Amtrak CEO & Board Chair Testify on Passenger Rail Safety : CSPAN3 : June 12, 2024 2:00pm-4:08pm EDT : Free Borrow & Streaming : Internet Archive (2024)

explanation of the method used to determine bonuses for ceo, president, and a number of executive vice president positions. this transportation infrastructure subcommittee hearing suspected to get underway shortly live here on c- span 3.

>> the subcommittee on railroads, pipelines will come to order. i authorize that the chairman be able to declare recess at anytime during today's hearing. i also ask that members not on the subcommittee be required to sit with the subcommittee on today's hearing and ask questions without objections so ordered. as a reminder, if members wish to insert a document into the record, please also email it to documents@ti. i know recognize an opening statement for five minutes. amtrak is federally chartered, owned by the federal

government, and governed by a board of directors to senate confirmation. as a generous recipient of taxpayer dollars to operate its system, amtrak should focus on maintaining and improving its current services to increase revenue, and achieve profitability. instead, amtrak seems content to lose roughly 1 billion per year by its own predictions and flush with historic funding from the aisha is choosing to pursue costly acquisitions and route expansions that may not serve the best interest of the american commuter. amtrak ridership collapsed during the covid-19 pandemic. the ridership has since rebounded as of march of 2024, yet much remains to be done to improve service and attract riders. today's hearing will provide an opportunity to determine the subcommittee challenges that are in the way of potential

improvements. for instance, in 2016, amtrak received almost $2.5 billion in federal loans to procure new train sets. however as of today no train sets have been entered into service. this is primarily because amtrak approved the transfer of new train sets before the completion of required safety modeling that ensures the trains are safe to run on the northeast corridor track. as such, these train sets are three years behind schedule, and 10s of millions of dollars over budget. we also remain concern about the lacked of improvements and accountability at amtrak following the record levels of funding it has received in recent years. the amtrak board of directors does not make its meetings open to the public as other federally chartered entities do. and the board has approved substantial performance bonuses, payments to amtrak executives despite significant

financial losses. doesn't seem right. as the committee of jurisdiction over amtrak, we will continue to monitor these critical issues and conduct oversight to ensure that taxpayer funding is used in the most effective manner to approve service and get amtrak back on the road to profitability. thank you to our witnesses for joining us today, and i do -- i do look forward to our discussion. i now recognize ranking member of the subcommittee, ms. wilson for five minutes for an opening statement. >> thank you, chairman deals. and thank you to our witnesses today. welcome to all of you. amtrak is our nation's inner city passenger rail service, and as a floridian, i'm proud of both amtrak's routes and bright line services, which now connect miami and orlando. amtrak and brightline operates

on tracks that my great- grandfather built when he first immigrated to this country from the bahamas. amtrak allowed me to ride my first overnight train trip to new york city as a little girl. two amtrak trains per day run through my district. and we have a maintenance facility in nearby hialeah. brightline and amtrak are essential services in our community. but unfortunately, we have endured too many grade crossing deaths. two weeks ago, a vehicle was struck on the rail in the heart of my district. luckily no one was hurt this time. but this is just one of the countless incidents of rail car collisions. while i understand some of

these incidents are outside of brightline and amtrak's control, at a certain point, with so many incidents we must ask, at what point does it become our joint responsibility to address this crisis? when do we do that? well the three years before the brightline launch, i discussed safety along the railroad line because safety remains my top priority for the work on this subcommittee. alongside safety, expanding rail to all americans and connecting the diverse parts of america through rail remains a priority for me. as one of the five original cosponsors of the bipartisan infrastructure law, i'm proud that this law is ushering in an era of unprecedented investments in rail. we're seeing this funding being

channeled into substantial safety improvements to the brightline route in denube beach, wilten manors, ft. lauderdale, pompano beach, and west palm beach. in our effort to expand rail, the quarter program identified 69 corridors in 44 states guiding passenger rail expansion across the country. i'm glad to see that two of those corridors are in my home state of florida, and more specifically, in my community. the miami-orlando-tampa corridor, and the jacksonville- miami reason orlando-orlando corridor. late last year, the federal administration awarded $8.2 billion across ten projects in nine states to improve, and

expand passenger rail service. this includes extending and improving the piedmont corridor in north carolina, which will improve connectionwise the busy northeast corridor. ms. white, i'm sure you will be able to tell us more about just how your state has been able to make this historic investment in passenger rail. beyond the benefits to rail passengers, the bipartisan infrastructure law enforcements are revolutionizing the railway supply chain. siemens is investing in a new facility that will provide new train sets and provide maintenance for rail cars and locomotives for years to come. this facility will add 500 jobs and $1.6 billion to local economy, all thanks to the bipartisan infrastructure law. through recent rail

investments, we also have been able to better support our future rail workers. last september, the federal railroad administration awarded the university of south florida a $17 million grant to work with universities nationwide to boost the railroad workforce. these are just some of the many improvements we've recently made in rail space. and i look forward to hearing from our witnesses today about the impact the bipartisan infrastructure law has made on passenger rail and what they would like to see in the next infrastructure law. all aboard. mr. chair, with that, i yield back. >> with thank you, ms. wilson and i appreciate your comments on rail crossings, grade crossings and the dangers that we see across our country probably on a weekly basis here and i think we as a community

