Passenger Rail Reform and Investment Act of 2015

Floor Speech

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Mr. NADLER. I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the Passenger Rail Reform and
Investment Act of 2015. This bill authorizes $7 billion for passenger
rail, including $5.8 billion for Amtrak, over the next 4 years.

This bill is not perfect, but I appreciate the committee leadership's
efforts to develop a bill in a bipartisan manner.

This bill significantly reforms the way Amtrak funding is authorized.

Rather than authorizing separate appropriations for debt service,
capital, and operating expenses, the bill creates two new accounts--a
Northeast corridor account and a national network account. The bill
also creates a new program to provide grants to the States, funded at
$300 million annually, of which $150 million is dedicated to the
Northeast corridor.

The Northeast corridor region contains 4 of the 10 largest
metropolitan areas in the country. It is home to more than 51 million
people, and our regional economy is the fifth-largest in the world
between France and Germany. If the Northeast corridor were to
unexpectedly shut down for just one day, the potential impact on the
U.S. economy could be $100 million in transportation-related impacts
and productivity losses.

There is no question that it is absolutely in our national interest
to do everything we can to maintain and develop the Northeast corridor,
but New Yorkers also understand the importance of maintaining a
national network, so I am pleased that the bill grants Amtrak the
flexibility to transfer funds, if needed, to keep the national rail
system operational. The bill also requires a more detailed plan for
implementing specific improvements to the Northeast corridor that is
free of poison pill, antilabor provisions, and it applies Buy America
to the RRIF loan program.

All of this is good, but we cannot lose sight of the bigger picture,
which is that we are still woefully underfunding Amtrak. We spend more
than $50 billion per year on highways and transit and over $15 billion
on aviation, while Amtrak is just $1.4 billion, or less than 2 percent,
of Federal transportation spending. This is despite the fact that the
rail system needs at least $52 billion, or $2.6 billion per year, for
20 years just to meet ridership demands and bring the system into a
state of good repair.

The President's FY16 budget request, on the other hand, includes $5
billion for rail. Half of that is intended to bring public rail assets
throughout the country to a state of good repair, including $550
million for the Northeast corridor; $2 billion is for high-speed rail
and commuter rail; and $204 million is for the FRA rail safety
measures, proven to be so necessary by the accidents on Metro North in
New York and Connecticut.

Unfortunately, this bill before us today simply authorizes current
funding levels, but given the budget constraints imposed by the
majority, it is probably the best bill we can hope for right now if we
want to move a bipartisan bill.

I would like to thank Chairman Shuster and Ranking Member DeFazio for
their efforts to advance an Amtrak reauthorization bill that moves the
process forward. I look forward to working with them and the rest of my
colleagues to make sure passenger rail receives the attention and
resources it deserves. For now, this is a good bill, and I urge its
adoption.

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