me first state that i hope there will be funding tore projects other than those that may be further along than the texas t-bone, and if you could apply right now for federal funding in part of this stimulus, what would you ask for it to do? >> today, our biggest need is the market and environmental engineering studies. before we go on the ground with a system we want to make sure that it's a system that will be viable, will have the market that will support the system. unlike the east coast, we don't have regular service between houston and dallas today. so to develop one we need to make sure that we are building a system which can be priced so we can compete with the automobiles, with the aircraft and also to keep an operational system. i do think bringing the discipline of the marketplace to the system can help set a fair schedule and construction,

you know, of the technology that will make sense and would be viable for the long term for the state. >> let me ask mr. szabo, i'm looking at a map, basically the amtrak system with the high speed corridors that have been designated, the 11 that have been designated in the darker red, and is this the beginning of a planned system, that those are investments that are already being made? and do you favor the ones that are already in the amtrak system being upgraded to high speed or are you looking at other factors like a new high speed rail project that might feed into amtrak and therefore enhance amtrak's capabilities? >> one of the next steps we

absolutely must take is the development of a national rail plan. when i say that, i mean it from a most comprehensive standpoint. we have to understand how high-speed rail is going to overlay on traditional intler city rail, how commuter rail is going to overlay on top of that. and frankly, we have to understand how it's going to interact with the freight rail network. so there are all these components that need to be looked at to ensure we have a comprehensive strategy when it comes to rail. you can't talk about high speed rail without talking about the impact on freights. you know that map is a document that happens to exist today, but certainly there's the need for a much bolder, clearer vision. and a national strategy on how to get there. >> have you ever talked or even put on the table with the amtrak corridors that do share

freight rail lines, which make for problems of on time service, which then cause problems at the fare box, have you put on the table, sharing the space and adding a line on the same corridor as the freight rail, which if you could get a reasonable deal, like maybe free use of that space in exchange for getting out of the freight rail system, which they would certainly benefit them, because they don't like dealing with amtrak, have you ever thought about trying to get a second rail on the same right of way as one of the ways for higher speed rail service in highly congested

corridors? >> i think clearly there's multiple options. the key is that whatever we do, and clearly if we're going to have true high speed rail, it has to be on a dedicated corridor, but whatever we do,  we have to make sure we achieve a win-win relationship with the freight industry. we have an obligation to make sure that if the passenger trains are operating, that they're operating on time, you know, clearly reliability is a very critical component of ensuring a high quality passenger rail operation and growing ridership. >> have you looked at having a separate track, though, to make that happen? you can talk about it, but in reality, at least on the sunset limited and the texas eagle i know so well, the experience has not been good. >> yeah. i mean, any of these options

can be considered. >> well, i would ask if, in the parameters of the spending of this stimulus money, that is a factor, if looking at those congested areas where you might be able to get a more streamlined service for high speed rail if that might be an option? >> certainly that could be a component that would be measured in a state's application to us. you know, there are clear advantages to that, as far as reliability which is one of the components we measure, safety, which is one of the components we measure, so again if that was part of an application, it's a criteria that could be viewed favorably. >> a state effort is one criteria that would be very important for matching funds and then possibly if you could ease congestion for better

service and higher speed rail in state application, that would be a good factor. >> that's right, yes. >> judge exels, let me ask you -- eckels, let me ask you, obviously the texas t-bone is not going to be looking at an amtrak route, but are there options on the texas t-bone that might provide duel-rail with freight line, are or you looking at a different, all-new right of way. >> senator, the very fast track portion of the system, as mr. szabo pointed out, the system would have to have its own tracks. we think the whole system should be a separate track anyway. but as you described, in the urban corridors, the highway 290 corridor coming into houston we partner with the

harris county toll authority, the yube pacific railroad, the houston met reauthority and the high speed rail and right of way and share a common corridor. the idea where it's appropriate to lay a track adjacent to freight railroads, and there's a number of places where that makes a lot of place, particularly in the urban areas where you have a limited right of way. as we move out, it depends on the demand we get from the freight side. we have found them to be reluctant to give up the right of way, claiming they need it for future development and it's theirs. it's a continuous problem. we're not for taking a lot of new right of way, we'd like to consolidate as much as possible with txdot as much as possible. >> that's what -- i just think