should address those. i agree with you wholeheartedly. i now recognize mr. larsen for five minutes for an opening statement. >> thank you, chair, and thank you ranking member wilson for holding today's hearing on amtrak and passenger rail safety across the country. before i begin, i want to welcome representative chris deluzio. i look forward to your partnership on rail safety and other initiatives to make america's infrastructure cleaner, greener, safer, and more accessible. turning to today's hearing, the bipartisan infrastructure law was a monumental achievement that supercharged our nation's investment in rail, with more than $100 billion in funding. the bil provided long improvements in transportation systems and infrastructure. these investments are creating jobs and benefiting the

committee. for inner city passenger rail, it included development. it made possible for the first time ever, dedicated, reliable federal funding dispersed over five years to improve and expand intercity passenger rail. since our hearing last year, the fra has announced $26.6 billion in bil grants for 237 projects. this includes 69 corridors in 44 states, including the district of columbia, that were all recipients of corridor i.d. grants. the cascadeia grant, and the current state supported amtrak cascades route that serves belling bellingham, mount stanwood and edwards in my district. the funding is being used to

grow a well trained workforce to build and maintain a passenger raservice network. the bil is funding university- led, amtrak-led, and union-led workplace developments. more is still to come from additional rail funding to be announced. while the final appropriations bill for fiscal year 2024 did not include all the rail funding authorized in bil, it did demonstrate bipartisan involvement. i look forward to hearing from witnesses about the impact of certainty, and how this will improve rail service for passengers. as we did in fighting for the rail improvement of bil, this committee is looking to help passengers get reliable rail service. $66billion was provided in the form of advanced appropriations. the remaining $34 billion is subject to appropriations and

therefore not guaranteed. so i'll continue to push for congress to fully fund its inner city passenger rail commitments to create jobs, reduce carbon emissions and create a greener and more safer transportation network. this transformational investment in the bil is a great start. but congress needs to build on this, by creating reliable funding for inner city passenger rail. thanks to bil for the first time since the founding of amtrak over 50 years ago, states and cities have the certainty of knowing passenger rail projects will be there. highways, transit, airports and harbors all have funding certainty, to some extend, enabling long term projects without fluctuations. it's time inner city passenger rail had the same certainty. the demand exists. last year, fra received over $18 billion in applications or

$8.9 billion in available funds. so today we're going to hear from witnesses who are turning these historic investments into tangible improvements. i want to thank each of the witnesses for joining the committee today to provide their recommendations for the future of passenger rail. and with that, i yield back. >> ranking member larsen yields. i would like to welcome our witnesses and thank them for being here today. briefly, i'd like to take a moment to explain our lighting system to our witnesses. there are three lights in front of you. green means go. yellow, you're running out. and red, conclude your remarks. i ask that the witness's full statements be entered into the record. i ask that the hearing remain open until such time our witnesses provide answers to any questions that may be submitted to them in writing.

without objection so ordered, i also ask that the record remain open for 15 days, and for statements to be included in the records. as your written testimony has been made part of the record, the subcommittee has asked that you limit your arguments to five minutes. >> good afternoon, ranking member wilson, ranking member larsen and members of the subcommittee. i'm steve gardner, amtrak's ceo and thank you for inviting me today. it's my pleasure to share this table with our cochairman and secretary white of north carolina. amtrak has accomplished a great deal during fy24. may was our best revenue month ever in the history of the country. we're on track to set a new record ridership this year, and will further reduce our operating losses. we've expanded service with our state partners, and on the northeast corridor, we've added

frequencies to meet demand. thanks to the funding from the infrastructure investment and jobs act, construction is now underway, or starting soon on truly massive projects that we've been discussing for decades, like the hudson and frederick douglas tunnel projects, and redevelopment of our stations in chicago and philadelphia. we're also acquiring new equipment. our new trains are testing now and could enter service at the end of this year. our new amtrak air routes are arriving in 2026. and we're about to bid now for a fret of long distance trams. we're not the company we were a few years ago. we have rebuilt and expanded our workforce with some of the best in the business. we've enhanced safety and

security thanks to technologies like positive trank control and our cybersecurity team. we've improved overall on-time performance, and improved accessibility for passengers with disabilities. finally, we've continued upgrading our customer experience with refreshed equipment, improved customer communications, expanding dining options, better trained employees and much more to come. as our nation's population grows, we believe passenger rail can and must play a bigger role. this goal underlies these investments, our partnerships with states like north carolina and the federal administration, and our evaluation of potential public private partnerships. increasing amtrak ridership is so important, because more amtrak passengers mean less congestion on already overcrowded highways, and less

need to turn existing interstates into monster highways, ten lanes or more. for instance, we all know how bad traffic here is to the south on i-95. imagine how much worse it would be if the over 1.3 million passengers who rode straight supported transportation service had to drive. to grow, we will need to both improve existing service, and expand service in states and corridors that we don't serve well, or even at all today. our current route map largely reflects an america of 70 years ago. that's why texas, now our second most populous state has only five amtrak trains a day. and florida, our third most populous state only has six, compared to the small, but mighty rhode island, which has 38 trains per day. building enhanced partnerships with our state, commuter, and host railroad partners is key to this growth with. thankfully llj funding has

