Why Upstate New York Got the Shaft on High Speed Rail Funding

Today President Obama and Vice President Joe "Amtrak" Biden were in Tampa to announce how the $8 billion in stimulus funds for high speed rail projects would be allocated. Leading up to the event States were able to submit applications for the funds and the Department of Transportation would decide who to award them to based upon a number of criteria. Unfortunately, we here in Upstate New York got a much lower share of the funds than we had applied for. Overall New York State received $151 million out of a requested $564.8 million. The question now remains, why we were not granted the full amount we requested? And the answer boils down to one simple point: New York State has neglected to invest it's own money in our rail network.

All of the state's that received more stimulus money than New York (mainly California, Illinois, Washington, and Flordia), have already dedicated their own funds to projects that received federal dollars. In California for instance, voters last year approved a $10 billion bond measure to raise money to construct their high speed rail system. In Florida, Republican Governor Charlie Crist got a bill passed to invest over $1 billion in rail transportation within the state. Wisconsin, who received over $800 million in funds, had already signed an agreement to buy new rolling stock for high speed service in the state. And these are just a few examples of other state's investing in their rail networks.

In New York we have not, and did not, show any interest in spending any of our own funds to construct a high speed rail line through Upstate during the allocation process. I understand that the State is in a dire fiscal situation, but if we at least put up some of the funds for the our project, the Federal Government would have been willingly to give us more money. From the Federal DOT's perspective, in five years they will now be able to say that they helped construct a high speed line from Tampa to Orlando, one from Chicago to St. Louis, and had a hand in starting construction on California's, even though they only put up part of the funds for the projects. If they invested the $564.8 million in New York, sure we would see improved service, but Ray LaHood (Transportation Secretary) would not be able to claim that his Agency was a part of accomplishing something impressive.

If we are going to be serious about building a high speed rail line through Upstate, the State needs to begin to take the leadership role in not only planning the project, but funding it as well. As has been demonstrated by the Federal DOT today, we no longer can plan a project and expect it to be completed through Federal hand outs.

With this in mind, lets look at our proposed project in more detail:

The current proposal would build a new third track along the two currently operating through our region. This third track would allow for passenger trains to operate on their own dedicated track, without the interference of freight trains. The current two lines running through our area used to be four, up until the 1960's when New York Central tore up two of the tracks to save money on right of way taxes. This means that we already have the land for two more sets of tracks. Once the third line is built operating speeds of trains on the line would be increased to at least 110 MPH (which I will point out is much faster than a car on the Thruway). The overall estimated cost of the project is $1.2 billion.

This project turns out to be one of the easiest to construct in the nation, and here is why:

-We already own the right away for a new track. Thus, all we are doing is rebuilding one of the two defunct tracks.

-We already have the passenger train infrastructure in place. The most expensive parts of other high speed rail proposals is building new stations, buying new train sets, and other necessities that come with new passenger service. All we have to do is upgrade the service components of the system to handle more passengers, such as having more ticket booths, more convienences in our stations, etc. And all of this means more sales tax revenue for local communities where stations are located.

-The project can be built in sections. Since all we are doing is adding a third track, it makes it possible to construct the project in sections, starting with the areas that have the worst delays or the most freight traffic. This means that if the State is not able to come up with all of the $1.2 billion price tag at once, they can construct it a section at a time, bringing real speed increases to the corridor, without breaking the State's finances with a large one-time expenditure.

-The beginnings of the project are already being constructed. Sure we lost out on a majority of the funding we could have had, but the funding we did receive is going towards essential improvements, such as double tracking a stretch of track between Albany and Schenectady, where all trains have to wait for 18 minutes if a train is coming in the other direction, leading to delays for all.

-It is incredibly cheap. When compared to other proposals around the country, such as California's $42 billion system, this is a bargain.

So the project has a lot of merit, but our current strategy for constructing it seems to have fallen apart now that we have not received federal money. But there is another way in which we can see this line through to fruition:

We can begin constructing it in sections funded through the DOT's general infrastructure improvement budget. So that initial $1.2 billion could be broken down to $240 million a year over five years. When put in these terms, this project seems a lot more reasonable and would give the State more financial breathing room should we have another financial meltdown in the next five years. All that would need to be done is to have the amount allocated to the DOT's budget be increased by $240 million and those funds be spent directly on the project, instead of the messy political battles that have been taking place in the public sphere over large-scale projects. It would also ensure that the construction jobs that are created would be there for at least five years, meaning steady employment for a large number of people.

So we do have options to proceed with this project even though we did not receive as much funding as we had requested from the Federal DOT. But the question now remains to be seen whether or not New York State will finally take a leadership role in funding the line, as opposed to wasting tax payers money by continually studying it (as has been done countless times now). And I sincerely hope that the State begins the process of finding the funds for this line, for Upstate has been given too many promises of new economic development tools over the years, with few ever coming to fruition.