All Aboard with the Big Sky Passenger Rail Authority

Montana currently has only one passenger train line: The Empire Builder, which runs along the Hi-Line in the northern part of the state. That wasn’t always the case – and the Big Sky Passenger Rail Authority is looking to reinstate a former southern route that would connect towns and cities to each other and neighboring states.

This week the commissioners were joined by Dan Bucks to discuss the status of expanding passenger train service, the potential economic benefits and much more. 

Thank you to Missoula's Community Media Resource for podcast recording support!

Transcript

Juanita Vero: [00:00:10] Welcome back to the agenda with your Missoula County Commissioners. I'm Juanita Vero and I'm here with my fellow commissioners Dave Strohmaier and Josh Slotnick. And today we're joined by Dan Bucks, a friend of the podcast and committee chair for the big Sky Passenger Rail Authority. Welcome, Dan.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:00:28] That is an anemic train whistle. We got to do better than that. Wow.

Dan Bucks: [00:00:32] Well thank you Dave. If there's. And thank you, Juanita. It's a pleasure to be here. This is a fantastic podcast, and I admire the work that everyone here at Missoula County does, including getting the word out through the agenda.

Josh Slotnick: [00:00:46] Well, I'm going to say anemic or not, as I think we've learned from the last elections. Everything does better with schwag. So and having things like this, it's going to help.

Juanita Vero: [00:00:57] You describe what you're holding.

Josh Slotnick: [00:00:58] This is this is a train whistle that says train whistle on it. In case you think it's just just something to thump on the. Yeah. So having this kind of thing is going to further the efforts of big Sky passenger rail I think. So I'm bringing this up. But this is a softball question, and I'm only doing this because Juanita did the intro. And it would be just ridiculous for Dave to ask this question. So I am asking this question, what, Dan, is the goal of the big Sky Passenger Rail Authority and I guess back up just a teeny bit. What's your role in the big Sky Passenger Rail Authority such that you can answer this question with authority?

Dan Bucks: [00:01:33] Well, I'm a volunteer with the authority.

Josh Slotnick: [00:01:35] I am just a guy.

Dan Bucks: [00:01:37] Just a guy who works with Dave.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:01:39] Although, have you watched The Wizard of Oz? There's someone behind the curtain here who's very powerful. So.

Josh Slotnick: [00:01:46] So you have no official title?

Dan Bucks: [00:01:47] I'm the chair of the Development and Strategic Engagement Committee of the authority.

Josh Slotnick: [00:01:52] I knew you had some. I knew you had something going on there.

Dan Bucks: [00:01:55] And it does outreach to the public, to various groups, tries to create mechanisms for support for the authority and input into the authority in its decision making. And of course, it looks to enhance the finances for the project to make sure the money flows in that's needed to operate the authority and more importantly, to develop the passenger rail service that we hope will come about. Great Big Passenger Rail Authority was founded to expand passenger rail service in Montana and beyond, and it must be beyond because the trains don't just run here, they connect to someplace else, which is part of their great value. So that's the goal, is to expand passenger rail service in this region, including through Montana. That's kind of the transportation objective. There's a broader public objective, a public purpose of in the process of revitalizing and the or expanding passenger rail. We intend to revitalize communities across this region, particularly small rural communities, tribal nations and and larger communities as well. And to create a growing, sustainable economy that's good for people, good for the environment, and good in the long term for the future of this region overall.

Josh Slotnick: [00:03:13] So we could say passenger rail is a medium for doing economic development.

Dan Bucks: [00:03:18] Community development.

Josh Slotnick: [00:03:19] Community.

Dan Bucks: [00:03:19] Development, economic and community development. It'll expand opportunities for education, better access to health care, healthier communities that can sustain themselves better, and a whole variety of other purposes.