created new opportunities for win-win projects with our freight and commuter part summers, whether we can improve safety, and capacity together for all users. in fact, much of the rail funding is not going to the network. two thirds of the chrissy funds awarded last year went to short line and regional railroads. amtrak supports these investments, because they will grow and improve the whole system, while we use our supplemental funding to invest in fleet, infrastructure and systems. it's critical to remember, it's essential that we continue to receive adequate annual appropriations to maintain our assets and continue serving your communities. likewise, while the reshorization of iij is still a

couple of years away, i want to state now how important it is that congress continue to provide multiyear funding for rail. without multiyear funding, we simply couldn't make the progress we are accomplishing today. sustained funding will allow intercity passenger rail to at least fulfill, and spur economic development throughout the nation. i'm thrilled to be part of this extraordinary time in amtrak's history. i thank the members of this subcommittee, mr. chairman, for their support, and for support of passenger rail. i like forward to answering your questions. >> thank you, mr. gardner. i see you have a robust team. i want to recognize chief dossen. thank you for being here. i now recognize mr. coscia for five minutes. >> good afternoon. ranking member larsen and members of the committee.

i am tony coscia, the chainman of amtrak's board of directors on which i have served since 2010 and chaired since 2013. while i am grateful for the experience to speak before you today, it does sadden me not to see thomas payne, a good friend of mine. amtrak has come a long way since 2010. we've served many more passengers, and are very mindful of our statutory directive to operate as a business. the role of amtrak's board is to set policy, and oversea amtrak's management. we represent interest of the amtrak's holders. we soon will have a full compliment of board members to bring greater geographic

diversity, and additional perspectives and expertise. the group have improved amtrak's reporting and transparency. new project controls estimating functions and at the board's direction, we've enhanced our collaboration with amtrak's office of inspector general. we now hold board sessions each year with the general public, labor unions representing our employees, the disability community, and other stakeholders, and we will begin next month holding meters with our state partners. infrastructure investment and jobs act, or ija funding, for which we are grateful, will allow amtrak to grow ridership, enhance safety, and build partnerships and increase our value throughout the nation. the iija has made accountability, and the board's oversite even more important. i believe amtrak and its board are well approved to receive the additional responsibilities the iija has given us.

one of the board's responsibilities is to set management compensation policies. i know there have been questions raised by amtrak's compensation program. that goal, which places a pores of manager's compensation on performance was initiated in 2014, in conjunction with terminating amtrak's very costly management, and post- retirement benefit programs, which paid workers regardless of performance. the management incentive allowed the company to attract a stronger management team that significantly improved financial performance prior to the covid-19 pandemic. as amtrak emerged from the first year of the pandemic, it imposed management salary cuts of up to 20%. the program allowed us to rebuild our workforce, and attract new employees with the expertise we needed. it bears noting that even with

the potential management incentive payments, amtrak employees, particularly those at the senior level, generally earned much less than their counterparts in the freight, railroad, and other industries with which amtrak competes for talent. that said, i am aware of the bills that were introduced yesterday regarding transparency. that information will be posted on amtrak's website this week. if amtrak didn't have the workforce required to manage and support multiple multibillion dollar capital consultants, it would have to rely on high priced consultants before us. after we were rebuilding manhattan in 9/11, i can say it would greatly increase project

risks, as the rail and project risks overly depended on consultants as demonstrated. those of us who live in the northern corridor are very fortunate. they don't have to sit in long queues of planes waiting for takeoff. instead, i can hop on a train at union station, work without interruption, and less than three hours be dropped off 200 miles away near my home. i believe those who live in other parts of the united states should have that same benefit. i hope you will decide that intercity passenger rail service should be an important travel mode throughout the united states, and we'll provide the resources to allow amtrak and our passengers to make that vision a reality. thank you again for your time, and i'm happy to answer any of

your questions. >> thank you, mr. coscia. i'd like to now recognize ms. fulsih to recognize our next witness. >> thank you, mr. chairman, it gives me great pleasure to introduce one of our witnesses here from north carolina, my home state, julie white. it is great to see you again, ms. white. there have been a number of exciting developments and investments of late in north carolina's passenger rail systems, so i think it's very timely to have you here before this committee today. i look forward to hearing more about the work that north carolina department of transportation is doing to make rail travel more affordable, and accessible for the folks back home. and how they are partnering with amtrak to do so. it is also my sincere hope that this might proving to be an

opportunity for others to learn from the strides we in the tar heel state are making from this proposal. we're so grateful you're here and a part of this hearing today, deputy secretary, and we greatly look forward to your testimony. thank you, mr. chair. >> ms. white, you are recognized for five minutes. >> good afternoon, and thank you. thank you congresswoman, thank you chairman nells, ranking member wilson, ranking member larsen and all the members of the subcommittee to discuss passenger rail as an integral part of our national transportation system. i oversee our rail, aviation, ferry, public transit, bicycle, and pedestrian divisions. i also chair a regional cooperation. i want to thank congress for its support of the bipartisan

infrastructure law, which has significantly advanced our rail investments. north carolina has received several chrissy grants, a $1 billion federal state partnership construction grant, and short line grants supporting economic develop.ment in rural, western, and south carolina. we are grateful for the bipartisan support we have received from both state elected leaders and our congressional delegation. rail is the only mode that does not enjoy formulaic federal funding, meaning projects often languish on shelves resulting in decades' long waits. the bipartisan infrastructure law offers a once in a generation opportunity to demonstrate how your insubstantial investment can change the directory and set a different course for the future. passenger ridership in north carolina is at an all-time

