April 25, 2026 - TRA Newswire -

While some Oklahoma legislators complain that their state share of funding for the Heartland Flyer passenger rail service only sends Sooner dollars south on the train to be spent in Texas, the opposite is shown to be true in a recently released document .

The Oklahoma Department of Transportation, in an interim study, shows that the daily Amtrak Heartland Flyer, which runs between Fort Worth and Oklahoma City, delivers a healthy bang for the buck from any state funding it receives.

The study shows a positive $9 million dollar economic impact on tourism and visitor spending from passengers who travel by train in Oklahoma. Other benefits include $1.6 million saved from fewer highway accidents and $1.5 million in net transportation cost savings. Between local employment and purchase of area goods and services, Amtrak spent almost $1 million in the Oklahoma economy. 

The Texas Department of Transportation has not furnished any relevant documentation on economic impact of the Heartland Flyer in the Lone Star state. The last report was in 2010. 

Funding the Heartland Flyer operations has been a shared effort between the Oklahoma and Texas Department of Transportation since 2007. Last year Texas Senate Finance Committee Chair Joan Huffman stripped out a $3.5 million TxDOT budget request, what insiders said was a "philosophical decision" to eliminate funds. The North Central Texas Council of Governments stepped in with emergency funding for the critical rail service through this fall. 

"Eliminating this critical rail service will throw over 80,000 passengers back out on Interstate 35 between Oklahoma City and Fort Worth every year," according to Texas Rail Advocates President Peter LeCody. "This is a quality-of-life issue for Sooners and Texans that use the Heartland Flyer to visit family and friends, for tourism and recreation, to get to universities, and to get from the smaller towns to larger cities for medical treatment and employment. These limousine legislators need to get on the train and talk to their constituents to see why this train is needed." 

On April 9th, Oklahoma Representative Trey Caldwell, Chairman of the Appropriations and Budget Committee, stripped the Sooner state's funding for the train. He said "The state of Texas is saying they don't want to fund it, so I don't think it should be on the state of Oklahoma to subsidize it and keep it alive", according to Caldwell.

ODOT said it requested but was not allocated $2.5 million for the Oklahoma Passenger Rail Revolving Fund, which would support the Flyer operations. Texas has no such funding mechanism. 

In 2025 the Heartland Flyer carried 80,3710 passengers, showing an increase in ridership and revenue since the previous year. The service, which is run by Amtrak,  had an 85% cost recovery, bringing it closer to breakeven as travel demand increases since Covid.

The ODOT document also showed additional scenarios that would increase ridership and revenue on the Heartland Flyer. 

• A new station stop in Thackerville, Oklahoma would provide access to WinStar Casino and the local community
• An additional daily round-trip along the existing corridor would enhance connectivity, allow for same-day business travel and return, as well as increase ridership
• Expanding service north from Oklahoma City through Wichita to Newton, Kansas would broaden geographic coverage and connect to Amtrak national network rail services 

Photo credit: North Central Central Texas Council of Governments