Josh Slotnick: [00:03:30] Has this been proved out on the High Line? Yes, that would be the Empire Builder. Yes, call it that.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:03:35] Yeah, so I will I'll just jump in here. The Empire Builder is our closest example of how this plays out right to us here in Missoula, Montana. I frequently tell folks that if you're looking for some semblance of an analogy of what we are shooting for in southern Montana, we need look no farther than the Empire Builder, although there is a caveat that I'll add. And that is, we are not trying to emulate your last worst experience on a passenger train. Be that 3040 years ago or last week if you were on the Empire Builder and it was delayed. But yes, I think if you were to ask folks who live in Malta, who live in Harvard, who live in Wolf Point and all manner of places in between there along the high line of Montana, what you will hear is a resounding yes. This train is a lifeline to our communities. It is both a means for us to access services beyond our community. It's a means for visitors to our state to access our locations. And the other take home message is contrary to some who might think if we talk about train travel, this is just some sort of nostalgic thing. It's a relic of the past and and we need to just move on and, and accept the reality that modern transportation is not looking in that rear view mirror. And what we frequently say, what I say is absolutely not. This is not just about nostalgia. I will say that traveling on a train provides a very different sort of experience to the traveler than if you were behind the wheel of a motor vehicle, or as I did last week, as we all did last week.

Josh Slotnick: [00:05:20] Well, I was.

Juanita Vero: [00:05:21] I was on a.

Josh Slotnick: [00:05:21] Plane. I was just going to ask you about your train trip last week, if I understand it right. You rode the famous Acela that goes 150 miles an hour. This is not your grandfather's train. Yeah. How was it? It's from D.C. to New York.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:05:34] It was. It was great. I rode the Acela from D.C. to New York City when we were all back on the East Coast last week for the National Association of Counties meeting. Not only is it way more comfortable than being crammed into the aluminum tube that shuttles at 30 or 40,000ft, my knees hurt, but I was able to get up, stroll down to the cafe car, get a snack, leisurely talk to my family on the train. A much different experience. So while Dan is absolutely correct that transportation, this mode of transportation is a means to an end of and the end is community development and vitality, there is an aspect in which it is an end unto itself. By virtue of the fact that the experience of traveling on a train is very different than other modes of transportation. But again, this is not about nostalgia. It's not about recreating a period of time and an experience that may be never fully existed as folks remember it. But it's a both and.

Josh Slotnick: [00:06:38] It sounds like it's about community development and economic development, right?

Dan Bucks: [00:06:42] Going to Dave's point about the experience of riding a passenger train being different, that is very true. It is the only form of major transportation that actually helps pull communities together and pull people together. Both the experience on the train, where there's time for people who've never met before to meet each other, to learn from each other. The experience of a train is very different from being crammed into an airplane or being isolated in your car. A train is an enriching experience in in human terms. Sure. But beyond that, there's something else about trains that people need to understand. The route that big Sky Passenger Rail Authority is focusing on first, and that Dave can talk about the progress of it, is along the length of the old route of of a train that was called the North Coast Hiawatha. We've renamed it temporarily to be the big Sky North Coast Corridor. It runs from Chicago to Seattle and potentially Portland as well. That train is a long distance train. So people say, oh, you pick up passengers in Chicago and they get dropped off in Seattle or Portland? No, that's what makes trains different. A long distance train really is a misleading term. 90% of the Empire Builders trips are trips that are between internal markets.

Josh Slotnick: [00:08:04] Within the route.

Dan Bucks: [00:08:05] Within the route, within the route from from Glasgow to Havre and back to Glasgow to Williston, North Dakota. Those are the kinds of trips that are taken, and it's that intermediate travel service that makes this different. Now, this is important to think about, because if you look at the whole region of the country that this route will serve from Chicago to Seattle, Portland, there is no air service among the 15 regional metropolitan areas below the largest metro areas. 60 years ago or so, there was air service between some of these mid-major cities like Missoula and to Billings sometimes, or Bismarck to Spokane routes like that had air service. We've lost that air service. We used to have train service, abundant train service actually in this region. And trains can run in weather when cars can't. So we are left basically for our travel, our intermediate travel between communities. We are left with the interstate highway and it works pretty well. But it's not a reliable 24 over seven transportation system because of hazardous weather conditions at particular points that are closing passes or stretches of highway that are too windy to travel through or too icy because of the weather we have. As a result, today we have a transportation system in this region that is worse than it was in the 1960s in terms of reliability, versatility and choices for people and the ability of people within a state or within an area to relate to each other through travel. We can't do it in the way we could back in the 1960s, because the trains went away and the Air Service went away, and we were left with a less than fully weather resilient highway system.