high. 38% higher than prepandemic levels in 2019, we continue to see an upward trajectory with a 24% higher volume in the first quarter of 2024, compared to the first quarter of 2023. tomorrow, we will travel for the first time all the way to line hurst, north carolina, bringing attendees to the united states golf association's u.s. open. we have sold out all four train trips. communities in north carolina actively sought the submission of corridors to the corridor development pipeline program and we're pleased so their that north carolina received a record seven corridors into the program. we can now provide local government strong estimates of how much federal match will be needed to advance the corridors

allowing them to budget. better communicating plans to citizens and galvanizing the support needed to lift a large scale decades long projects. with consistent, robust, reliable, and sufficient federal rail funding, we could potentially see service across our state from asheville to wilmington by 2035. the nc d.o.t. has developed a highly successful proprietorship to advance multi-modal projects. we develop the federal grant applications, and administer the local funds, while the local community provides the needed non-federal matching funds. through these partnerships we have secured planning grants. the raleigh to richmond project along the s line is a key initiative reducing travel time between raleigh and richmond by an hour, and providing a car

competitive trip between raleigh and washington, d.c. at full build now, we estimate our annual ridership will climb to 2.5 million ridders. we anticipate our first grant to arrive this summer and will comply for future grants. through regular reliable rail funding formulas, we could significantly shorten the time it takes to put the investment in the ground as we would be able to program developments earlier. ncdot has a strong history of spending billions of federal dollars, as do many other states. streamlining the process would be beneficial to all stakeholders. we remain committed to partnering with congress, amtrak, the fra, and others to expand freight and passenger rail in the southeast. continued strong investment in rail and the next

reauthorization will allow us to meet the transportation needs of north carolinians in all parts of our state, assist communities in growing their economic fatality, and provide more opportunities for the next generation to remain in the communities they grew up in. thank you for the opportunity to address the subcommittee. >> thank you, ms. white, and thank you all for your testimony. we'll now turn to questions for the panel. i would recognize myself for five minutes. mr. garner, again, thank you for being here. my question is related to the government in the sunshine act, or sunshine act which was created to promote and position transparency under decision making in the government. under this law, general meetings must be open to the public, makes sense. found in d.o.t., american association versus railroads thatamtrak was controlled by the government, and operates for the government's benefit,

giving amtrak's federal status, why has amtrak continued to violate the sunshine act? >> thank you, chairman. i believe that amtrak in the '90s, through a series of work with our counsel and others determined that the sunshine act itself didn't apply to amtrak at that time. as you've said, we are certainly an entity owned by the government, but we're established under the d.c. corporate act. we certainly could get back to you on the specifics there of the application of that statute, certainly as the chairman said, we intend, and we have been following the recent changes in the iaja to engage with the public and have more public input at the board meetings. >> can just getting you to commit to implementing some measures that will bring you into compliance with it is what we're asking. it's just, given the compliance with the sunshine act, i don't

think it's that difficult to do. >> the issue applies to the governance to the company. >> everything is about transparency. we know that. how would that transparency measure required under the sunshine act, will you commit to complying with federal requirements for your board meetings? >> well, without adding to the sort of need to analyze it from a legal stand point, which mr. gardner has committed to doing, and my recognition of the application is in line with what mr. garner just mentioned. but on a more important note, the board feels as though the level of request for transparency is actually a very, very positive thing. we embrace it. we very much welcome the opportunity as we have now in the last year to have several meetings in the public.

our meeting in richmond was very well attended by the general public. meetings we've had with the disability committee, with our labor unions. all of them have been in the context of a board session, including those constituent groups. as i mentioned during my testimony, we're doing that with the states beginning next month. in addition to that, myself and several board members have made a point of engaging different stakeholder groups that are very engaged with amtrak on a individual level in order to hear more of their concerns. i've had conversations within the past day, with the rpa, which you know, represents the largest group of our passengers and we've discussed a number of initiatives that we can do jointly to create a greater level of interaction between our stake hold community and the board in general. they can speak for themselves, but i think they're very supportive of that effort.

>> i'd like to hear from ms. wait on being more open with amtrak's decision making. >> we were appreciating the opportunity to share our story there. transparency is foundational in the state of north carolina. so we support what amtrak is doing to become more transparent. >> yeah, last one for mr. gardner here. in 2016, amtrak awarded the 2.5 federal billion dollars plan. which i hope contributed to your record month. may 2024, the most revenue? well, i'm part of that. however today these train sets are still not in service. i don't know why amtrak agrees to build train sets, i think you mentioned in your opening, what can we expect the newest

cell of train sets to enter into service? >> well, thank you, chairman nell. you're right that we have been, working for quite a while on these trains. our hope is now they could be in service by the end of the year. when we went out to bid for these trains, they're of course not a domestic high speed rail industry here at the time. we had a competitive procurement, and we went through a brand new process established by the faa, which required prototype trains to be built, and additional trains, and then to be tested both in dynamic test it's, and using a simulation model. that is underway, and is fulfilling all of the requirements of the fra. it's really ulston's job, as you said, the ridership is going well, and we wish we had

