private sector. One day there will be no service as profits diminish.
Okay Lou, If NW Indiana is part of the greater Chicagoland area and the South Shore originates its easternmost piont in South Bend then does South Bend not belong in the Central Time zone???
Metra, and the South Shore, are socialism. But then so is most of our highway system, moderated only slighty in that a form of user fee (motor fuel taxes) pays for it. Were congestion based pricing on the highways closest to Chicago in place, and the proceeds could have been used to support the South Shore, and both highway and rail users would have benefitted. That option has been lost though, the toll road has been sold and I have seen no movement on the part of the State to obtain permission from the feds to turn the Frank Borman expressway into a toll road (and I to think of where that money would go). The proceeds from the toll road sale have been committed to build more highways, mostly in parts of the state other than NW and northern Indiana with the South Shore getting nothing.
So much for “advanced thinking” on multi-modal transportation from this administration.
Larry,
My opinion( having lived in Chicago so i’m an expert) is that South Bend could be on CT time as far as Chicago is concerned,but if it doesn’t minimally bring along contiguous Michigan and Elkhart county( and the counties directly south),then it would be cut off from much of its commuting and cultural area. I think that would take precedence over Chicago ties..I wouldnt sacrifice daily inconvenience for weekend football convenience. South Bend is certainly not a commuting area of Chicago as Lake and Porter county are,but it’s true that there is a great deal of travel, not so much commuting,but with sports especially, between South Bend and Chicago.So the fact that everyone is on DST is a plus ..no more ‘figuring out’ what time it is by what the date is.
My view of time zone concept is that which time zone is irrelevant,just dont divide people in their daily pursuits.Of course some people are divided wherever a line is drawn,but just count the people and find a hole,and draw the line.
If I had to pointedly criticize those who favor CT I would say all they want is a certain sunrise and sunset sequence and they couldn’t care less what inconvenience that might cause,and it’s never their fault even if there is inconvenience bordering on chaos.
Now if I get kicked off this blog for insubordination, I will understand and accept!But I was asked a question,and remember i’m a non-resident,although frequent visitor, to Indiana.
Local South Bend television station now breaking the South Shore story:
http://www.wsbt.com/news/local/4306482.html
Regarding the WSBT story I see they gave it the spin that InDOT intended, rather than quoting what was actually said.
Pat Bauer has a few words for Daniels in this press release:
http://www.in.gov/serv/presscal?PF=ihdc&Clist=234&Elist=87462
I apologize for my unfair characterization above, since both sides played brinksmanship hardball on time zone issue in Northern Indiana..
As far as the South Shore Railroad is concerned,why would the railroad determine the time zone? The railroad has nothing to do with the time zone. We just make out a schedule in the proper local time,which is easier now since with DST, one schedule can be used year round.
Ah but Lou – look at your history. Time zones are and always have been about railroads (and now more generally, transportation routes). We all were on sun time – 12 noon was “high noon” and thus slightly different in every town, until the railroads got big enough to demand uniformity. Time zones are nothing but an attempt to compromise “high noon” with railroad schedule needs.
Nancy,
Yes, historically that’s true.But in 2006,railroads have no standing in time zone choice. The trucking industry rules interstate commerce now and uniformity now includes DST.
But it’s one of those interesting points we learned from the time zone debates. First there was sundial time,then there was railroad time and, indeed, at first standard time followed the railroad cities and then gradually spread out from there. In 1918,Standard time was made mandatory and was no longer an option. Then until 1966 DST was used as local option to adjust summer vs winter daylight,and after that Indiana was forced to deal with both DST and ET, one piled on the other,and for 30 plus years managed to maintain year round EST.Now that era is over and Indiana is unfortunate enough to suffer from both EST and EDT in order to join the time rythmn of the whole country.When DST caught up with ET and both became mandatory there was nothing to be done because Indiana’s contiguous states seem perfectly happy,or at least have have had 30 plus year to adjust and people don’t care anymore.Barring revolt in KY and MI, Indiana is stuck.
I have no statistics, but I think the trucking industry and the Interstate Highway system have a lot to do with uniform time now.The movement to ET( without DST) in Indiana coincided with the building of the Interstate Highway system,and was a means of normalizing time with states to north, east and south. And just as standard time in 1883 was adopted to replace the sundial ,now the concept is standard time with DST as being just ‘standard time’.
Looking back at what has happened in the recent time debates in Indiana,the most heated controversy was in Northern Indiana,between the CT and ET people.It turned really mean at times.The thought that many people would have gladly put St Joesph County on CT,leaving all the rest of the area to the north,east and south on ET still irks me.
