High-speed trains could help ease airport congestion.

Byline: Alfred Borcover

Like millions of Americans who fly a lot, Harry Reid is really ticked off. He's angry at the way airlines treat its passengers. He's annoyed by flight delays. And he's frustrated about crowded airports and jammed highways. One good thing about Harry Reid is that he can make his complaints heard better than most. Harry Reid is a United States senator, a Democrat from Nevada, and he is speaking out.

During a Senate transportation appropriations subcommittee hearing in July, Reid suggested: "Maybe the federal government and the airline industry need to widen their focus. Instead of thinking of themselves as only being in the airline business, maybe they can start viewing themselves as being in the transportation business and look at supplementing air travel with other alternatives like high-speed magnetic levitation or other new technologies."

"Airlines should be supportive of measures to develop high speed rail or to improve Amtrak," Reid said last month in a phone interview.

"A significant percentage of flights in the U.S. are short flights," Reid continued. "Can you imagine there are flights between Washington's Dulles Airport and Baltimore, about 40 miles apart. It's ridiculous. I believe we should try to eliminate as many of these flights as we can. I think the only way to do that is by some type of high-speed rail."

At Chicago's O'Hare International Airport, congestion is ever-present. In a survey of just seven of the many airlines serving O'Hare, I found that nearly 54 percent of the flights initially travel 400 miles or less. The seven, with total flights and the number flying 400 miles or less, are: United Airlines 440/75; Air Wisconsin, which flies as United Express, 73/62; American Airlines, including American Eagle, 489/173; Northwest, 29/25; Delta, 28/8; Continental, 24/6; and TWA, 11/11.

The near-term outlook to alleviate airport congestion is not good.