Josh Slotnick: [00:10:00] Fewer options.

Dan Bucks: [00:10:01] Fewer options. And so what this route will do is to create options that we have lost and do even better if we are successful in the design of this route.

Juanita Vero: [00:10:11] But we want to talk about rail interference with passenger rail, or the perceptions that passenger rail will interfere with freight. Can you address that?

Dave Strohmaier: [00:10:19] That is a frequent question as far as okay is with the given volume of freight traffic passing through southern Montana, will passenger trains mess that up or just be unworkable? And so what's important to to remember and keep in mind is that what we are working on is not a proposal to simply this afternoon, sometime slap a bunch of additional passenger trains on the existing infrastructure and hope for the best. No, we are in a deep dive planning process to look at. How do you have synergy between freight and passenger operations?

Josh Slotnick: [00:11:00] Does that mean separate tracks?

Dave Strohmaier: [00:11:01] No, it means using the exact same infrastructure that we have today, but enhancing it here in the state of Montana. In fact, along this entire route that we're talking about, that Dan mentioned from Chicago to Seattle or Portland, it's where you see trains rolling. Today is where you will see the passenger trains rolling in the future. We're not talking about building an entirely separate dedicated line just for passenger trains. We're talking about using the existing enhanced and enhanced infrastructure for both. Just like with the High Line, freight trains and passenger trains are are what are Co utilized?

Josh Slotnick: [00:11:39] Is it just a matter of timing or does one can one move aside for the other in certain junctures.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:11:44] It would be both. So as we continue on developing what is called a service development plan for this route over the next 18 to 24 months, we'll be asking the question, what infrastructure improvements would be necessary on the ground to allow for the unimpeded operation of both freight and passenger trains? In some cases, that might mean an additional siding, which is basically a section of track where one train can pull over and allow the other train to pass. It would be additional double tracking, which is similar to a siding which allows two trains to pass each other in each direction. And also it certainly will be looking at the scheduling piece, because what we're proposing is not simply replicating what exists on the other 15 long distance routes in the United States today, which is at best a once daily service, one train in each direction. What we're talking about is twice daily, or maybe even three times daily service, meaning either two trains in each direction or even three trains in each direction every day. What this would allow you to do is get on a train here in Missoula, travel east to Bozeman or Billings, and potentially get a train on the same day back to your original location. Much more difficult if you're talking about just twice one time daily service, which means someone gets screwed every day because you're going to have a train in the middle of the night.

Josh Slotnick: [00:13:11] You're talking about multiple times a day on the North Coast, or it's not the North Coast Hiawatha anymore. It's the big Sky North Coast corridor.

Dan Bucks: [00:13:19] Yes, big Sky North coast corridor.

Josh Slotnick: [00:13:20] How can you measure market demand right now, or is this more of a build it and they will come kind of thing.

Dan Bucks: [00:13:25] In our planning process that the authority has been funded for to this point, we envision a some very sophisticated economic models and ridership prediction models being applied to test out, for example, different routes in smaller areas across the the whole region and different levels of frequency the two times daily or three times daily. There are models that exist that statisticians that we have that are part of our consulting team, will use to predict ridership under different kinds of frequency train station stops, scenarios, different frequency scenarios, different train station scenarios, and different routings in local areas, and hopefully some multiple routings in different local local areas where there are multiple possibilities for the trains to run that that can be predicted and estimated and that will be done. But what I think is important is for the public to understand is how everyday people who live along this line Montanans, North Dakotans, Washington State folks, people in Wisconsin and Minnesota, how they can use this line in ways that give them choices they don't have right now. If you're in Miles city, Montana, and you have a medical appointment in Billings and the and the snow is all over the ground or the ice is blocking the highway, a train can get you to a medical appointment and back again in a single day. If we have twice daily.

Josh Slotnick: [00:14:57] Maybe if because of your ailments, driving is not your thing.

