Ohio Higher Education Rail Network

OHERN Institute
Department of Sociology
Bowling Green State University
Bowling Green, Ohio 43403-0222

Overview
Plan
The Ohio Higher Education Rail Network (OHERN) is a plan to link all public and private colleges and universities in Ohio by passenger rail.
Founding Principle
The OHERN concept grew out of the belief that there is a mutually beneficial and interdependent relationship between education and transportation; where colleges and universities can help build a statewide network of passenger trains and, by building that network, strengthen Ohio's system of higher education.
Mission
The primary mission of Bowling Green State University’s OHERN Institute is to strengthen collaboration among Ohio’s colleges and universities by helping to build a statewide passenger rail system.

The OHERN Plan calls for extending the state’s rail service by connecting public and private colleges and universities to the Ohio Hub - Ohio’s near future, high-speed rail system. The plan extends the Ohio Hub by providing commuter rail service to smaller communities where high-speed train service may not be economical. The system’s funding comes largely from a user tax, that is, a modest increase in student, faculty and staff fees.

Making the Argument for OHERN

A critical element in is the call for a reduction in costs of education through various cost-cutting measures and new initiatives. Centers of excellence are to be recognized and the historical counter-productive competition among institutions is to be reduced through greater collaboration and the sharing of resources.

Solutions to encourage collaboration include increased reliance on distant learning, adoption of new learning strategies and streamlined admission standards. However, faced with the unpredictable and often high cost of transportation, the overall effectiveness of these new initiatives could be blunted. Most Ohioans confront the problem of high travel costs, but since transportation is one of the largest indirect costs associated with attending a college or university, the burden of this cost falls especially hard on households with members in college.

The cost of fuel is pricing many families out of the higher education market and making it all the more difficult for people on different campuses to collaborate. Distance learning technologies provide one type of solution, but there are limits to what Internet technologies can do. There are times when students really must visit a science lab, art museum, agricultural experiment station, or attend a conference or athletic event on another campus, but the costs of these firsthand experiences continue to rise. Can the costs associated with higher education transportation be reduced, while simultaneously increasing collaboration among Ohio’s colleges and universities and decreasing the "carbon footprint" of higher education in Ohio?
The OHERN Institute is proposing to link all Ohio institutions of higher learning via rail as a way to lower the transportation costs associated with higher education, while yielding additional benefits.
The OHERN solution is relatively inexpensive since the plan relies on the use of existing freight rail and self-propelled, diesel-electric passenger trains. The system can be funded largely through a modest increase in fees -- amounting each school year to the price of one textbook.

Once completed, students and faculty will have unlimited use of a statewide transportation network that will run seven days a week from 6:30 am to 12 pm, year round. Ohio families should see an annual average reduction of several hundred dollars in their travel expenditures associated with higher education. And while effectively extending the learning opportunities for students who travel to Ohio's cultural and educational institutions, the "carbon footprint" of higher education in Ohio (in student vehicle use) would be reduced.

The Ohio Higher Education Rail Network will enable the state to develop a unique, tightly integrated system of colleges and universities, distinguishing it from all other university systems in the United States. And since the rail network will be available for all to use, it will help to strengthen and extend Ohio’s entire transportation system.

Tracks and Trains

The tracks and trains required for building a statewide passenger rail service are either available or, in the case of the required self-propelled, diesel-electric trains, easily acquired. Parts of the existing railroad track and crossings will need to be upgraded but the huge expense of acquiring the right-of-way to lay new track or electrify that track is avoided since 99% of what is needed is already in place.
Railroads - Ohio has nearly 6,000 miles of railroad track. It is the most heavily “tracked” state in the U.S., with more miles of track per square mile than any other state. There is a railroad in nearly every community of any size in the state. Every public university as well as most colleges and private universities in Ohio are situated next to or near a railroad track.
Trains - an estimated 50 self-propelled, diesel-electric commuter trains (DMU) will be needed to service a network linking Ohio’s colleges and universities. Diesel electric trains can run on freight rail, are relatively inexpensive to operate and have been in widespread use throughout Europe and the rest of the world for decades.
DMU’s are usually in a “push-me, pull-me” configuration allowing the train to travel in either direction without turning. DMU’s accelerate rapidly from a stop and can travel well above 80 mph, with some traveling well over 100 mph.

