Secretary Pete wants fast trains. He will have to succeed where Obama couldn’t.

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U.S. transportation investment has been dominated by automobiles since hundreds of billions were spent building the Interstate Highway System in the 20th century. But Buttigieg, echoing his boss, President Joe Biden (who is sometimes referred to as “Amtrak Joe,” due to his habit of running the train between his home state of Delaware and Washington) has recently spoken about upgrading the US railways.

“We need to take things to the next level,” Buttigieg said on MSNBC last week. “I think we have a real opportunity to do that, especially with the dual thirst for real investments that we have ahead of us this year.”
Buttigieg has a history of thinking differently about transportation. As mayor of South Bend, Indiana, he led an effort to reorient downtown around pedestrians and cyclists, rather than motorists. Now he is working on a bigger stage and will try to succeed where others fall short.

According to Amtrak, America had the fastest passenger trains in the world in 1959, but now 18 countries are faster than the fastest option, the Acela, which runs between Boston and Washington DC.

“We have been asked to settle for less in this country,” Buttigieg said in the MSNBC interview. “I just don’t know why people in other countries should have a better train service and invest more in high-speed trains than Americans.”

Ten years ago, Biden and the Obama administration pushed for high-speed trains across the country, but lacked the necessary funding and political support.

In 2010, the government revealed an initial investment of $ 8 billion, as well as $ 5 billion that would be invested in five years. In comparison, Amtrak generally receives less than $ 2 billion a year.

Obama’s initial funding was a significant increase in rail funding, but only a small step toward paying for a national network.

Biden will have to invest a lot more to live up to Buttigieg’s speech to lead the world. A plan by Democratic Congressman Seth Moulton to build a national high-speed network called for $ 205 billion over five years. (In comparison, the US spends about $ 50 billion a year on highways.)

Obama’s talk of faster trains was not well received in Republican-led states. Governors in Wisconsin, Ohio, and Florida turned down billions in federal funding, sinking high-speed rail projects in those states.

“A huge, huge disappointment,” said Ray LaHood, who served as Obama’s first transportation secretary, that in a 2011 interview with CNN Business, Florida turned down $ 2.3 billion to build a high-speed train.

LaHood said the project was ready, but then Florida Governor Rick Scott declined funding. Scott, now a US senator, said in a statement to CNN Business that he declined the funding because Florida taxpayers would have to pay hundreds of millions for the project.

The Obama administration instead took interest in California. Work is underway on the connection between San Francisco and Los Angeles. But the initial construction is limited to Central California, far from the major cities of San Francisco and Los Angeles. The project is plagued by challenges, including rising costs, delayed deadlines and budget cuts from the Trump administration. Extra money is needed to connect the major cities.
Brian Kelly, CEO of California High Speed ​​Rail Authority, has expressed optimism that the project will attract private sector funding once major hurdles such as environmental approvals and land to build on are overcome. The private sector has shown a greater interest in high-speed rail in recent years, with ongoing projects connecting Houston and Dallas, as well as Las Vegas and greater Los Angeles.

High-speed rail advocates believe the Biden administration is better positioned to succeed, given what was learned at the Department of Transportation during the Obama years, when there was less experience with high-speed train projects.

“A lot of people had to learn a lot of things very quickly. They did their best,” Rick Harnish, director of the High Speed ​​Rail Alliance, told CNN Business.

LaHood thinks more US governors would now accept funding, and estimates as many as half would receive funding. The biggest hurdle, he says, is if the Biden administration can get Congress to fund the high-speed trains.

That path will be challenging, said Moulton, who last year introduced his bill to invest billions in high-speed trains.

“There will be many lawmakers who just want to fix their local pits or old bridges instead of investing in 21st century technology,” Moulton told CNN Business. “We cannot waste a generation opportunity by investing in the infrastructure of the latest generation.”

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