Dan Bucks: [00:15:00] Or yes, or you may not have access to a vehicle, or you may, you may not be a driver. There's a fairly large percentage of the population that does not drive and doesn't always have access to a vehicle to access medical care. There's a movement in this in the state called agritourism, getting people to visit farm and ranch areas. This train is ideal for that. For bringing passengers a plane will get them to Billings. This train will get people to Glendive or to Forsyth, or potentially to if there's a new station there, Columbus, you know, and it can bring people to then who can access tourism in a more decentralized way, as opposed to just at a few locations? There's economic opportunities to be had from that small parcel delivery that we want to bring back with this. Can you imagine multiple scenarios where you have a well, we've heard a story of a retail store, a tourism oriented store in Terry, Montana, where the owner of this store is very excited about this train because he says, well, first of all, we can get visitors to to get closer to us. And if we don't have a stop in Terry, we'll have it in Glendive. We get people to come closer by. But he said, every year I have to drive around Montana to collect the craft items that I have to bring into my store. If I had a train that can bring it close to me, I can save a lot of money. He's already calculated out that he can save money and time and focus on marketing his store. Kids can get to college for sure all the.

Josh Slotnick: [00:16:36] I mean, this would serve the needs that transportation serves so so last.

Dan Bucks: [00:16:40] Week in ways that you cannot do today in better ways.

Josh Slotnick: [00:16:43] So last week in the in the New York Times, there was an article about this guy with a chainsaw who decided to attack our federal budget, who has said that passenger rail needs to fund itself. Amtrak doesn't make any money right now. If it can't cover its costs, it shouldn't exist. What would your response be to that.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:17:01] Before Dan jumps in with with his silver tongued response? I yeah, I just want to say this, this kind of is the the literal elephant in the room right now. And this is the challenge with that chainsaw wielding individual who you're referencing is that.

Juanita Vero: [00:17:17] He prefers investments in Mars.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:17:19] Yeah. Yes, yes.

Josh Slotnick: [00:17:21] So that's going to pay for itself.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:17:23] So, so so there are some kernels of truth in here in that the rail system we have in the United States, the passenger rail system is absolutely not what it ought to be. We have been left in the dust by much of.

Josh Slotnick: [00:17:38] We haven't invested in.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:17:39] It. We have not invested in it. And that that is a true statement that we are not at the point of that, that shining beacon of light on, on a hill as it relates to passenger rail. So there's work to be done. And we believe that what we are working on can help achieve that goal. And I'll tee this up. I think this is the question you're asking of Dan in terms of how does transportation operate or not operate like a business? And because the three of us here in local government, I don't think there's an inch of highway or road that pays for itself. This is all paid for with public investment of one type or another. I'm on the edge of my seat to see what Dan might say on this, to.

Josh Slotnick: [00:18:27] Ask to plains pay for themselves.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:18:29] No, no, they do not. If they did, none of us could.

Juanita Vero: [00:18:32] Afford.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:18:33] It. Yeah, we could not afford the ticket price.

Dan Bucks: [00:18:35] So. So let's talk about some down home comparisons here. First of all, in terms of cost. Trains come out very well in a cost benefit framework because passenger rail utilizes what is largely an existing infrastructure. Yes, it needs to be invested in and enhanced in terms of the rail lines to ensure the smooth flow of freight and passenger rail, together improving the capacity of both. But if you look at a project close to home, you're Russell Street project. The next stretch is about a mile long, $70 million total, as I understand it, to fix that one street. Now I'm acquainted with it. I frequently drive on that stretch, and I know it'll be a better street, but fixing it up doesn't create any new connections. It will create safer connections. And that's great. And and enable bikers and pedestrians to travel a bit better along that stretch. But that's $70 million for that one mile is in terms of the projected cost of this 2300 mile train, that Russell Street project costs 300 to 400 times per mile. The cost of this rail line rail is cheap in comparison to other sources of transportation, and I could go on with some examples.

Juanita Vero: [00:19:56] Say that again, because I bet listeners are going to pause and rewind.

Josh Slotnick: [00:19:59] Good.

Juanita Vero: [00:20:00] Good. Say that again.

Josh Slotnick: [00:20:01] Okay. Good.

Dan Bucks: [00:20:02] The projected costs. And I am taking higher projections of the capital investment now, which is in improving the tracks, putting in the train stations, making sure there's some connectivity to other communities. The high end costs are a fraction of the Russell Street project on a per mile base.

Josh Slotnick: [00:20:21] Per mile basis, not in total, but per mile.