coming to some realistic terms with the freight rail is going to be in everyone's interest. because they have a business to run and you can understand their wanting to keep control of their tracks. that's why i think getting sort of separated out where we can, but not having the huge expense of eminent domain and those issues. >> there are many places where it's cheaper for us to relocate the freight rail and buy them a new area than for us to try to condemn a new right of way. >> thank you very much. my time is up, i appreciate all of your coming in and helping us get through this it is a very important new capability for america to have true multimodal planning for transportation. thank you. >> thank you, senator hutchison. as senator boxer was leave she

mentioned the letter between she and senator rockefeller and asked that it be put as part of the record, there's no objection, it will be ordered to be part of the official record. governor rendell, i appreciate your enthusiasm for capital budgets and also high speed rail. i wish in a way we could get the same kind of enthusiasm in the west and one of my questions here was, why no high speed rail corridor in the southwest. we have good sized population centers in el paso, albuquerque, denver, as i look at the map here, it looks like that would make sense. i'm wondering, congress, we haven't designated or haven't authorized its 11th -- we have

authorized 11 high speed rail corridor, yet the department of transportation has only designated 10. i hope you're reserving that last one for the southwest. but could you tell me a little bit of the thinking on the 11th and where you are and what's the -- what your thoughts are on an el paso-albuquerque-denver corridor? >> i'm assuming that's to me. >> yes. yes it is, mr. szabo. >> frankly there's no position to announce at this time relative to any 11th high speed rail corridor, but the important thing is it's not necessary to be an applicant under the grant guidance we've issued. i think most of this gets addressed again as we start taking a look at a national rail plan. quite frankly, it's possible

that there's the need for more than 11. we need to take a look at where are those markets where there's good potential, what is the interest from those states? and historically, there's not been a strong interest from the southwest, but it sounds like the level of enthusiasm frankly nationwide is changing considerably. so i think the issues of whether there's an 11th corridor a 12th corridor a 13th whatever will get fleshed out as we put together a national rail plan. >> senator, could i take a shot at that? >> yes. >> i think the way this is going to happen is to do it. i think that's what mr. skancke said, it's up to us to find a way to do it to scale. i think it comes incrementally. if i could, and i've thought and thought and i've had wall street people in to try to see

how i could finance high speed rail from philadelphia to pittsburgh, 200-mile-per-hour rail. if we built that, there's no doubt in my mind that others would be 200 miles per hour and from pittsburgh to detroit to chicago, the texas t-bone may be your best shot. if they can build it and prove it work, how tough is it to take it -- i don't know if el paso is on the t-bone -- >> el paso isn't, but el paso is one of the strongest supporters of high speed rail, not that they expect to see the line to houston, but the line from el paso to albuquerque to denver, and they see the proof in the system on t-bone, this would be the next step to provide the capacity to build the el paso route to albuquerque and on to other points in the west. >> the -- one of the things that's been fascinating in new

mexico, governor richardson stepped up and did commuter rail and there were a lot of doubts, an earlier governor talked about doing it, was ridiculed by the press but he stepped up and did it, on time, on schedule, ended up, it's been going about nine months now, it's past the 2 millionth passenger and in a very short period of time. one of you, i think it was mr. skancke mentioned reliable -- you used the term reliable ridership and predictions. i don't think anybody would have predicted in new mexico, now granted this is the same period where we hit $4 gasoline and we're a terribly rural state and people are known to travel 120, 150 miles a day to work. just to commute. but that -- it sounds a little

bit like governor rendell you build it and the people are going to come. i think, looking at our energy future, i don't know if any of you have comments on that, it may be very hard to predict what reliable ridership is right now. please, governor rendell. >> if o.m.b., c.b.o. and the g.a.o. were predicted the success of columbus' venture if they were advising queen isabel lark we'd all be speaking italian. i garne tee you. you hit it right on the head, senator. some of this we've got to do because a we know it works in other parts of the world, and some of this we've got to do on faith. when i invested $7 million dollars in commonwealth, that's not a lot of money down here we spend that sum of money before breakfast in washington but for the commonwealth that's a nice hunk of change. i wasn't sure.