more trains available today, we're working very hard to have that happen and hold our partners accountable in the process. >> thank you, i yield back. i now recognize ms. wilson for five minutes. >> this is for ms. white. the state's for passenger rail correlation, recently sent a joint letter to our colleagues to set aside funds from the crisis program. since there is no dedicated federal funding source for rail planning, ms. white, do you support this effort? >> thank you for the question. yes, we are members of ashta, and we do support the position. >> mr. chairman, i'd like to ask for unanimous consent to

add that letter. >> without objection. ms. white, what is north carolina doing to reduce great crossing incidents with passenger and freight trains. >> our rail d has responsibility for as part of our portfolio. we have a number of programs. our s line corridor we're developing from raleigh north is actually going to be a sealed corridor. the entire corridor will be grade separated. that's one example of what we're doing. we have an active program to close crossings throughout the state, and we help fund those programs as well. we have a b rail safe program, where we provide education to encourage people not to trespass and be where the tracks are. so we have a very active safety

portfolio in our rail division. >> thank you, this is for mr. gardner. mr. gardner, what can you tell me about when amtrak will be able to serve the miami intermodal center at miami airport? >> thank you, congresswoman. the miami international airport, or intermodal center at the airport has been a project long underway, and it involves us transitioning from our facility to that facility. we're in active conversations with f d.o.t. and also the miami dade airport authority, and trirail, who are responsible for both the infrastructure and the station. we've been in negotiations for a while to try and establish the right terms of access. amtrak has access as a matter of statute to the facility. so we're in negotiations presently with f d.o.t. to true and come up with a deal

that works for all parties here, and allows amtrak to move over, so that we can terminate our trains. it's important that we have an efficient facility there, that can continue to serve passengers well, and we think the connections intermodaly are great, but we remain in negotiations with f d.o.t. so we can get the right deal for amtrak in terms of its tendency. >> thank you. ms. white, north carolina received a partnership for international grant for the rodney richard's center. why did you choose this corridor to submit to the program? >> congresswoman, i want to be sure i understood the question. did you see the submission for the federal state partnership grant? >> yes. >> request when the competitive grant opportunities open up we analyze them as compared to the

projects that we have in our pipeline to determine which we think will be the most competitive, and which we think we have a match for. we had a number of those grade separations already programmed in our state transportation improvement program. additionally we felt it would be a highly competitive project. we're doing it in partnership with the state of virginia, and with amtrak, and we know that advancing projects is important to the federal rail commission. we have an entire ground swell of support from our communities along the s line. when we first started brinking passenger rail back to the s line, we met with each community and asked if that

would be something that would influence them. each of them said that was a goal for their community to bring passenger rail back. that was part of our determining to determine that was the best project to put forward. >> thank you, i yield back. >> i now recognize mr. larsen for five minutes. go ahead. >> thank you, mr. chair. i appreciate that. first question is really for mr. coscia, and congratulations on your recent re-confirmation. i've heard some concerns thatamtrak's board is overly concerned with the northeast corridor at the expense of the national network. can you characterize the amtrak's board's view on long distance trains and getting a long distance network? >> thank you, ranking member

for that question. i actually welcome the opportunity to speak about this, which i often do, given the fact that i'm actually from the northeast corridor, and i've had a career there, there's an assumption made about my position on the subject as well as several of my fellow board members. i think i can say, i'd like to say without any equivalentcation whatsoever, that i and my board are very, very much committed to the national network. in fact, we've made many decisions during the course of our board's work together so make significant investments in acquiring additional equipment, in updating state of good repair, and we've recently, as i think was mentioned, issued an rfp to completely replace the fleet on the long disdance corridor. but i think far more fundamental to it is our view is to build a national network that uses our existing long distance system as essentially the spine upon which we built that. we see that as an anchor that

gives us the ability to serve many communities throughout the country that don't have service today. we also are very much aware that the communities we serve, in many respects, we are their own form of transportation. there isn't a an airport that can be easily utilized. many of or travelers don't have access to an automobile as well. so we know that from an economic driver stand point, our work in those communities is absolutely fundamental. so we, as a board are 100% committed to the maintenance of our network, and frankly the expansion of it. amend i think we put our resources behind that kind of initiative and expect it to continue. >> deputy secretary white, what lessons can other states take from your work to develop support for passenger rail? do you have a top three for us

to consider? >> top three. let's start with local community support. we really start with a approach of a partnership. if it is not a goal of a community and they around willing to do a match, we're going to work with different communities. get in the game, i'd say is goal number 2. all of these great opportunities require a match. so we like communities willing to take a tough vote and put their project behind the vote. and the third key success for us is the nc d.o.t.'s expertise. applying for and administrating federal funds is an incredible key complex thing to do. and small towns do not have the staff to be able to do that. the most proud we are is bringing our expertise, making their she stay in the guardrails, but they make sure their investment stays in their

community. >> with apologies for the pun, to keep this engine running for amtrak, as well as state supported services, can you tell us how the fra's corridor i.d. grants are meshing with amtrak's investments? both state supported as well as amtrak directly. >> yes, thank you ranking member larsen. the quarter i.d. program is really the pipeline for expansion. the type of expansion deputy secretary white mentioned is happening. it planned to happen in north carolina, as our chairman just mentioned. it's really the pathway, similar to the fta, or new start, that establishes with the guidance of the federal government, this network. amtrak's goal is to be a