Dan Bucks: [00:20:24] On a per mile basis will cost 300 to 400 times the cost per mile of this rail line that will connect communities that haven't been connected with safe, reliable transportation in decades. Hundreds of small communities, dozens of trade center communities. 20 metropolitan areas across this entire route connected again for the first time in a regular, reliable way. More than once daily. Now that's also go to the the question of well, yes, there's the capital cost, but what about the operating costs? You know, the Empire Builder is a great service and we'd like to improve that service as well because it doesn't operate on time. It's often late, there are too many delays, and it only operates one time daily in each direction. And even though it has those limitations, it has not been invested in enough, what have you. It's fare recovery has been about 60% of the operating costs, 60%.

Josh Slotnick: [00:21:29] How does that compare to other lines across the country?

Dan Bucks: [00:21:32] Well, it's one of the better ones in the country and which shows the potential in this region. It shows the fact that it gets utilized more in rural areas, because it is a positive choice that communities don't otherwise have. It's worth more to rural Americans than it is to urban Americans to have that service, because they don't have as many choices for travel as you do in urban areas. Now, I want to get back on the track here where it was.

Juanita Vero: [00:21:58] Was was.

Josh Slotnick: [00:22:00] It got derailed.

Josh Slotnick: [00:22:02] Not every time there's a train pun.

Dan Bucks: [00:22:04] So so the anyway, what I was talking about was the if we upgraded the Empire Builder. So this is within reach to make the point. If you upgraded it so that it was on time, 90% or more of the time within ten minutes, if it ran twice daily in each direction, if you had continuous Wi-Fi connectivity on the train, so that so that workers who are traveling to work can work on the train or you're keeping track. You're keeping in touch with family and friends that train service, that operating service gap in the budget, in my judgment, has a good shot of disappearing just through those.

Josh Slotnick: [00:22:45] You could bring it to 100% instead of 60%.

Dan Bucks: [00:22:47] So I think we have a shot. The point is, by using the Empire Builder as an example, you run a train that doesn't run on time too often, it's too often it's too late. And it it does not have on time performance, and it only runs once daily in each direction. You were to double or triple that frequency, run it on time and connect it to the modern world through the internet. And that train, I think, has a shot at paying for ourselves and our the train here in southern Montana would as well. So I think we have a real shot. The current data is such on fare recoveries on the existing deficient service means that if we had good high performance service, we can cover the operating costs. I think we have a shot at it.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:23:31] And I think it's okay to come to peace with the fact that it's all right. And in fact, this is the way every other mode of transportation works. It's okay for public investments in those capital costs, whether it's an airport terminal, whether it's maintaining our highways.

Josh Slotnick: [00:23:50] This is interesting how you phrase that, Dave. We have to come to terms and say, it's okay to do this when it's the only way it's done. Well, you basically you're saying we need to accept reality.

Dan Bucks: [00:24:00] Well...

Josh Slotnick: [00:24:01] We just we we're just witnessing an incredible transformation. And they've done such a fantastic job out there at our airport that's done with federal money. Right? That's how that's how that thing works. That's how every massive infrastructure project we do, which is small on a national scale and actual, real, massive infrastructure projects are done across the country. They are all publicly funded. Unless it's your private road, it's done with public money.

Dan Bucks: [00:24:25] There's a little per ticket fee that passengers getting on in Missoula pay that goes into the big fund that funds these things. We can guarantee ourselves that there is no way that that little nib on top of the passenger ticket that is paid by people departing from the Missoula airport pays for those airport improvements. The terminal itself a more than $100 million.

Josh Slotnick: [00:24:49] Oh, no. This is all major, major grants.

Dan Bucks: [00:24:51] Major grants. And that is not paid back. And people talk about does the train make a profit? Well, has anybody asked and figured out whether or not I-90 and I-94 make a profit? The answer is certainly not in the region between Fargo, North Dakota, and Spokane, Washington, through southern Montana and North Dakota, because the revenue that is collected from fuel taxes in this region do not pay for those roads. You see, the federal government never issues an accounting for the cost benefit. So people think, oh, everything's paying for itself. No, it is not. None of these transportation benefits.

