20061007-1

The first speaker was Jonathan Hutchison, the new Government Affairs official for Amtrak, stationed in Oakland. The basic Amtrak message remains the same; tell Congress to give Amtrak more money. Amtrak continues to talk about the need to trim "low performing" long distance trains in the same breath when talking about the Sunset Limited. There were many comments from the audience about the importance of decent food service to maintain ridership on the long distance trains.