partner with the fra and north carolina who are looking at opportunities for passenger rail. i think i take your point, chairman, we're is responding to the overwhelming response among america. we're trying to support that while also trying to drive our business and improving in all the dimensions that we can. i think our investments are really in two buckets. one is this rij supplemental funds, that's really letting us bring our old assets out of the 20th century and bring them into the 21st, and then, allowing us to partner with states for modernization. because the iha funds that come to amtrak, aren't for expansion. they aren't to grow capacity, they're really to build that

core asset base. so we need those funds to keep developing this network, and look for the opportunities. recognizing that some opportunities are near, and some are in the distance. but passenger role can play a much bigger role in the community and it must. >> i now recognize mr. rowser for five minutes. >> with ms. white, i am going to start with you here, thank you so much for the work that you do for north carolina. so in your role, you oversee the rail as well as the ferry systems. i want to talk to you a bit about the ferry system, which is the second largest in the country. are there things the economy can do which would be a benefit? >> thank you, congressman, i love talking about ferries at the subcommittee. >> i am chairman of water

resources, i have a little leeway here. >> we do run in north carolina a ferry system serving eastern north carolina. it is a $74 million a year operation. we are incredibly proud of running that system. thank you for the support that congress did in creating the world fair capital program. it's a $20 million a year grant program. we're very grateful to be able to compete for that program. it is incredibly over- subscribed. competing in a $20 million pot is incredibly difficult. so we would very much appreciate consideration of additional resources to the world ferry capital program. also, there are some mileage requirements on what allows you to compete in the bigger pot which may be expanded to allow bigger ferry systems to compete

among them. thank you so much for the question. >> talk a little about how the ferry system is so critical during hurricanes and other natural disasters, that we often have in north carolina. >> that is so true. thinkingback to hurricane dorian, they evacuated over 750 vehicles from ocaco*ke island. after the storm, we were the first responders bringing over the necessary assistance to rebuild the dump trucks hauling off the trash. we bring the gas, we bring the water. so it was a many months long he effort with our team coordinating after hurricane dorian. we, unfortunately, are seeing more and more substantial weather at our coast. we now have on highway 12, what we call sunny day storms. we will have complete water over wash on a sunny day on highway 12. so we are pretty much a

critical lifeline to the island, to our poorest county in the state, which needs to pull in its tax revenues in the summer to support the county year long. >> thank you very much. mr. gardner, now back to rail. has amtrak ever turned a profit in a year? >> no, sir. >> i think that's why the issue of bonuses and incentive pay is so touchy. and particularly given the dollar amount. so what's the prospects? what's the timeline where you think we can get to a point where we can turn a profit? >> well, congressman, i think, first off the sort of yard stick is set forth in statue. it's a balance. >> i got that. i got that. >> so we're trying to do both those things. before the pandemic, we were

essentially to be at break even. we've lost all of our business. so in the same stores to pre- pandemic. we're working hard to break even at the end of this decade. we are facing many expanded costs. our cost structure is about 30 to 40% higher depending on the area, so we're working hard there. we'll keep reducing losses every year, and look back towards getting as efficient as we can. >> in my last 40 seconds here, you recently testified recording amtrak's desire to purchase and manage union station. you indicated your plan was to transform the station from the current mixed use transit hub to a passenger holding center. one thing i'm a little

concerned about here, we have a homeless issue there now. you take all those stores out, you take the mixed use out, number one, where are we getting the funding to do? and are you concerned it's just going can to be a much greater magnet for the homeless? it's a beautiful building. >> absolutely. our ability is to enhance the retail, but better amenities. amtrak doesn't have possession of the building yet, but our goal is to in affect create what you just described. the biggest issue is that amtrak was sort of sequestered in the back. we've more than doubled the rider system since we've had this little lease hold. the main part of the building wasn't used for passenger transportation. so we're just talking about using more of the building to serve the needs of the

passengers while also creating a great community amenity and a place that millions of people come to visit from all over the united states, when they come to this building in washington. so we believe very much in a successful venture that will drive both commercial revenue, so we can reinvest in the facility, and also the kind of amenities that people want in our train station. so they want the bookstores, they want to be able to go to the cafe, they want a restaurant, and we want to serve the committee well. >> thank you, mr. chairman. my time is expired. >> i would like to pick up where my colleague mr. bowser left off about amtrak profitability. it's also how you open the your remarks, mr. chair, about profitability. i just want to ask, why when we have hearings on highways, do we not open the hearing by saying why are interstate highways not profitable? why have they cost the american

taxpayer billions of dollars to maintain. like the 40,000 americans who die on our highways every year, and it's taxpayer dollars to clean up every one of those messes. it's taxpayer dollars who built the highways. hundreds of billions of dollars. amtrak got none of that. taxpayer dollars didn't build our roadways. yet, we don't have a problem with the fact that the interstate highway system doesn't make a profit. or why not open our conversation on airlines, by saying, how much would our airlines make in profits if they had to pay for security, if they had to pay for air traffic control. they barely squeeze a profit as it is. in fact, the united states taxpayer has bailed out our airlines multiple times in the last 20 years to the tunes of tens of billions of dollars, and we don't ask them how they could be profitable if they didn't have subsidies. so there's a huge double

