Billions in Amtrak funding set to modernize aging rail system
WASHINGTON — Officials up and down the East Coast have long agitated for money to help replace crumbling bridges and tunnels along the Northeast Corridor, the heavily traveled route between Washington and Boston. After decades of underinvestment, the $1 trillion infrastructure bill that President Joe Biden signed last month is poised to deliver muchneeded improvements.
The funding includes the largest investment in passenger rail since the creation of Amtrak in 1971, handing the agency billions of dollars to address its repair backlog, modernize its fleet and reduce trip times. The $66 billion in new funding for rail could also fuel Amtrak’s expansion in its routes across the country, an elusive goal that could generate millions more in revenue for the agency and extend its network to new areas.
“This is a fundamental change,” said John Robert Smith, a former Amtrak board chair and the chair of Transportation for America, an advocacy group. “They’ve never had anything comparable to this.”
Still, officials say it will take time for riders to see the full impact since Amtrak will need to ramp up hiring and construction projects could take years. Shortages of electricians, machinists and train operators could also lengthen improvement projects.
“It’s going to take a long time before they show up as actual finished infrastructure,” said Amtrak’s president, Stephen Gardner, who will be the new CEO starting Jan. 17.
The money is intended to help modernize America’s primary rail system, which has long lagged behind Asian and European countries in speed and coverage. In China, officials already have built more than 20,000 miles of highspeed rail and debuted a train that would reach more than 370 mph. In comparison, the fastest Amtrak Acela trains reach 150 mph in a few sections of the Northeast Corridor.
Gardner said the agency has long needed to address its repair backlog and modernize the Northeast Corridor, which includes some bridges and tunnels that are more than 100 years old. That could help eliminate major choke points along the corridor, which serves about 750,000 riders daily in normal times, reducing service disruptions and making trips faster.
The package aims to fulfill a campaign pledge from Biden, who promised to inject billions in rail and frequently mentions his fondness for Amtrak, when as a senator he would travel home from Washington to Delaware every night to care for his two sons after his wife and infant daughter died in a car crash.
Amtrak, which owns nearly 80 percent of the Northeast Corridor, is working with members of the Northeast Corridor Commission to determine which improvement projects to make a priority. It will also work with states and other groups to submit applications for a $44 billion pool of money that the Department of Transportation will dole out through competitive grant programs.
Of the $22 billion going directly to Amtrak, about $6 billion will be used for improvement projects along the Northeast Corridor. The corridor could receive an additional $24 billion through the competitive grants.
The money comes at a critical yet complicated moment. Amtrak is already struggling to deal with labor shortages, which are affecting employers across the United States. For more than 16 months, as the pandemic sapped rail travel and ridership levels plummeted as much as 97 percent, Amtrak stopped hiring workers. Employees also retired or quit, resulting in a 10 percent drop in the number of train engineers and conductors from attrition.
Jim Mathews, the president and CEO of the Rail Passengers Association, said he was optimistic that worker shortages would be alleviated in the coming months, but it would be a challenge to staff up, given the sheer size of the projects.
“Even in normal times, we don’t necessarily have the workforce in this country to support this,” Mathews said.
That could be further compounded by a vaccine mandate. Although Amtrak temporarily
dropped its vaccine mandate after a federal court halted the enforcement of the requirement for federal contractors, Amtrak officials said Tuesday that they would continue to update the policy “as needed.” About 97 percent of Amtrak’s employees have either received a shot or an accommodation providing an exemption.
Amtrak executives had previously warned about cuts to service next month because of the mandate, but the agency no longer expected to scale back service, according to the memo.
While ridership is still down, it has reached about 70 percent of pre-pandemic levels, Gardner said.
The Northeast Corridor Commission has identified more than 150 improvement projects that would cost $117 billion over 15 years. That includes replacing the nearly 150-year-old Baltimore and Potomac Tunnel, the biggest bottleneck
between Washington and New Jersey. The new Frederick Douglass Tunnel would allow speeds as fast as 100 mph, up from the current maximum of 30 mph.
According to the commission’s plan, the improvement projects would have long-lasting benefits, including increasing daily service along the corridor and making Acela trips from Washington to New York and New York to Boston nearly 30 minutes faster.
Mitch Warren, the executive director of the Northeast Corridor Commission, said the infrastructure bill funding would benefit many of the projects outlined in the commission’s plan.
“After decades of underinvestment, after living off investments made by previous generations, this gives us a path forward,” Warren said. “This infrastructure bill lays the groundwork for new investments in the Northeast Corridor that will last for generations.”