From the “We Just Want the Trains to Run on Time” school of political thinking, here’s a good reason for the government to stop dragging its feet on the approval of energy pipelines: As railways strain to accommodate all of America’s energy traffic, long-distance Amtrak passenger trains are now late more often than not.

The New York Times reports:

American rail lines now move more than a million barrels of oil a day, much of it from the Bakken shale oil field in North Dakota and Montana and from the oil sands of Alberta, Canada. Last year about 415,000 rail cars filled with crude oil moved through the United States, compared with 9,500 in 2008, according to the Surface Transportation Board, a bipartisan body with oversight of the nation’s railroads.
In large part as a result, long-distance Amtrak passenger trains are now late 60 percent of the time, Amtrak officials said, compared with a year ago, when the trains were late 35 percent of the time.
The problems are particularly acute on long-distance passenger lines like the Empire Builder, which shares tracks with freight traffic from Chicago to Portland, Ore., and is late nearly 70 percent of the time. Trains on the 47-hour trip typically run three to five hours behind. Revenue from the line has dropped 18 percent from last year, Amtrak officials said, as word about the sluggish service spread among passengers, most of whom use the Empire Builder for shorter trips between cities on the route.

A smart solution would be to build pipelines to transport energy and ease the pressure on our rail system. But right now, many such projects remain snarled in red tape.

The Energy Information Administration has reported it takes three years on average to build or expand an interstate pipeline, and it can take even longer “if it encounters major environmental obstacles or public opposition.”

Case in point: the Keystone XL pipeline, first proposed in September 19, 2008 — a whopping 2,211 days ago.

Meanwhile, the clock continues to tick, for would-be U.S. infrastructure investors and commuters alike.

— Jillian Kay Melchior is a Thomas L. Rhodes Fellow for the Franklin Center for Government and Public Integrity and a Senior Fellow for the Independent Women’s Forum.