Josh Slotnick: [00:25:28] The benefit is awfully hard to quantify. I mean, not that it can't be done, but it's really hard to quantify. I think of all the everybody moving about on a train or on a highway, how do we quantify what the benefit what's the economic benefit? If I'm driving to Bozeman to see my friend who's ill in the hospital? It's super important to me. But is there an economic benefit there? There's a huge benefit. My life would be much better with it.

Dan Bucks: [00:25:52] It's difficult to do it overall, but you can find major sources of data and information to calculate out what the benefits are. Let's take an example of the Veterans Administration. Here in Montana, we met with the operating officer of the Veterans Administration a couple of years ago. And he told us that out of Helena, they run clinics for veterans in Billings and Miles city. And to run those clinics, they put trained advanced medical staff, doctors, nurses, medical technicians in vehicles one day to drive to Billings and they can't and they are not able to work while they're doing this. Yeah, they drive to Billings and then they have one day of clinic, and then they turn around and drive back to Helena. The next day they lose two days of work time.

Juanita Vero: [00:26:41] And it's dangerous.

Dan Bucks: [00:26:42] And it's and it's dangerous and it's dangerous. That's an excellent point. If they were on a train, those medical professionals can do work while they're on the train. If there's Wi-Fi connectivity, or maybe they bring some of it along, they can update patient notes, they can prepare for the patients that they're going to serve, etc. the train converts dead time into work time. The same is true if banks are sending people out to train people in their branches, or to fix the information technology systems out there, businesses that use technology or businesses that have to deploy their staff in different directions at various times, you can quantify that. You can quantify how much when you put in train service because they know this, how much it boosts the economy of a small town that is measurable. I could give other examples. You can measure the benefit of access to health care. If you have pregnant women out in eastern Montana who cannot get prenatal and postnatal care, there is a known cost to that to society, and we can calculate what the benefit of this train will be.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:27:48] And take a local example, that is our mountain line busses here in Missoula. We've made a conscious choice in our community to have zero fare because of the social benefit to our citizenry here, and there is no expectation that we are going to have fare recovery because we we have no fares. So and that is another thing that.

Juanita Vero: [00:28:12] Actually.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:28:12] Costs.

Juanita Vero: [00:28:13] More to administer.

Josh Slotnick: [00:28:14] Fares. It turns out that the collection of fares turns out to be an onerous and highly costly, and not worth it.

Juanita Vero: [00:28:21] Can we go back to talk about the last mile, because I'm thinking of when folks get to their destination. They're not still at their final destination. So what do we how do we talk about?

Dan Bucks: [00:28:31] I'm glad you asked that. We've just launched an expanded a government partners program with cities and towns along the route, because we're thinking of this route, not simply as a train that runs along a track and stops at stations along the way, maybe approximately every 50 miles or so. The corridor is not just the width of the track and the station. We see the corridor as a quarter of opportunity that in some cases, stretches out as much as 100 miles in either direction from the tracks, so that you have actually up to a 200 mile corridor of opportunity. If you connect towns and communities and tribal nations that are off the route and destinations that are off the route. So we're working we've we've created a government partners program. We're working with cities and towns in Montana, in North Dakota. We're inviting them in on the rest of the route as well, to come and join us in this and trying to get them the help they need to plan their train stations. If they are a candidate for a train station, to plan development around the train station in terms of businesses and housing, that makes sense around a train station and then connecting services. The last mile services that you were talking about when needed to destinations and locations off the line. And there will be different solutions in different places. It may be busses. In some cases it may be simply on demand shuttles or regular shuttle shuttle service. Or it could even be some commuter rail type lines that get developed along here. We will stimulate that discussion and that planning as we plan the route.

Josh Slotnick: [00:30:10] This has been in the works for a while. You guys have received a bunch of money. Where are we at right now in the process? On making the North Coast Big Sky corridor a reality.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:30:23] It's coming down the tracks, Josh.

Josh Slotnick: [00:30:25] Coming down the tracks. Yeah. Where? Where are we? 

Dave Strohmaier: [00:30:30] You're right. We Have made great progress. So the big Sky Passenger Rail Authority, for those folks out there in our listening world who don't know, is a government agency in the state of Montana, we're a subdivision of state government. We were created by counties. Missoula County, being one of the founding member counties of the Rail Authority came into existence in 2020.

