page_title: Amtrak
section_title: The 1980s and 1990s
hierarchical_section_title: Amtrak / History / The 1980s and 1990s
caption_attribution_description: English: Amtrak AEM-7 #943 with a Metroliner at Seabrook, Maryland in 1987
context_page_description: The National Railroad Passenger Corporation, doing business as Amtrak, is a passenger railroad service that provides medium and long-distance intercity service in the contiguous United States and to nine Canadian cities.
  Founded in 1971 as a quasi-public corporation to operate many U.S. passenger rail routes, Amtrak receives a combination of state and federal subsidies but is managed as a for-profit organization. The United States government through the Secretary of the United States Department of Transportation owns all the company's issued and outstanding preferred stock. Amtrak's headquarters is located one block west of Union Station in Washington, D.C.
  Amtrak serves more than 500 destinations in 46 states and three Canadian provinces, operating more than 300 trains daily over 21,400 miles of track. Amtrak owns approximately 623 miles of this track and operates an additional 132 miles of track. Some track sections allow trains to run as fast as 150 mph.
  In fiscal year 2018, Amtrak served 31.7 million passengers and had $3.4 billion in revenue, while employing more than 20,000 people. Nearly 87,000 passengers ride more than 300 Amtrak trains on a daily basis.
context_section_description: In 1982, former Secretary of the Navy and retired Southern Railway head William Graham Claytor Jr. came out of retirement to lead Amtrak. Despite frequent clashes with the Reagan administration over funding, Claytor enjoyed a good relationship with John H. Riley, the head of the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), and with members of Congress. Limited funding led Claytor to use short-term debt to fund operations.
  Building on mechanical developments in the 1970s, high-speed Washington–New York Metroliner Service was improved with new equipment and faster schedules. Travel time between New York and Washington D.C was reduced to under 3 hours. According to the 1980 Amtrak Annual Report, a converted 12-car set saved the company approximately $250,000 a year in fuel, maintenance and yard support costs. Amtrak completed the head-end power conversion program in 1982. Demand for passenger rail service resulted in the creation of five new state-supported routes in California, Illinois, Missouri, Oregon and Pennsylvania, for a total of 15 state-supported routes across the nation.
  Ridership stagnated at roughly 20 million passengers per year amid uncertain government aid from 1981 to about 2000. Thomas Downs succeeded Claytor in 1993. Amtrak's stated goal remained "operational self-sufficiency". By this time, however, Amtrak had a large overhang of debt from years of underfunding, and in the mid-1990s, Amtrak suffered through a serious cash crunch. Under Downs, Congress included a provision in the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997 that resulted in Amtrak receiving a $2.3 billion tax refund that resolved their cash crisis. However, Congress also instituted a "glide-path" to financial self-sufficiency, excluding railroad retirement tax act payments.
  George Warrington became president in 1998 with a mandate to make Amtrak financially self-sufficient. Passengers became "guests" and there were expansions into express freight work, but the financial plans failed. Amtrak's inroads in express freight delivery created additional friction with competing freight operators, including the trucking industry. Delivery was delayed of much anticipated high-speed trainsets for the improved Acela Express service, which promised to be a strong source of income and favorable publicity along the Northeast Corridor between Boston and Washington, D.C.
caption: An EMD AEM-7 with a Metroliner in 1987. The AEM-7 was Amtrak's workhorse on electrified routes for over 30 years.
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