standard here. and the fact that mr. gardner can even talk about approaching profitability, something that we wouldn't even discuss with our highways, is pretty remarkable, and it points to the innate efficiency of rail. now to emphasize my bipartisan credentials here, i also have a critique of what the ranking member said, because when she brought up accidents, we talked about how this is a problem for the railroads, and it's why you talked about how the railroad division is responsible for great crossing accidents in north carolina. let's be clear. every one of these accidents is a highway traveler breaking the law. with very, very, very few exceptions, with malfunctioning equipment. this is law-breakers getting killed by trains, delaying train passage. i wish we could have a discussion about how we reduce the delays to rail passengers

every time there's one of these accidents. that's what we should be talking about. we should be talking about accidents, no the just pinning the blame on the railroads. ms. white, you mention the the goal of service from wilmington to asheville, currently a 5 hour and 45 minute drive. that's made possible, of course, it would be a much longer drive, but it's made possible by state and highway dollars that went into building those highways. would travel time would you expect for this corridor? >> thank you for the question. each of those corridors has been into corridor i.d. program. >> i'm just asking a simple question. what travel time would you expect? >> i don't have that answer. >> any country in the world would do under 2 hours. they invest in true high speed

rail. i mean, morocco is investing in true high speed rail. your s line would go the same speed as trains in the 1920s and exactly half the speed of trains of new lines in europe. less than half the speed of new lines in china. is north carolina planning to build at half the speed of current highways? >> we are not. >> are you planning to build any new international airports that only accept prop planes? the technology taking off in the 1920s, when we had 110 mile- per-hour trains in america? i assume the answer is no. >> we are not. >> you said the trip from washington, d.c. to raleigh will be car competitive. i guess that's 4 hours, 30 minutes to 5 hours. again, just to put this in perspective, any other developed country in the world would make that 1 hour and 45 minutes. express planes at 1 hour and a

half. that would be transparent. that would get a lot of people off our airports and off our highways. that's what our goal should be. i mean, my point to you is that as you're building this, please look at what the rest of the world is doing. look at the model of the tgv in france, where any new corridors they build are built to modern rail standards. you have that opportunity, because some of the s line was abandoned, so you're building a sometimes tgv trains slow down to go slower on the segments but please do not invest good taxpayer money into technology appropriate for the 1920s instead of the 2020s to mr. chairman, i believe that even you would be a great amtrak passenger rail supporter if we invested in modern high-speed rail and not trains we had 100

years ago. thank you, mr. chairman, i yield back. >> good omen yields and recognize the gentleman for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chair. my home state of telephone or, i will direct this to mr. gardner, high-speed rail project went from projected ballot item that told the taxpayers $33 billion project to go from sf to l.a. and be completed by the year 2020. a good portion of that above the $9 billion bond portion the voters voted on, the rest from private investment, attracting private investment. so far, the private investors stayed away in droves, the $9 billion burned up and the projected cost is inside of 33 billion, at least 128 billion and there hasn't been a mile of actual track laid other than some of the roadbed put down and some

of the bridges. they also claimed there would be 1 million jobs up until a couple years after the ballot measure, they had 1 million job years which the present number they tout of 13,000 workers, the math i did with eight you have 1 million jobs divided by 13,000 workers, i will take 76 years to build the project, which they are right on track for that at this point here, at least 2030 something before they get one of the segments done. mr. gardner, how could they be so far off on initial business plan that they told the voters, the taxpayers in 2008 to what we have now? nowhere near 120 billion, they might be able to put their hands on 20 billion, when they do carbon taxing and

another $3 billion out of the federal government recently. 100 million short, where they going to get that, how can they be so far off with the plan? they did not even have the route figured out before they put this in front of the voters. >> congressman, certainly amtrak was not involved in the high- speed project. >> no, supportive in your comments. >> we are supportive of advancing high-speed similar to congressman walton's point, we think there's a real role for high-speed in various markets in the united states, california certainly has incredible markets and huge demand and real challenges in terms of mobility. i think the main issue and something we learned, also faced amtrak, quite often because there has not been the apparatus to develop or fund early planning phases for good ideas, when folks are trying to develop concepts for these

systems, which could create a lot of value, they are doing so before we have gone through the standard preliminary engineering design, processes that set that envelope of cost and schedule. >> what did you say the last 42nd, what did you actually just say right there? >> one of the challenges when doing big projects is the amount of planning and the time for planning to get the project developed. what happened in california is really, i think california high- speed team could explain the process. i would say for any project, a big project to be something folks understand, in terms of estimated cost and time, go through this environment process and the environmental process and planning process are what is set out for possible envelope. you asked me what happened from initial estimates to now, it is not process. >> you have any idea how a plan

could be that far off with your plans going forward? let me talk about more local, california in my district, twice a day connection during the pandemic, as they called it , it was all halted. only one a day, catch it around 1:00 a.m. or 4:00 p.m. depending so that local economy, one typical rural town , rural areas are some of the least utilized service routes and they have much more interruptions. with amtrak setting forward to do very optimistic work, how are we going to see that the rural areas have any share of this that will be significant instead of the tail end of the whole system? >> congressman, we've got our co-starlight service is serving several stops in your district. there is also supplemental bus

service that serves some of the stations, chico, i think up to redding as well, funded by the state of california in partnership with amtrak with connecting bus service. maybe the change in the service is the bus service levels, we believe, as you heard from our chairman, investing in this national network, right now the big changes as our new fleet coming to help better serve committees like dunsmuir and investment across all of the station so we have accessible stations and stations -- >> thank you, have to cut you off due to time. a new fleet will not change the fact there are no trains running through their and we don't have the model to be successful with passenger rail, it seems that freight has to somehow keep railroads in business, with that, thank you,