Juanita Vero: [00:30:49] Was Dawson the second county? Ooh, Sanders.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:30:52] Dawson... I.. That is a good trivia question. I do not know which the what the second county was, but there were there were 12 initial counties who were signatories of the joint resolution to establish the authority. Today we're up to 18 counties stretching from Sanders all the way to Wibaux County. And two of our signature accomplishments in the last four years, of which Dan sitting next to me, has played a huge role in these. One Was getting into the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, or bipartisan Infrastructure law language that directed the US Department of Transportation to conduct a nationwide study of restoring discontinued Amtrak routes or creating new routes that have never existed in the past. This was called the Amtrak Daily Long Distance Service Study. The final report was delivered from the Federal Railroad Administration to the US Congress on the morning of January 20th. No real surprise there. Why? That date was the date because administrations changed later that day. That report was delivered to Congress. And for Montana, there were two big recommendations that benefit this state. Coming out of that report. One is a preferred route for restoration, being this former North Coast Hiawatha route now being called the big Sky North Coast Corridor. The second one was a potential future route between El Paso, Texas and Billings, Montana. So Montana is the epicenter of two of the preferred routes in this report that went to Congress just a couple of months ago. The second big signature accomplishment of the rail authority is inclusion in what is called the Corridor Identification and Development Program. This is the project development pipeline of the Federal Railroad Administration. So as opposed to the report that I just mentioned, which was a report full of recommendations to Congress. We have kind of leapt over the other routes recommended in that report for restoration and are actually included in this program, which is the project development pipeline. The mechanism by which projects move from concept into actual design and engineering and implementation. So where we are right now, this is a three step program. We in the next couple of months we'll be wrapping up step one which is scoping. So we got $500,000 to develop a scope, schedule and budget to create.

Josh Slotnick: [00:33:23] What does scoping mean in this case?

Dave Strohmaier: [00:33:25] Well, it is basically creating a scope of work for a service development.

Josh Slotnick: [00:33:30] What would be done.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:33:31] What will be done in a service development plan. So the service development plan is that document that will answer all of the burning questions that are on people's minds, some of which we've touched on today, like what are the infrastructure investments necessary to accommodate both freight and passenger trains? What will the schedule look like? What will the trains themselves look like? Where will the station stops be? That is in the service development plan. What we're doing right now is to figure out what are all of those elements that need to be analyzed in that plan, how much is it going to cost to create the plan, and what is the schedule? Our hope is that we'll be wrapping up this scoping phase in April or May of this year. Then we'll move into this service development planning phase, which is about probably an 18 or 24 month project. This is the longest long distance route in the nation in the corridor identification program. It's the only new long distance route in the entire United States in the program. So it's going to be a heavy lift and a big undertaking once we finish that service development plan. Step three of this program is engineering and Nepa environmental analysis. At the end of all of this, probably three years or so from now, if all goes according to plan, we will have a shovel ready project that can be implemented. There's a lot of work that needs to happen with Congress between now and then. We haven't even touched on the need to figure out how to fabricate enough train sets to service this route and manufacturing capacity limitations in the United States.

Juanita Vero: [00:35:12] Where are trains manufactured?

Dave Strohmaier: [00:35:14] Funny you should ask that, Juanita.

Dan Bucks: [00:35:17] They're made in different places, but there are major manufacturing facilities in New York. There's a new facility in Salt Lake City, relatively new, that Dave has visited. And there's a facilities in California on both coasts and some places in between. I'm glad you asked this, because we think there's opportunities to actually locate manufacturing in Montana, and we have some ideas in mind and we have done some inquiries. We think that's something that we will bird dog, if you wish, follow as we can and and pursue if the opportunities present themselves as we develop this route, it's not lost on us. If there's manufacturing capacity needed, maybe we could provide that capacity right here within this state.

Josh Slotnick: [00:36:04] Great opportunity.

Juanita Vero: [00:36:05] So one more thing. How can folks get involved?

