In much of the world, a major capital city without passenger trains would be unthinkable, yet that’s been the case in Columbus since 1979. With the last Amtrak train’s departure that year, Central Ohio bet all its transportation chips on cars, buses, and airplanes, and the area’s transit puzzle has been without passenger trains of any kind since then, earning Columbus the dubious distinction of today being the country’s second largest city without any passenger rail service at all.

Amtrak’s return to Central Ohio has been long-discussed and debated: former Governor Ted Strickland felt trains were important to the state’s economic development, but his successor John Kasich, did not, and in 2010, Kasich rejected a $17M annual subsidy to keep passenger trains running in Central Ohio as too expensive.

With the passage of President Biden’s new Federal infrastructure bill in 2022, which included $2.3B to expand Amtrak, plus encouraging signals from the administration of current Ohio Governor Mike DeWine, is the stage finally set for Amtrak’s return to Central Ohio?

The panelists are:

William Murdock, Executive Director, Mid-Ohio Regional Planning Commission

Erin Rosiello, Vice Chair, All Aboard Ohio

And Arun Rao, Director of Network Development, Amtrak

The moderator is Elizabeth Blount McCormick, President, Uniglobe Travel Designers.

This forum was sponsored by HNTB and was supported by the Grange Insurance Audubon Center. The forum livestream was supported by The Center for Human Kindness at The Columbus Foundation and The Columbus Dispatch.

It was recorded before a live audience on March 15, 2023.