Rail backers call for Republicans to fund project

State House Republicans should get out of the way of passenger trains to Iowa City, a contingent of Senate Democrats said today in Cedar Rapids.

“This is a great opportunity for the state of Iowa, and we shouldn't let it pass by,” Sen. Rob Hogg, D-Cedar Rapids,  told a gathering at Greene Square Park.

The project to restore service between Chicago and Iowa City could lose $230 million in federal funds if the state doesn't appropriate its $20 million share. That's not fully due until July 2013, but Hogg said House Republicans have blocked both a $6 million initial appropriation and the authorizing legislation to spend it.

“We've been told by the governor that he's not going to stand in the way of passenger rail, if that's what the Legislature wants to do,” Hogg said.

Republican critics of the plan have said they doubt the service would meet supporters' expectations, leaving the state to cover additional costs.

Iowa would subsidize the service for costs in excess of ticket revenues, an amount estimated at $1 million to $3 million a year. Sen. Matt McCoy, D-Des Moines, said the rail subsidy would come from the Reinvest in Iowa Fund, which gets about $115 million a year in gambling revenues.

“I think it's a great opportunity,” said McCoy, chairman of the Transportation, Infrastructure, and Capital Appropriations Subcommittee. “The big holdup on this is in the House. The Senate, they're all strong supporters.”

Hogg and McCoy said the twice-daily Iowa City-Chicago roundtrips, set to start in 2015 if the state comes up with its share, would offer residents an option as gas hits $4 a gallon.

“The future is about finding more efficient ways to move,” said McCoy. “We have the money to fund this. There isn't any transportation anywhere you look that isn't subsidized.”

The press conference was held near the site of Cedar Rapids Union Station, scene of the comings and goings of dozens of passenger trains during the 1930s and '40s but torn down in 1961. Gary Wicklund said he often went to the station to meet his father, a railway mail clerk, and to pick up out-of-town newspapers for delivery on his bicycle.

Wicklund, 71, president of the business consulting group Capricorn Research, said he'd prefer the train for his frequent business trips to Chicago.

“The bus is an option, but the schedule's different,” he said. “To connect with the hubs in the east, and later also to the west, is the future.”