Cost and Revenue
What will it cost to build the necessary train stations and to purchase 50 trains to run the network? And where will the funding come from to accomplish all of this?
Cost
There are two major expenses facing OHERN: 1) capital costs and 2) operating/maintenance costs.
(N.B., the cost to upgrade railroad tracks, crossings and general rail infrastructure were not included in this estimate since it is assumed those costs will be paid for using separate federal and state funds.)
The two largest capital costs are for trains and the building of new train stations.
Issuance of a $300 million state bond will be required for these two capital costs. Servicing that bond is included in the ongoing annual cost estimates for the network. The annual bond payment on $300 million for 20 years @ 5% is $24 million.
Operating and maintenance costs are based on numbers provided to the OHERN Institute by the city of Ottawa, Ontario. Ottawa operates a transit rail system connecting Carleton University to the downtown. [http://en. .org/wiki/Ottawa_O-Train Ottawa’s "O-Train”] relies on a set of three self-propelled diesel-electric trains similar to the trains proposed for use by OHERN.
Ottawa’s “O-Train” operates year round from 6:30 am to midnight, seven days a week. The OHERN plan followed the lessons learned from the popular and successful system in Ottawa. The Canadian operating costs were considered a good benchmark from which to derive OHERN’s likely operating and maintenance expenses. After making the necessary adjustments for differences in US and Canadian currency and year, it is estimated that the annual operating costs for a 50-train system in Ohio would be $80 million.
Therefore, each year’s combined cost to service the $300 million bond ($24 million) and operate and maintain the 50-train system ($80 million) totals $104 million.
Revenue
There are three major stakeholders in the proposed rail system: 1) government (federal, state and local), 2) general public (transit riders), and 3) education (students, faculty and staff).
While a good case can be made that all three groups should help fund the system since all three will derive numerous indirect benefits and cost savings, for the sake of simplicity, no new tax dollars were included in the revenue model. In other words, a "user tax" model was adopted as the only method for funding OHERN.
Given the previously estimated annual cost of $104 million to build and operate the 50-train system, and the assumption that no federal or state tax revenues would be used for funding, the question becomes how much would students, faculty, staff and transit riders be required to pay to cover the system’s annual cost?
Again, a number of simplifying assumptions were made. To begin, it was assumed that all students, faculty and staff at public institutions of higher education would be required to pay into the system. This “all in” solution is necessary since the original intent of the network is to increase collaboration and sharing of resources among Ohio schools by providing a year round, low cost, reliable, easy to use, campus-to-campus transportation system. Professors and students must all be able to participate in order for the system to make sense. For example, an Art History professor can't expect all members of a class to meet at selected sites (e.g., at the Toledo Museum of Art and at the Cleveland Museum of Art and at the Cincinnati Art Museum and at the Columbus Museum of Art) if only half the class is participating in the OHERN plan.
Private colleges and universities can buy into the system at the same rate as public institutions. High school students also will be allowed to buy an annual pass for the same price as students in higher education. For this model, it was assumed the general public would pay three times the rate charged higher education.
Using the average price of a college textbook as a guide, the annual ticket price for higher education was set at $105. The price of an annual pass for transit riders was set at $315. These prices were set low, relative to existing transit costs, in order to justify the revenue model's assumption of "full participation" among colleges and universities.
Assuming full participation by public and private institutions, the “One Textbook Revenue Model” generates $81 million from higher education. The 573,000 students, faculty and staff in public higher education accounts for $61 million while their 195,000 counterparts in private higher education accounts for $20 million. A modest number of high school students (49,000, or 5% of Ohio's 13-18 age cohort) were included, generating an additional $5 million.
It was further assumed an estimated 200,000 transit riders would purchase annual passes generating $63 million. An additional $1 million in revenue was included under a miscellaneous category.
Given these assumptions, the "One Textbook Revenue Model" generates $150 million annually, providing a revenue surplus of $46 million.

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