Page 134 - Introduction to Tourism

corporation, the controlling stock of which is owned by

the U.S.

government through the U.S. Department of
Transportation. Amtrak ’ s business is providing rail

passenger transportation in the major intercity markets

of the United States. The National Railroad Passenger
Corporation was established by the Rail Passenger

Service Act of 1970.

Although it receives financial support from the federal

government, Amtrak is not a government agency. It is a
corporation structured and managed like other large

businesses in the United States and competes with all

other modes in the transportation marketplace.
Serving forty - six states and five hundred destinations

on its 21,000 - mile route system, Amtrak carried more

than 24 million intercity passengers in fiscal 2006.

Amtrak employs nearly 19,000 people. Its employees
are represented by fourteen different labor

organizations.

Amtrak was launched as an experiment to identify the
importance of rail passenger service to a balanced

national transportation system. A key for continued

support of Amtrak in the mid - 1970s was the dramatic
impact of the oil embargo and recognition of the need

for alternative forms of transportation.

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