Cascades line boasts more trekkers.

Byline: MARK BAKER The Register-Guard

ABOARD THE AMTRAK CASCADES - This was a trial run.

If it worked out, the whole crew was considering a longer train trek in the future - all the way to Disneyland.

"Do you think you could make it all the way to Los Angeles?" Bridget Mang asked her 4-year-old granddaughter, Leticia.

"Yep," came the simple reply.

For Mang and her three daughters, and her four grandchildren, Friday's trip to Portland on Amtrak from their home in Albany was a special occasion.

It was a first-time trip for the grandchildren as the family headed north to the big city to pick out a wedding dress for Mang's daughter, Lisa, and to celebrate the 25th birthday of another daughter, Rachel.

Mang, however, is a frequent train rider. "I don't have to worry about traffic and parking," she said.

Despite the slow economy and a sluggish travel industry, ridership increased on the Eugene-to-Vancouver, B.C., Amtrak Cascades run for the second straight year in 2002.

About 577,000 riders used the service in 2002, a 3 percent increase from 2001, a year in which train travel rose dramatically nationwide after the Sept. 11 terrorists attacks on the East Coast.

The Eugene-to-Portland run saw just a 1 percent increase from 2001, with about 120,000 trips, said Bob Krebs, intercity passenger rail coordinator for the state Department of Transportation.

But an increase is just that, Krebs said. "We're pleased, with the way the economy's going, that we've maintained a marginal increase this year," he said.

During the Amtrak Cascades run from Eugene to Salem on Friday, a few business travelers could be found, along with those heading north to visit friends and a lot of people who just don't like to drive.

"If it wasn't for the train, I'd lose my job," Neal Terry said. A mechanic in Springfield, Terry, 40, has taken the train from his home in Salem since moving there a year ago. "My boss thinks I'm crazy," said Terry, who likes his graveyard shift, and the pay, too much to look for work in Salem.

So every night he hops on the train and heads south, then returns the next morning to greet his wife, and often some of the couple's eight children, at the stately, 85-year-old train station in Salem.

The fate of Amtrak, a federally supported service, is still very uncertain. In 1997, Congress gave it a five-year deadline to become self-sufficient or liquidate. But then Congress infused Amtrak with about $500 million in 2002 to keep it from going bankrupt, Oregon 4th District Rep. Peter DeFazio said Friday.

And both the House and Senate will most likely consider again this year whether to OK a long-term package to save Amtrak. "We're in the middle of a pitched battle to save the national rail system," said DeFazio, a member of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.

However, there are many in Washington, D.C., who would like to break up Amtrak and see part of the system, the most profitable part, privatized, DeFazio said.

"But then what does it connect to?" he said of the rest of Amtrak's nationwide system, noting that "It doesn't provide (the nation) with a viable transportation alternative" such as those in Europe, China and Japan.

Amtrak had announced plans to stop all its long-distance train service last year, including the Seattle-to-Los Angeles Coast Starlight run that goes through Eugene. The service is still up and running, however, as demonstrated by a busy afternoon crowd boarding the northbound Coast Starlight in Eugene on Friday afternoon.

The success of the Cascades run, launched in 1993, is proof that Congress should support Amtrak, DeFazio said. The congressman recently showed his colleagues on the transportation committee Amtrak numbers from the Northwest, as compared to the rest of the nation, "and they were astounded," he said.

In the Northwest, we have a strong "ethic" when it comes to finding alternative transportation sources, DeFazio said, adding that the region has beautiful scenery, too.

A Washington Post newspaper story in early December said the Cascades service "is an example of what can happen when simplicity meets a transportation need. In many ways, the service is a working model of what the Bush administration is pushing for as the Amtrak of the future - a reliable, high-volume regional service that, despite what state officials complain is a lack of federal funding commitment, does well with the help of significant state support."

The Cascades service is operated by Amtrak but Washington state owns two of its five train sets and Oregon owns one. The trains are maintained under contract with Spanish train manufacturer Talgo which makes the equipment used on the Cascades service.

Oregon and Washington have contributed $140 million in capital funds for the service since 1993 and Amtrak has contributed $90 million, according to the Washington Post story.

Compared to plane travel, taking the train is relatively inexpensive, with Eugene-to-Portland fares as low as $20. However, passengers often complain of trains being late because Amtrak has to share the tracks with freight trains.

Although ridership is up in the Northwest, it's a shame more people don't ride the train, Eugene's Trudy Cook said as she knitted while riding from Eugene to Portland on Friday to visit a friend.

Born and raised in Ireland, where train travel is common, Cook, 38, remembers trains passing her home daily in the city of Westport.

"It's just kind of comforting hearing the train go by," she said in her Irish brogue.

CAPTION(S):

Two-year-old Faith Williams (left) and Leticia Avalos-Mang, 4, enjoy the view as they travel north on the Cascades Amtrak train with their families. The Cascades Amtrak train leaves the station in Salem bound for Portland. The future of Amtrak train services is still unclear.