Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor Power Supply Is

How could the one piece of passenger rail in this country that more or less, kind of, approximately, works as a business—the closest thing we have to a modern electric European railway—break down so often?

The answer is likely a toxic combination of deferred maintenance on a fraying and ancient power supply.

This piece led to Hicks joining the Brian Lehrer Show for “What’s up With Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor?”:

There’s no singular set of standards, there’s no singular management entity, and there’s no singular regulatory body in charge of overseeing the capital and the operations of the Northeast Corridor. Someone was telling me that, ironically, it’s the most important rail corridor in America, but it also probably has the least amount of planning and actual supervision.