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Disagreements over costs are creating resistance to high-speed rail’s progress in the U.S., but supporters highlight energy efficiency, travel ease and job production as reasons to back such proposed projects.
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The Recovery Act of 2009 included $8 billion in funding devoted to increasing high-speed and intercity passenger rail infrastructure in the United States, and the Obama administration allocated $2.5 billion of the 2010 budget to that purpose as well. But in his 2011 State of the Union Address, President Barack Obama announced a larger goal.
While detailing the administration’s plan for further federal investment in American infrastructure to “rebuild for the 21st century,” President Obama presented an ambitious objective for rail travel in the United States. “Within 25 years, our goal is to give 80 percent of Americans access to high-speed rail,” the president said. (See State of the Union Highlights: Innovation, Education and Infrastructure)
Within weeks, Vice President Joe Biden, a noted Amtrak commuter and supporter, presented a comprehensive plan while joined by Department of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood in Philadelphia.
The administration’s Vision for High-Speed Rail in America initiative identifies 10 high-speed rail corridors to receive funding and infrastructure development: California, Pacific Northwest, South Central, Gulf Coast, Chicago Hub Network, Florida, Southeast, Keystone, Empire and Northern New England.
These corridors would be divided into three types of development:
- Core Express — Forming “the backbone of the national high-speed rail system,” these lines will be developed into high-speed rail corridors with electric trains reaching speeds of 125-250 mph or higher.
- Regional — These existing rail lines in important economic communities will see continued development to improve travel times, with long-term progress resulting in eventual high-speed conversion. Trains will travel at speeds of 90-125 mph.
- Emerging — These corridors will feature trains achieving speeds of about 90 mph and will connect to the Core Express and Regional networks, providing travelers with access to the larger national high-speed and intercity passenger rail network.
The proposed plan — which would also streamline the Department of Transportation’s rail programs, making it simpler for states, cities and private companies to apply for grants and loans — requires the Transportation Department to work with state governments, freight rail organizations and private companies to lay new tracks for high-speed trains, develop planning outlines for resource commitments and improve speeds on existing tracks over a six-year period of continuous construction.
The estimated cost of the six year plan: $53 billion.
Biden has argued that improving rail transportation will have multiple benefits for the country, including energy self-sufficiency, environmental relief and easing travel restrictions for millions of Americans.
“[W]e’re making a down payment today, a down payment on the economy for tomorrow, the economy that’s going to drive us in the 21st century in a way that [...] the highway system drove us in the mid-20th century,” Biden said in April 2009. “With [a] high-speed rail system, we’re going to be able to pull people off the road, lowering our dependence on foreign oil, lowering the bill for our gas in our gas tanks. [...] And we’re going to significantly lessen the damage to our planet.”
Obama has continually called attention to the fact that the United States is behind foreign countries that have large high-speed rail networks and are investing much more money in rail projects than the U.S.
“In France, high-speed rail has pulled regions from isolation, ignited growth, remade quiet towns into thriving tourist destinations,” the president said in April 2009. “China, where service began just two years ago, may have more miles of high-speed rail service than any other country just five years from now. And Japan, the nation that unveiled the first high-speed rail system, is already at work building the next: a line that will connect Tokyo with Osaka at speeds of over 300 miles per hour.
“There’s no reason why we can’t do this,” he continued. “This is America. There’s no reason why the future of travel should lie somewhere else beyond our borders.”
Funding has been a contentious issue, however, creating resistance to the project and similar initiatives.
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka and U.S. Chamber of Commerce President Thomas J. Donohue, “two longtime adversaries,” jointly agreed at a Senate committee hearing in mid-February that while they have disagreements about how to fund infrastructure developments, investments must move forward to help U.S. manufacturing.
“There needs to be a vigorous dialogue on funding and financing,” Donohue said, according to the Washington Post. “But first we have to agree on the direction in which we’re going.”
On the same day, Florida Governor Rick Scott officially rejected a Tampa-to-Orlando high-speed rail project worth $2.7 billion. In a statement, the governor said, “The truth is that this project would be far too costly to taxpayers and I believe the risk far outweighs the benefits.” Governor Scott included details on the possibility of $3 billion in cost overruns that Florida would have to cover and the historically overoptimistic estimates of ridership and revenue for American rail transport.
Florida follows Wisconsin and Ohio, states that also rejected federal high-speed rail money in December.
Resources
Remarks by the President in State of Union Address
The White House, Jan. 25, 2011
Why America Needs Trains
by Joe Biden
Arrive, January/February 2010
Vice President Biden Announces 6-Year Plan to Build National High-Speed Rail Network
The White House, Feb. 8, 2011
Bringing High-Speed Rail to America
by Tobin Marcus
The White House, Feb. 8, 2011
Remarks by the President and the Vice President on a Vision for High-Speed Rail in America
The White House, April 16, 2009
A Vision for High Speed Rail
by Jesse Lee
The White House, April 16, 2009
Obama Seeks $53 Billion Over Six Years to Build High-Speed Rail Networks
by Lisa Caruso
Bloomberg News, Feb. 8, 2011
Investing More in High-Speed Rail Will keep U.S. Competitive, White House Says
by Ashley Halsey III
The Washington Post, Feb. 8, 2011
U.S. to Inject $53 Billion into Passenger Rail
by David Warner
Reuters, Feb. 9, 2011
Florida Kills Obama-Backed High-Speed Rail
Agence France-Presse, Feb. 16, 2011
Labor’s Richard Trumka, Chamber’s Tom Donohue Appear Together to Plead for Infrastructure Spending
by Felicia Sonmez
The Washington Post, Feb. 16, 2011
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I fear that this high speed rail initiative will get bogged down in the typical and mediocre, as usual, low speed and red taped bureaucracy that ONLY someone as abjectly brain dead as the definitively public sector government can provide in underwhelming and overspending fashion. I fear it will be put, not in places that make the most sense, but in heavily politically lobbied locations that make no sense, even to a densest and thickest of morons. I fear “Sputnik moment” political grandstanding that provides highly teleprompted promise but delivers low-brow results. I fear a highly partisan, single focused project that takes into account no signs of brilliant integration into other transportation factors as it plows straight away and “invests” in what ends up being longest term payback and even longer term failure. I fear that wherever the government gets involved, it means woe to the American taxpayer, who pays far too much, to get far too little, that takes far too long, and resembles far less than was promised (lied about).
Now, can we talk about a redo? Leave the government out of it!
Political decisions often have bad or questionable motives. The project must make sense – not just be a popular idea supported by a favored group. Based upon the little I know, I think it would only be viable between two large metropolitan areas. Only dense areas could possibly make the high initial cost versus jobs, fuel savings, etc., an intelligent decision.