there wasn't a study that said we'd jump up ridership that much. but i knew we had to try. this was our best shot. if you look at the topography of pennsylvania, this was our best shot to prove there was a market for high speed rail and it work. it worked. so times -- so sometimes as mr. skancke said, you have to do it. >> senator, in the texas-new mexico connection there, it's not just about the train system. we spent a lot of time talking about moving passengers, but it's about the transit oriented development and the additional demand in thesing me on liss that would grow -- the megopolis we refer to and it's hard to measure until it's in place. >> mr. skancke, did you want to talk about reliable ridership issue or comment on this? >> i think we have studied ridership in this country for hundreds of millions of dollars.

i didn't say years. hundreds of millions of dollars. and as i said, we have to stop studying. we know on all the amtrak corridors throughout the country that there's a need and demand. as fuel prices go up, ridership goes up. as congestion goes up, ridership goes up. we don't have to guess. the problem we have is, we're afraid to do it. because it may fail. what we need to do is not set up our high speed rail and transit systems to fail. let's set them up to succeed. create systems that work, not pieces. so as we've all said, instead of doing 100 mile segments, let's try a 500 mile segment, let's actually, i'll be little partisan for a second, let's build a line from los angeles to las vegas. let's build a line from phoenix to las vegas.

let's go from albuquerque to denver. let's try it. what do we have to lose? nothing. if we fail, then we fail, but we don't even know what failure is yet, because we haven't gotten there. >> senator udall. as the good governor was saying to me, who was that guy that built our 110-mile-per-hour service, i said david gunn, it's the only good thing he did for amtrak. but that's not true, i want to say that because david and i are friends, i talked to him a couple of days ago, i accused him from using the turbo money from the project in new york to get that done. but i know he got pennsylvania money. i think what tom is talking about is sab lutely true, with an exception. that is that the culture in this country is not a train riding culture. in the northeast corridor, about 43 million people live within 40 miles of where we operate ocela.

it is a success. in 2000, we had about 37%, this was before it started, of the air-rail market was with rail. today, in 2008, we have just the opposite of that. we have 63% of the rail-air market. that's with service that's two hours and 45 minutes. from new york to washington. and on north end, from new york to boston, it was at about 20% and is now, or 22%, it's now at about 49% in the same way system of we are demonstrating success. but the piece that we can't miss, and i think administrator szabo pointed it out, is that we need to do both. we need to talk about having very high speed and it needs to connect. t-bone needs, i listened carefully, i didn't hear it connecting to amtrak, it might.

but amtrak is the only connected intercity service coast to coast, border to border in the united states. and we need the incremental improvements knot 90 to 110, so that people build a culture of riding the train. so they fill up the high speed trains that are connected in some fashion, and it might even be at an airport, but it could be somewhere else, where you connect our system. people want to be seamless. they don't want to go to the border of pennsylvania and new york at route 15, when we had to build the connection, if you remember, governor, to make sure that new york kept up with the leadership that was coming out of pennsylvania. to make that interstate connection. that's the difficult -- difficulty we have today with railroads. we don't always connect. >> senator, if i may, the texas

t-bone does connect into the amtrak houston metro multimodal facility in downtown houston. >> great. it's a good way to finish. we very much appreciate this panel, very informative. thank you very much and i will -- >> thank you, senator. >> i will adjourn. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2009]

>> the house came in today, debated five bills and has recessed until 6:30 eastern for votes on those bills debated this afternoon. tomorrow, members consider nearly $46 million for the homeland security department next budget year. a 7% increase over this year. also this week, defense department programs and policy. on friday, speaker pelosi may bring climate change legislation to the floor. live coverage when the house returns here on c-span. on thursday, washington journal talks to the original head of the homeland security department, former pennsylvania governor tom ridge.

