President Obama Calls for $53 Billion in High-Speed Rail Spending

This blog post was updated on October 22, 2018.

One month after he touted the importance of high-speed rail development in America’s future, President Barack Obama unveiled a spending plan that would allocate $53 billion for such projects over the next 6 years.

 

In his State of the Union address in January, Obama said he wanted to give 80 percent of Americans access to high-speed trains within the next 25 years.

 

This new spending plan would go a long way toward making that goal a reality.

 

An initial $8 billion funding request for the project will appear before Congress on Monday in the president’s new budget proposal.

 

If approved, that funding would go toward developing or improving trains that travel up to 250 mph and linking existing rail lines to new projects.

 

Source: AP