Rail Company Increase Could End Oklahoma's Passenger Train Service

Oklahoma is in jeopardy of losing its passenger train, the Heartland Flyer.

The train runs daily between Oklahoma City and Ft. Worth, Texas with five stops in between.

5/30/2008 Related Story: Amtrak To Expand Heartland Flyer Route

The state contracts Amtrak to run the train service and a cost increase by the rail company is too much for the state to pay.

Supporters and state officials met downtown Saturday to discuss ways to offset the cost, including doubling the train's frequency and expanding service to Kansas.

“This is all about economic development and the more trains that we have running the more economic impact we're going to have and we're going to see a lot of people I think embrace this service more than they have in the past,” Evan Stair with Passenger Rail Oklahoma said.

At the time of this report, Oklahoma shared the Amtrak cost with Texas but Oklahoma didn't appropriate enough annually to cover its share.