With Ohio's economy losing steam, perhaps it's best to put on hold plans to connect the state's three largest cities by passenger rail, some state representatives said in a budget hearing last week.

Rep. Ross McGregor, R-Springfield, asked Transportation Department chief Jolene Molitoris whether the state should spend money on rail service at a time when an I-90 bridge in Cleveland is too dilapidated to carry trucks.

Speaking in a finance committee hearing on the state transportation budget, McGregor called trains "quite a romantic notion" but perhaps not the most practical thing in a recession.

Molitoris, a former federal railroad administrator, disagreed.

"I would call it a good business decision," she said. "The whole romantic notion is really not one I would apply to this at all."

Molitoris acknowledged that the passenger rail line would lose money and require a public subsidy. That's true of all passenger rail systems around the world, she said.

Still, she said, trains would help enhance economic development along the rail corridor, generating tax revenue. There also would be benefits for the environment and for passengers, she said.

Rep. Cheryl Grossman, R-Grove City, said the state could improve the economy better by enhancing freight-rail service. Passenger rail, she said, wouldn't pay its own freight.

-- James Nash jnash@dispatch.com