Inside Amtrak's Push to Bring Japanese-Style High-Speed Rail to the US
Amtrak wants to bring high-speed trains to the US, a country known more for pickup trucks and planes than public transit, and has recruited Andy Byford to get the job done.
"If there ever was a time we can make high-speed reality in the US it’s now," the Englishman said at the MOVE America Conference last week. "We have the support. We have the funding. We are looking to effect a rail revolution across the US."
Byford joined Amtrak this year, his 34th year working in public transit and second position in the States. He previously served as president of the New York Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA) from 2018-2020. During that time, he improved on-time train performance from 59% to 82%, he says. The improvements delighted New Yorkers, who dubbed him "Train Daddy."
"Little stickers with a picture of my face superimposed on a train started appearing in Brooklyn and suddenly everyone was calling me Train Daddy," he says. "The most amusing thing was that the image of me had lipstick on. I'm not sure what they were trying to tell me."
After a falling out with since-ousted Governor Andrew Cuomo, Byford left the MTA and went to oversee London's transport system, the New York Times reports. As of April 2023, he's back in America with a new mission: Gaining enough political support, and funding, to finally start the type of high-speed rail service he says is already commonplace in Europe, Asia, Russia, Morocco—"everywhere except the US. The US is the outlier."
Byford defines high-speed as trains that can go at least 160mph. Amtrak's lines currently achieve far lower speeds, such as the six-hour, 70mph journey from Boston to Washington, D.C. "It takes that long because the train cannot go at its full speed," Byford says.
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