I know it was a strategy of desperation to cause widespread chaos so that there would have to be further action to co-ordinate time,hopefully putting the whole area on CT.I have never lived in that area and it’s not the the part of Indiana Im most familiar with,but it still seems so ruthless to me,like a Berlin Wall of time zone division.Time should never be a weapon used against people.It’s been proven, to me anyway, that what the number one choice of people anywhere would be is to live on ONE time,whichever.There is no manifest destiny for any time zone anywhere.Sure 75,90,105 degree lines are guidelines for time zones,but all time has been pushed west over the last 100 yrs. Mainly because people are awake and functioning more after work than they are before work.It’s just practical.DST was the last local option variable for sunrise/sunset manipulation and now that’s gone and local option is no longer an option. So here we are..
Lou, that is still a problem. The South Shore has a station in Hudson Lake, LaPorte County, approximately 1/4 mile from the time zone line. The train schedule says that 5:55 AM. Nothing about CT/ET. The post office address for Hudson Lake is New Carlisle ET, the location is LaPorte County CT. So if I am trying to figure out what time to be at the station how do I go about doing that without a certain amount of background knowledge of the area? My long time contention on the timezone issue has been that a county should not be the dividing line when a state line could do. Elkhart wanted ET because of the ties to Cass County Michigan. St. Joe, Marshall,and Fulton all wanted CT. So in reality St. Joe was bringing the south with them,just not the east and north.(west was already there).For convience of commerce it seems to me that Hoosier to Hoosier convience trumps Hoosier to Wolverine. Since a school system(New Prairie) sits on the line,this is more important to have that area in the same timezone.
OK Lou, prepare to be “irked” some more. St. Joseph County didn’t ask for this process and it acted with great restraint on this issue. It may “irk” you that St. Joseph County acted in what it saw as its own best interest, that is to work to strengthen its ties to the nation’s third largest city and one of the most economically dynamic cities in the midwest. But South Bend is a settled urban center and has much more in common in Chicago than college football games.
St. Joseph County didn’t ask for a process of moving the time line one county at a time. Or a process under which the DOT says it will not move any county without that county asking to be moved. Very few counties will willingly assume the burden of a time line along their border, especially if it happens to split a school district. Under this system why should a Kosciusko County ever ask whether a potential division between itself and Whitley County is worth sparing St. Joseph County of its division from La Porte?
Going back to the events of last year though, Marshall, St. Joseph, Elkhart and Kosciusko counties, acting through MACOG, early on agreed to coordinate their efforts on the time zone issue, though they did so without agreeing to a particular time zone.
Soon after the agreement Kosciusko County announced it would not petition for Eastern citing its position between Fort Wayne and South Bend and its ties to Whitley County.
Then, the territory to St. Joseph County’s south, Marshall and Fulton Counties, petitioned for Central Time. I emphasize that they petitioned for Central time before St. Joseph County did. On this point Plymouth’s mayor (Plymouth is the county seat of Marshall County) voted against the time zone “agreement” at MACOG and on the very basis that it had not specified a time zone.
Next Elkhart County announced it would not petition for Central Time. To my knowledge they did this without consulting St. Joseph County. They did say at the time though that they did not think they would oppose St. Joseph County petitioning for Central Time.
Only after all of these events, up against the deadline set by the DOT, did St. Joseph County submit its petition. If it hadn’t done so, and had not stuck to its guns through the whole process its case would never have been heard. I for one do not think the whole case has yet been heard. You, like all of the other opponents to Central Time for St. Joseph County, want to say the issue is whether St. Joseph County’s ties to Chicago are more important than those it has to Elkhart County. When can we ask the question of whether the ties Elkhart has with Lagrange County are more important than those St. Joseph County has with Chicago?
Paul,
I’m not an opponent of CT. That isn’t the issue. But a rule of thumb is, that the closer the area the more important unity of time is. that to me is common sense. Chicago would always lose over Elkhart with that criterium when South Bend is the other place,if a choice has to be made.
The debate always is how underhanded and waffling the govenor has been, how the commissoners are being bought off by special interest groups.All that is provable with documentation ,but its a point of view also,and the court of public opinion is biased in one way or the other.And that kind of reasoning should not be a rationalization for further bullying.
For me the bottom line was that there were people actually advocating a time zone division going down the middle of Elkhart-Joseph Counties and that would have literally made people change time crossing neighborhood streets. How corrupt the process has been is not a justification for that sort of action.It can’t be justified in any way.
larry,
There will always be problems wherever a time zone is drawn,so there’s always an issue of ‘relative confusion’. Thats why if I were in charge (joke) I might meander the lines locally so that school districts are not divided,but that could cause more problems we’re not aware of.But the solution has been to have schools make up their own school schedule. Hopefully a train schedule will state ET or CT. If there is a change of time zone there should be an notification on the schedule that we just crossed a time zone.I don’t have any other solution with that issue.
I don’t think TZ change at the state border is any less divisive than dividing through a county. It depends entirely on the comparative demographics.
