US is twenty, thirty, even forty years behind countries that made passenger rail a sustained national priority
- Sat, Oct 24 at 8:45 AM
Advance appropriations are the security blanket industry leaders need.
Advance appropriations are the security blanket industry leaders need.
Photo Credit: Jim Mathews
Dear Mark,
Here’s something I’ve been telling people lately about America’s struggle to build better passenger trains:
Money buys projects. Certainty builds an industry.
There’s a difference, and it’s a big one.
In 2021, your Rail Passengers Association joined with allies across the country to help win the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. For the first time in decades, passenger rail had something it desperately needed: five years of predictable Federal funding.
Think about how much we’ve been able to get moving with just five years of certainty. Now imagine what we could accomplish if we actually committed ourselves to doing this over the long term.
Because trains, tracks, catenary, signaling systems, and all the other pieces of a modern railroad don’t just appear out of thin air. They’re built by companies. Companies that need certainty before they’ll invest in factories, equipment, and workers.
And when that certainty doesn’t exist? We get stops and starts. Projects stall. Costs rise. Expertise disappears. Then, a few years later, we start all over again.
Stop and start. Stop and start.
That’s a big part of why we’re twenty, thirty, even forty years behind countries that made passenger rail a sustained national priority.
Right now, we’re working with allies on Capitol Hill to restore the kind of predictable, advance funding that made the 2021 law so important. And as Congress prepares to write the next transportation bill, we’re determined to make sure passenger rail doesn’t fall back into the old cycle.
It’s not the flashiest fight in Washington. There are no ribbon cuttings for advance appropriations. The term “Division J Appropriations” doesn’t exactly trip off the tongue.
But without that certainty, ribbon cuttings might never happen.
Help us fight for the policies and investments that turn passenger rail from a succession of individual projects into a transportation system Americans can depend on.
Please stand with us.With Determination,
Jim Mathews
President & CEO
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