Senators Want Guaranteed Rail Money

by Jim Mathews / President & CEO

A bloc of 44 Senators on Wednesday kicked off the fight for a new surface bill that includes advanced appropriations, just like the five-year Investment in Infrastructure and Jobs Act (IIJA), also known as the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, did when it passed in 2021.

Senators reminded Senate leadership in a coalition letter that by providing nearly $37 billion every year in guaranteed funding for half a decade, IIJA bought something much more crucial than just enough money to build bridges, fix tunnels, or start other badly needed projects -- IIJA bought certainty, the kind business needs to commit to big projects. And in the U.S., unfortunately there’s no such thing as a small passenger rail project.

One thing I think sometimes gets lost in all the noise around Washington budget fights is that the rail programs created and expanded under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act aren’t theoretical.

They’re not “wish lists,” or PowerPoint slides. And they aren’t abstract debates between think-tanks. They’re real projects, employing real people, building real things all across the United States right now. After only five years of predictable investment in passenger rail, we’ve already seen a reinvigoration of the U.S. passenger rail manufacturing base across the U.S. These green shoots include:

> Stadler expanding manufacturing in Utah, with a commitment to invest another $190 million in capacity over the next 15 years;

> Siemens Airo production generating new domestic manufacturing across the country, with 3,500 parts manufactured by nearly 100 suppliers in 31 states;

> Siemens opening a new manufacturing plant in Lexington, NC, which will create 500+ local jobs by 2028 and grow North Carolina’s economy by $1.6 billion over 12 years;

> Alstom investing $75 million to build and outfit an expansion of its Hornell, NY manufacturing facility; and

> Amtrak making investments for a more reliable fleet by building, upgrading and expanding maintenance facilities in Seattle, WA; Philadelphia, PA; Boston, MA; Washington, D.C.; New York City, NY; and Rensselaer, NY.

New trains. New stations. New bridges. Accessibility upgrades. Track improvements. Signal systems. Grade crossing eliminations. Manufacturing orders. Engineering contracts. State corridor planning. Equipment procurement. The biggest pipeline of passenger rail work this country has seen in several generations.

And now all of that faces an investment cliff.

This week, Rail Passengers Association was proud to endorse these Senators’ push to continue guaranteed rail funding as Congress works through both the annual budget process and the next surface transportation reauthorization bill.

Even more gratifying: Rail Passengers Association was specifically quoted in the Senate Commerce members’ report accompanying the letter.

It shows something I think is important, and that I hope you do, too: that passenger rail advocates weren’t standing on the sidelines while these programs were created. We helped build the case for them. We fought for them. We organized around them. We defended them when they were mocked as impossible or unnecessary. And now, years later, those investments are producing visible results in communities across the country.

As I said in our press release Wednesday morning:

“By providing predictable, dedicated funding for rail projects, the IIJA gave local governments and the private sector the certainty needed to invest with confidence in America’s passenger rail network. Thanks to that surety, we have a robust national pipeline of rail projects and new equipment in the U.S. for the first time in half a century.”

A lot of people just can’t get their heads around how vitally important it is to offer manufacturers that level of certainty.

Rail projects aren’t things you fund one year and abandon the next. Manufacturers don’t hire workers, expand facilities, and invest in supply chains if Congress treats transportation policy like a temporary hobby. States don’t spend years developing corridors if the federal government yanks the rug out from underneath them halfway through the process.

And if you're reading this and you think, "All I want to do is ride trains, I don't care about the politics," you're overlooking the fact that you won't get trains to ride without the programs these Senators are asking to fund. If Congress lets the IIJA rail funding structure expire without a replacement, the drop-off is severe. The National Network, Northeast Corridor, Federal-State Partnership grants, Corridor ID planning work — all of it suddenly becomes less certain, precisely when projects are finally moving from planning into construction.

It would be a spectacularly dumb time to hit the brakes.

This is the moment to keep building. The good news is that the coalition for passenger rail today is broader than it has been in decades. States want these projects. Labor wants these projects. Manufacturers want these projects. Communities want these projects. Passengers certainly want these projects.

We think that in a few days or weeks, the first draft of a surface transportation reauthorization (the law that will replace the IIJA, which funded so much of our progress) is going to emerge from the House Transportation & Infrastructure Committee. We are not hopeful about what’s likely to be in it...or, more precisely, what’s likely NOT to be in it.

We’re glad to see these Senators putting down a marker for where they’ll begin the conversation if a bill ever finds its way over to their chamber. Meanwhile, your Rail Passengers Association will keep pushing as hard we have since the very beginning.