The entire point here is that time zone lines are a NIMBY factor. I really feel that the best place for a timezone line here, is at the state line. That would result in the least amount of confusion. Elkhart’s arguement was that WE have to be on ET and since WE have to be on ET so does St. Joe. As Paul and I have pointed out Marshall and Fulton wanted CT and technically Kosciusko is not part of MACOG. So Elkhart gets what it wants and three neighbors do not. Getting back to my stateline point people generaly realize that “things/laws” change at state lines. See such issues as;helmet laws,beer purchasing on Sunday,and estate taxes. Why not a concept called “convience of commerce” ??
People are changing time zones crossing streets in New Carlisle now Lou.
But your statement “the closer the area the more important unity of time” only confirms what I said. There is a very strong interest for a county which does not presently have the time line running along its border to resist any move by a neighboring county to a new time zone that would result in the time line following any border of the non-petitioning county, no matter what interest is at stake for the petitioning county. A non-petitioning county would have an interest in disguising its motives though since the process gives them a veto on the petitioning county’s actions and, if the ties to the petitioning county are strong enough, allows them to paint the issue as a rupture between the non-petitioning county and the petitioning county. This happens even though the non-petitioning county could avoid the “rupture” issue by petitioning also. No, there interest is in playing up the possibility of rupture since doing so allows them to avoid answering much tougher questions.
Thus St. Joseph County’s interest in being moved to Central Time is always answered with the same non sequitur from Elkhart County. That is “You can’t go because of your ties to us”.
It is not that Elkhart County doesn’t have an interest in remaining on Eastern Time. The focus on purely local causes you brought up captures the point exactly. For example, why should Elkhart put up with the possibility of a split school district with Kosciusko County and the political fallout that would produce if it doesn’t have to? But if St. Joe and Elkhart are really an integral community (which I don’t think the statistics actually show) how do those interests weigh against St. Joseph County’s interest in ties with La Porte and Starke counties? How do they weigh against St. Joseph County’s interests in cashing in fully on its connections to Chicago? Those opposing CT for St. Joseph County by waving the bloody shirt of a time zone rupture on the St. Joseph/Elkhart County line are the parties who have played the fear card in this debate.
I would more than happy to see how the issue would play out if St. Joe and Elkhart were actually treated as a unit.
Paul, I totally believe that if we were to take those two counties as one, let the people vote in a referendum CT would win going away. The problem here is that the CT bandwagon would start as you then would have; Kosy,Marshall, Fulton,Cass,and Berrien counties petition for CT. Our governor does not want to see that, or he would have allowed the split to happen in the first place. What a better way to find out exactly where the TZ should be than to let the process play outby itself. OR maybe if St. Joe would have been allowed to go CT, they would be repetitioning by now. Problem is with the flawed system and corrupt governor’s influence we may never know the answer????
Larry and Paul,
I think NIMBY is basic. That’s why DOT tries to choose a relative less dense population compared to a more dense population to draw a time line and that’s why a state line is not necessarly a good place,especially in the Michiana area. Check the demographics, draw a line through relative less dense populations.The issue isn’t that Elkhart and St Joseph have closer or less close ties than anywhere else, it’s a matter of relative dense population not being divided,and where people are more, they move about causing more confusion if there is a time line.Of course much more rural New Carlisle is a better choice to straddle a time line.That may sound cavalier,but numbers and density count.
The process of petitioning and re-petitioning in Indiana is horrendous.Your county commissioner system is not adequate for this sort of emotional, pressurized time zone debate. It was obvious from the beginning that ET would be the default time since it is the status quo.I always understood that DOT would consider moving only those counties who petitioned and never move a county who didn’t.Right there any area-wide solution or interstate solution is eliminated.I never thought that petitioning was intended to move the state to CT,but many people were led to believe that and that’s why there is now re-petitioning imo.I think those who wanted statewide CT seized upon the opporuntity afforded to try to move the state to CT. The obstacles in the way were never fully perceived til the effort failed and then there was a strong feeling that they had been deceived and and the process was not fair.
Lou, The entire process was horrendous including the comments to DOT. When you have people from Elkhart writing in stating thaat dividing CT/Et there would devide a school system that was just an out and out lie. The only process that would seem to work would be a state wide referendum. Going county by county was just crazy simply because not every county bothered to have a hearing on the issue. Throw in a governor that changes positions like the wind and you end up with this mess. Interesting point here, Tom Dermondy, republican candidate for house seat district 20 is saying that he favors one state one time. Now since Tom and I attend the same church,if he does not at LEAST try to do that feat he will end up like Troy Woodruff in two years. People in the New Prairie area are really unhappy with the current time situation, and they do not blame the DOT. Daniels comes first,then Chocola, then three guys in Elkhart.Fair, who knows,but as ithas been said around here,many times we had a compromise situation before, now we have a mess. I like Paul would have loved to see how an Elkhart, St. Joe split would have worked out or an Elkhart Cass split. You do not know until you try.