Dave Strohmaier: [00:36:08] Excellent question. And for folks out there who have an interest in this topic of passenger rail expansion throughout big Sky country and beyond. Check out the website of the big Sky Passenger Rail Authority. Big Sky rail.org, or tune in for one of our bimonthly Rail Authority Board meetings. All of our meetings are open to the public. All of our committee meetings are open. We're looking for volunteers, passionate volunteers, just like our guest today, Dan Buck. And also at this moment in time, at this moment in history, our elected leaders, particularly our members of Congress, need to hear from you if they do not hear from their constituents here in the state of Montana about passenger rail or any other issue for that matter, they will likely assume that it is not that important of an issue, and they'll move on to the squeaky wheels that are out there. So get engaged in multiple ways. And all aboard.

Josh Slotnick: [00:37:07] Well, we're we're winding down here as.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:37:10] We.

Josh Slotnick: [00:37:10] Often as we often do. Yes. So we asked this last question of everyone who comes to visit in the recent past. Have you run into any little bit of culture you feel is worthy of repeating a podcast, a book, a song, and anything somebody said to you?

Dan Bucks: [00:37:26] You know, luck would have it. I have read reread a book that was published in 1920 on the taxation of mines in Montana. Whoa!

Dave Strohmaier: [00:37:37] Josh.

Juanita Vero: [00:37:38] Of course.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:37:39] What are the odds?

Josh Slotnick: [00:37:40] I know.

Dan Bucks: [00:37:40] But by Louis Levine.

Josh Slotnick: [00:37:42] By Louis levine.

Dan Bucks: [00:37:43] Louis Levine, who's very famous because he was a professor of economics. He came in 1916 right here at the University of Montana. All right. Uh, a graduate of a fancy graduate schools and that kind of thing. And he came to Montana and he was asked to examine the taxation system in Montana. And he did. So he went to a publisher in New York to publish it, because word got out about what was in this book and it caused a disturbance because, among other things, he pointed out that the Anaconda Company.

Josh Slotnick: [00:38:18] I knew they were coming next.

Dan Bucks: [00:38:20] Paid taxes at about half the rate in relation to their revenue. Property taxes, as were being paid by farmers in the state. And he said that wasn't fair. And he analyzed a lot of the details about the taxation of mines. He also wrote a history of taxation up to that time in Montana. And what I learned from this, a piece of culture and history is, is that the last territorial governor addressing the new state legislature said that the fundamental problem that needed to be solved was the equalization of property tax in the state.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:38:57] Weight.

Josh Slotnick: [00:38:58] Of those burdens. Way to bring it back.

Dan Bucks: [00:39:00] And Louis Levine documented that. And governor after governor after that, kept talking about equalization.

Josh Slotnick: [00:39:07] Oh, I can't wait to read.

Dan Bucks: [00:39:09] And then and now. But it's, you know. Louis Levine was ran out of the state by the Anaconda company.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:39:16] Josh, I see a rail out here with your name on it. So?

Dan Bucks: [00:39:20] So anyway. But. So he paid a price for this. Now, he went on, he was a famous economist nationally and globally. One of his his last tasks in his life was to help write the Marshall Plan to recover Europe. So this this was a real this was a real substantive guy who wrote this book and who upset the Anaconda Company at the time because they were paying less taxes than they should have been. But so what I took away from this book is that this question of equalizing property tax burdens, that so much on the minds of Montanans these days is not a new problem. It dates back to the very beginning of the state, and it has a very colorful and important history. So thank you for asking.

Josh Slotnick: [00:40:03] Yeah, that's a that's a great one. Thanks for sharing it.

Juanita Vero: [00:40:06] Thanks so much everyone.

Josh Slotnick: [00:40:07] Thanks, everybody.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:40:08] Thank you.

Dan Bucks: [00:40:08] Thank you.

Josh Slotnick: [00:40:10] Thanks for listening to the agenda. If you enjoy these conversations, it would mean a lot if you would rate and review the show on whichever podcast app you use.

Juanita Vero: [00:40:18] And if you know a friend who would like to keep up with what's happening in local government, be sure to recommend this podcast to them.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:40:23] The agenda with the Missoula County Commissioners is made possible with support from Missoula Community Access Television, better known as MCAT, and our staff in the Missoula County Communications Division.

Josh Slotnick: [00:40:36] If you have a question or a topic you'd like us to discuss on a future episode, email it to communications@missoulacounty.us.

Juanita Vero: [00:40:43] To find out other ways to stay up to date with what's happening in Missoula County, go to Missoula.co/countyupdates.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:40:51] Thanks for listening.