live coverage at 9:00 a.m. eastern here on c-span. >> july 4 weekend on book tv, discover an unfamiliar side of our nation's first president as we're live from george washington's mount vernon estate with historian and author john ferling on the ascent of george washington. join our conversation live on c-span2's book tv. >> how is c-span funded? >> through donations? >> i think you get a little bit from the federal government. >> grants and stuff like that >> maybe from sponsors. >> it might get some government funding. >> viewers? >> how is c-span funded? 30 years ago, america's cable companies created c-span as a public service a private business initiative no government mandate, no government money. >> this morning, "washington journal" talked with bob

schieffer of cbs news about issues on capitol hill and the future of the news business. it's about an hour. host: we want to welcome our guests to c-span, bob schieffer. guest: thank you. host: how you view where we are at at this moment in time? guest: i can ever recall a time when the president has faced more serious issues. you look at north korea and the threat that poses right now. you look at iran and the the middle east, then afghanistan, pakistan. i still think that the border is still the most dangerous place in the world. that is not to mention iraq or what is going on in this country. then you have the financial crisis we have been going through in this country. if there is any good news i

think we may have reached a bottom. nobody knows for sure. you have these enormous programs that have been launched. the stimulus package, the help to general motors, the help to the banks, all of this. we are at the very beginning of solving these problems. it is a very serious time here. i cannot recall the time when there have been this many different problems that a president confronted when he got up and went to work every day. host: you cannot go to a news magazine rack or turn on the tv without seeing it barack obama. is he over exposed? guest: there is no question he is getting a lot of exposure. you do run the risk of being overexposed, but this grows out of the fact that first, he is a new president and we are in the very beginning of this

presidency, but the other part is what i have talked about, the big number of problems he is confronted. he is trying to do with each one of those. every one of those brings with it more publicity as it were. more news conferences where he has to explain what he is up to, what he is doing. there is a second aside to that since we live in a democracy. the people on the other side are getting lots of publicity. a lot of it grows out of what he is trying to deal with right now. host: when you were on with senator john mccain, in the round table discussion the sentiment was that the mainstream media has a bias in favor of barack obama. could you address that? guest: you know, i think we're just trying to cover the news is what i think we are trying to do. i think it is a good question, a

legitimate question. in this a point we ought to discuss. but there's so much media out there now that the idea of bias in the media has almost become irrelevant. we are in the age of opinion journalism where you can get the news served up almost anywhere you want it. if you want to hear from a conservative point of view you can find plenty of places to get that. if you want to see it served up on that and no apology liberal point of view you can get a served up that way. it is almost like going into a restaurant and ordering eggs, you think it them sunny side up, scramble, with a little bit of help in your pepper if you wanted. is there if you wanted. -- a little bit of jalapeno pepper if you wanted. the mainstream agree that if you do not agree with every opinion expressed, you can agree or

disagree, but i hope when people watch cbs they can agree it is a place where the facts or correct. -- are correct. we have gone to every link to get the story. that is our role. host: your commentaries and they said the old person even gets the bill, even on father's day. guest: that is just one of the rules of the road. i was giving six rules for a happy and successful father's day as a veteran for 40 years no of father's day. i have two daughters and three granddaughters. the things i have learned, number one, do not try to sing. children everything that their parents can sing tell a joke. no child of everany age think tr parents say anything that is funny.

always pick up the check. they're really like that. they always give it to the oldest guy at the table anyway. if you do those things you probably had a good father's day. i certainly did. host: you have written a number of books. this one is just in. what is your approach when writing these books? guest: i do them because i like to do them. i like to write. i started out as a newspaper reporter. i still basically consider myself a writer. when i wrote this which took me two years to do, a professional memoir, it was the hardest thing i have ever done, but by the same token is the thing i'm most proud of. when you sit here and you are on tv and you have to write these little stories about this long to get on television and suddenly you have diarrhea of the type of. when you sit down to read a book because you have all this space and you still don't think you have enough time. that is the most fun about it. the thing i really enjoyed, i

had planned just to tell some tall tales and adventures and the world of journalism, not much reporting, but in order to check my own memory faster to to call people just like you do when you are checking out the story. i wound up interviewing about 85 people, some of whom i had not talked to for about 20 years. it made the book much richer in texture, but also really made it fun because i got to reconnect with all these people. i got to see what they thought about events they had been involved in 20 years ago, with their take was on it now. it was a very enjoyable thing to do. i just love it, i'd love to tell stories. i like to talk to people about the news. that is what this turned out to be. that is what was so much fun. host: we have covered you on many occasions for