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New York Times: High-speed rail deserves continued support

Originally uploaded by pgengler to Flickr.

The New York Times resolutely defended high-speed rail in an editorial this morning, characterizing the elimination of remaining funds for the program this fiscal year as “harebrained.”

The budget deal reached by the White House and Congress zeroed-out the $1 billion allocated for high-speed rail in fiscal year 2011 and rescinded an additional $400 million that had been returned by Florida Governor Rick Scott. A previous agreement to keep the government running for an additional week had already included $1.5 billion in cuts.

Governor Scott weathered heavy criticism for rejecting the funds, including from fellow Republicans, and his administration has since acknowledged getting key facts about the project wrong in a presentation to the state Supreme Court.

The Times strongly opposed Scott’s decision, but noted that his action has enabled other interested governors, including 11 Republicans, to put in bids. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood has 90 proposals from 24 states to choose from, with a total price tag of $10 billion, and a total of $2.4 billion to distribute. The Times wrote:

Two areas stand out on that list: the Northeast corridor from Boston to Washington; and California, which has ambitions to build a high-speed rail system from San Francisco and Sacramento to San Diego. California voters have approved almost $10 billion in bonds for the project (which has an ultimate price tag of some $45 billion), but the state wants the $2 billion for an extension.

While supportive of California’s efforts, the Times would like to see Amtrak’s application for an upgrade to the Northeast corridor’s Acela line receive top priority. Their $1.3 billion request would boost Acela’s speed from 135 miles per hour to 160 miles per hour between Philadelphia and New York City, one of the busiest and most popular stretches in the country. And, New York submitted an application to clear a path for Acela through New York City’s Penn Station, which more than 750 trains pass through daily.

USDOT has not yet announced when recipients will be selected.

Long Island Bus spared from drastic cuts — for the time being

A month ago, we noted that the Long Island Bus system in New York’s Nassau County was slated to cut service in half without a funding deal between state and local officials. Fortunately for the 33 million annual riders on the LI Bus, the New York State Senate on Friday announced an $8.6 million cash infusion to prevent these cuts.

The consequences of inaction would have been unacceptably draconian. It would have meant the elimination of 25 out of 48 routes, two hundred lay-offs and 16,000 riders left stranded, with 200 disabled riders losing paratransit services. Friday’s announcement, the result of months of negotiations between Nassau County and New York City’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority, puts the brakes on the cuts until the end of the year.

The discrepancy in funding arose largely because Nassau County Executive Edward Mangano refused to meet the obligation MTA officials deemed necessary to align with the contributions of neighboring counties. Although Nassau County is very wealthy, Mangano ran and won on an anti-tax platform and has remained steadfast against new revenues.

In an editorial today, the New York Times endorsed the $8.6 billion infusion, while noting that it is limited to the calendar year. The Times also encouraged Nassau to pay its fair share and chastised Mangano’s approach. “Buses limit traffic congestion and keep the economy moving. They are a means of survival for thousands of riders,” the Times wrote, continuing:

Instead of protecting that vital service, Mr. Mangano says a privatized system would run better for significantly less money. That’s ludicrous, as anyone will tell you who remembers the 1970s, when the failures of Nassau’s jumble of badly run private bus lines prompted the state to rescue the system.

The Tr-State Transportation Campaign has more information on the deal, including a statement here.