We’ve discussed some ways high speed rail in the U.S. could be going astray - such as failing to connect HSR lines to commuter lines, and thereby making it unduly hard for anyone to actually use the service. But critics of the government’s plans for HSR — and the administration behind them — are charging that the decision-making agency that awarded all that federal cash is and was fatally flawed.
According to some government investigators and critics in Congress (nearly all of whom are Republicans) the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), the agency charged with managing the $8 billion handed out last month, is woefully understaffed and was not equipped to adequately review the 214 applications submitted for funds. These critics also assert that the employees the FRA does have are not exactly experts in overseeing massive HSR projects: Until now, the agency’s primary function has been maintaining the safety of existing freight and passenger railroads.
Rep. John Mica of Florida, the top Republican on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, made a particularly strident statement, calling the award process “amateur hour,” and charging the FRA with not consulting enough with elected officials and devoting too much of the money to Amtrak improvements.
But while there’s little doubt the FRA has had probably the busiest few months in its existence, it’s hard to see how its staffing was so inadequate as to completely corrupt the awards process. A report by the Transportation Department inspector general states the agency brought in staff from other departments to get the applications reviewed and the money awarded by February 2010 — which was an enormous accomplishment given the complexity of the applications and the relatively small number of projects that won funding.
There’s also the fact that the existing FRA wasn’t tiny to begin with — it currently boasts 917 employees. Twenty-seven additional workers came in for the project, and the Obama administration is seeking $4.5 million from Congress to add 62 more FRA staff positions next year. Meaning that the agency will have over a thousand employees to focus their attentions on transforming America’s railways.
Granted, a thousand employees aren’t much good if none of them have the expertise to evaluate and guide major HSR projects. But that line of thinking seems to invalidate Mica’s argument that numbers have anything to do with the value of the awards given. There’s the simple fact that our government can’t ignore, no matter how hard it tries: More employees and more bureaucracy doesn’t necessarily mean better or smarter decisions.
Image: Egotron
March 17th, 2010 at 3:33 pm
Republicans are claiming the government wasn’t big enough when it was dealing with taxpayers money? Interesting hypocrisy there.
March 17th, 2010 at 3:39 pm
The problem is not the FRAs size - it is their out of date regulations.
March 17th, 2010 at 7:22 pm
Andy K, No kidding. Our FRA is so stupid thinking the heavy weight is safe, it is why our trains are unsafe to be on! It is why the Metro accident happened the way it did! If we had crash energy management, we would not have high impact. The FRA should evolve into a passenger rail development agency and CHANGE THE REGULATIONS FOR PETE SAKE. PTC? STANDARDIZE IT FOR ALL!
March 17th, 2010 at 8:16 pm
They did seem to dilute the money on minor station improvements and deferred station maintenance nationwide rather than focus first and foremost on the improvement of service. Let the efficient, fast, and cost effective transit lure people to the stations first, and then they can find out what rat nests they’ve become later after they’re already hooked on the concept.
March 17th, 2010 at 8:39 pm
They guy from Florida is complaining?
March 17th, 2010 at 11:42 pm
So republicans have spent the last thirty years trying to shrink government and have always had an anti-train bias and now they’re complaining that the FRA is understaffed. So they got what they wanted and now they can use it is a convenient excuse to keep us from building a real HSR system. Instead of tearing it down why don’t republicans work towards building the FRA back up?
March 18th, 2010 at 1:52 am
Mica is just bitter that his preferred projects didn’t get more money. I’m not sure I can blame him - as a Republican, he’s expected to attack everything the administration does. His reaction is much better than the usual reaction of Republicans, which is to attack the concept of passenger rail and quote lies.
March 18th, 2010 at 12:38 pm
gee…Thank God for small miracles, huh..But, I think there is a point to this, however. We’re going to take many decades to even get close to building the real McCoy, and in the interim who the heck knows how the leadership in Washington is going to change. This is whole thing is starting to seem in more danger than NASA’s plans for to land humans on Mars. Is it hopeless to reform FRA, get funding to build the thing, and execute the grants within the next 7 years?
March 18th, 2010 at 2:20 pm
I think they have a point. FTA would be a much better agency to handle this grant process. HSR is after all intercity transit. FTA is in a much better position to think strategically about HSR and evaluate the economics of it. While the HSR can be somewhat different from the transit market, it often appeals to many of the same more wealthy commuters riding rapid transit systems, especially commuter rail. This is a constituency with which the FTA is familiar. The FRA should remain a safety regulator. And yes, they do need to catchup with modern train knowledge and realities.
March 18th, 2010 at 9:07 pm
Commuter rail is already regulated by the FRA, and so is PATH, which is rapid transit and runs noncompliant trains.
The FRA understands safety like I understand Hmong. Go to JR East’s website; on the front page, you’ll find a link to a story about the Uetsu Line accident, which killed 5 people 5 years ago. Its annual factsheets mention that accident again in the safety section and talk about what is being done to prevent further accidents. The US doesn’t have either that level of safety or that level of honesty. JR East gets 130 billion passenger-km a year; at less than a hundredth this traffic, US commuter agencies kill five times as many people, and then neglect to mention that.
March 21st, 2010 at 10:21 pm
I’m all for high speed rail – in theory – but I’ve been attending public meetings on it here in LA and I’ve got to say America can do a lot better than this! What a stupid, antiquated, bassackwards technology and way of doing things!
C’mon! Everything about the way they’re doing this designed around putting lots of money into the hands of a few big developers. It’s not the transportation system of the future that we all envisioned. It’s heavy, loud, dangerous, over priced, inconvenient, made to the demands of the developers, not the riders.
There’s only a few stations and there will be lots of communities ruined by the dangerous rail lines splitting them apart. Consider that metrolink is currently cutting back because of low ridership. If HSR has the same problem and handles it with the same logic, they’ll only run trains once a week!
Let’s be American about this and let go of the 1880’s mentality that bigger is better. Lets go for 21st century, space age technology.
Here are a few alternatives we could develop:
http://faculty.washington.edu/jbs/itrans/techtable.htm
Two of my favorites:
http://www.jpods.com/TechIT.html
http://www.skytran.net/phpsite/home/Home%20Intro.php
March 29th, 2010 at 8:10 am
All I hear about the FRA ranting about are Freight Trains, Freight Trains, and Freight Trains. As easy as it is to carry cargo from state to state (diesel is supposedly “cheap”), it’s time for a change as the FRA now sees freight trains “running America.” Face it, we can never connect high speed lines to major terminals as long as freight locomotives don’t reduce in size. Our first step is to invest in those AC Traction motors and build electric freight locomotives like those on the Eurochannel Shuttle for any freight train train along the NEC. Then, we can finally go about constant tensioning the PRR lines to 175mph (designed track speed). This also applies with other lines but with the budget that Obama is offering for construction/conversions, I think he’s nuts.