Amtrak

An article in The Sun Tuesday incorrectly stated that a presidential emergency board is investigating a dispute between Conrail and two of its unions. In fact, the emergency board is examining the dispute with only one union, the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employes.The Sun regrets the errors.Amtrak, which operates 230 trains a day carrying 60,000 passengers nationwide, is bracing for a strike June 24.That's when the complicated mediation machinery set up under federal law will grind to a halt and the rail unions will be free tostrike.

Amtrak, hurt by airline fare wars, accidents and rising costs, is considering major cuts in service, the first since the early 1980s.The railroad's board will meet today to consider how to make up a deficit projected at $200 million for the fiscal year that began Oct. 1."Everything is on the table," said Clifford Black, an Amtrak spokesman, including eliminating some routes in places that have little service now, and cutting back the frequency of trains in the Northeast Corridor and on other busy routes.

Amtrak, the nation's passenger rail system, and Conrail, the dominant freight railroad in the Northeast, face the threat of a strike that most likely would begin in June.Although a strike could come as early as April 4, with the expiration of a 30-day cooling-off period after mediation by a national panel, Amtrak management and union leaders expect a second mediation panel to be convened. That could delay any strike for at least two months."The day of reckoning is June 4," said Jed Dodd, general chairman of the Pennsylvania Federation of the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employes.

WASHINGTON - Just 15 miles south of here, the federal government is building a $600 million spaghetti-bowl interchange at just one of the zillion intersections of the Interstate Highway System. This follows an investment of at least $200 million to add four lanes to Interstate 95 immediately south of this crowded interchange. There is enough spent there to build a great university campus - complete with medical school, linear accelerator and chemistry laboratories. This mindless splurge, which is being replicated all over the country, will accomplish nothing.

WASHINGTON -- Being the president of Amtrak is not a position most mortals would covet.The railroad has aging equipment, an overhang of debt and up-to-the-precipice struggles for congressional funding. Its name gets hit by accidents on lines of private railroads from which it leases track space. A constant chorus of critics suggests its entire operation be liquidated.But Tom Downs, a 54-year-old career manager with an irrepressible sense of humor, loves leading Amtrak. And right now he's ebullient over a new $2.3 billion lifeline from Congress.

Angelo Daniel Colaianni, a retired Amtrak purchasing agent and community activist, died of congestive heart failure Monday at Harbor Hospital. He was 78. Mr. Colaianni was born in Baltimore and raised in the Lake Montebello area. He attended city public schools. He joined the U.S. merchant marine in 1942 and traveled about 70,000 miles by sea during World War II. While on a Murmansk run, his ship was torpedoed, and he spent 13 hours in the water before being rescued. He went to work for the Pennsylvania Railroad in Baltimore in 1948, installing telephones and telegraph equipment.

The State Highway Administration will close the Route 175 bridge over the Amtrak tracks in Odenton from 10 p.m. tomorrowto 5 a.m. Wednesday.During the closure, workers will pour a concrete bridge deck as part of the $1.6 million project to replace and widen the now four-lane bridge. The project, expected to be completed next spring, will add a center turn lane.Motorists eastbound on Route 175 should use Route 32 east to Route 170 south to Route 175. Motorists traveling west on Route 175 should use Route 170 north to Route 32 west to Route 175.If weather delays the work, the bridge will be closed from 10 p.m. Wednesday to 5 a.m. Thursday.

Ollie M. Head, a retired Amtrak supervisor and longtime Edgewood resident, died of heart failure May 22 at Upper Chesapeake Medical Center in Bel Air. He was 77. Mr. Head was born and raised in Forsyth, Ga., and moved to Baltimore after graduating from high school. He served in the Army in Europe during World War II. "He joined the old Pennsylvania Railroad in 1940 as a water boy and worked himself up as a trackman in the railroad's track department. He was committed to the railroad and loved his job," said his wife of 58 years, the former Marguerite Harriet Bishop.

If you're taking the Metroliner from Baltimore to New York, don't look for the smoking car.Effective this week, Amtrak has eliminated smoking on trains with scheduled running times of 4 1/2 hours or less. The new restriction is similar to a federal rule that bans smoking on airlines for domestic flights of six hours or less.But for die-hard smokers, there are quite a few opportunities to beat the ban. For instance, passengers who take a one-hour trip from Baltimore to Philadelphia can board any one of nine daily trains that run from Washington to Boston.

Forrest Lee Griffith Jr., a retired manufacturing executive and Amtrak official, died of respiratory failure Monday at Gilchrist Center for Hospice Care. The Timonium resident was 87. A Baltimore native, he was a 1937 graduate of Polytechnic Institute and earned a joint bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering and business administration from Cornell University in 1940. He enlisted in the Navy in World War II and was assigned to the Bureau of Aeronautics, where he held various engineering assignments including director of flight test electronics in Washington.