chair, yield back. >> recognize for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. deputy secretary white, i'm sure you are aware, mobility recently announced new plant in lexington, north carolina to manufacture and maintain train sets. from your perspective it ncdot, what will the impact of the new facility before our state and how has the guarantee passenger rail funding from the bipartisan infrastructure law leveraged business investment in our state? >> thank you for the question. siemens mobility broke ground on the new plant in august 2023, $220 million facility in lexington, north carolina that will create 500 jobs by 2028 and estimated to grow the state economy by $1.6 billion over the next 12 years. they sought to build large-scale

manufacturing facility on the east coast because of all the orders for new inner-city passenger rail cars. we are very excited for the state of north carolina to see the supply chain that will grow around that investment, bringing further jobs and opportunity to north carolina and we are excited to see the trains rollout of north carolina-made plant up and down the eastern seaboard including when the new trains arrived in north carolina. thank you. >> thank you for that and thank you to the bipartisan infrastructure law, north carolina received seven core door i.d. awards last year, how do you anticipate the funding improving north carolina's ability to invest in and accelerate the development of passenger rail in our state? >> corridor i.d. is really important because community needs, as stephen had said, the community needs to

understand what a project will cost, the corridor i.d. unlocks $5000 worth of planning funds so we can work with communities to define what the service outcomes art they would like to see and what the infrastructure investments will be needed to make that happen. which each of our communities admitted to the corridor i.d. program, we are meeting with them to understand what is the kind of service outcomes they would like to see, what is the match they will need, at what time in this process i would give this is an example meeting with the community of fayetteville recently, they are very excited to have their core door admitted into the program, they see a connection between fayetteville and raleigh as really important to their military community. they don't get direct flights out of fayetteville to d.c., which is a common path of travel, they lost direct flight some years ago so they see this as an opportunity to do a ticket on

the train from fayetteville to raleigh and they can go from rdu to d.c. as a solution. when we build out the s line, more excited to stay on that single line train from fayetteville directly to d.c. what we are doing with them, we will do the first phase of initial planning with you and we can tell you when you need your 10% match for the next phase of planning and how much that will be so they can put it into the local government budget cycle. we can say when you get to that construction stage, 80% federal funds and 20% nonfederal funds and this is how much that will be and when you will need it. it is that kind of structured planning that will tell a community what has to be built, how much it will cost, what the timetable is to when they will need that funding. we are doing that with wilmington, asheville, goldsboro, fayetteville, all across our state and that kind of robust planning will help us deliver more projects on time and on budget i will have to brag a little bit on the rail division in north carolina, during the earlier era

investments, the state of north carolina won $500 million investment to improve the corridor between greensboro and charlotte. it was half $1 billion investment and we delivered on time and on budget. we delivered $3 under the grant given to us, attempted to spend it but could not find a way to do that within the rules. we feel really confident when we take the corridors through corridor i.d., we can help deliver the projects. >> thank you. finally, can you speak a little bit about the ways in which north carolina's department of transportation works both with amtrak and local communities to ensure that train service will benefit our community is back home? >> it is really important for us to listen to the communities and understand the service outcomes that they need. we are starting to export sixth frequency between charlotte and raleigh so the first step is to

go to the communities along the main corridor between raleigh and charlotte and understand, how do they use our train, how would they like to use our train ? we have folks that commute between cities for their jobs, we have folks that use it to get to healthcare, we have folks that use it to get to college, the main corridor touches 22 colleges. understanding what times a day they travel and how they want to use it will be the first step in ensuring it meets their traveling needs. then we will work with freight railroad partners, the north carolina railroad, and with amtrak to figure out what kind of infrastructure investments are needed to create that kind of capacity to unlock that additionally frequency along the corridor. for us, it is about the partnership with our partners. in north carolina, we approach rail projects because we run on freight rail tracks, we approach it, how do we create a win-win? how do we create the body for freight to not only continue to run its freight but grow the freight opportunity because

manufacturing is a key part of our economy in north carolina while also building the additional capacity to add more passenger rail? we really take that partnership approach to what we do. >> thanks for that, i yield back. >> i recognize mr. babbitt for five minutes . >> thank you, mr. chairman and witnesses for being here. my question is for you, mr. gardner, california petitioned the epa to allow implement the so-called in use locomotive regulation, which would effectively require all locomotives, including passenger rail, to operate zero emission configuration when operating in the state of california, does amtrak have a position on this matter and if so, why did amtrak not choose to submit comments? >> thank you, congressman, my understanding is the proposal won't create an issue for amtrak with our current fleet and trajectory over time to achieve

net zero by 2045. we are working with the state, we support ultimately the transmission here where appropriate so we have been working with california. of course, maintaining service will be critical to us, that is our position so far. >> all other railroads, large and small, conduct extensive analysis to determine the impact of this regulation on their businesses and customers, what sort of analysis has amtrak performed, if any or at all, and what are the results of the amtrak analysis? if epa approves california regulation, they may implement in other states as well, what sort of impact would this have on amtrak's business? >> at the moment, we don't impact, anticipate big impact

in california. i can follow up with specifics based on our analysis. >> great. amtrak projected $1 billion in annual losses through 2027, much of it related to covid era impact, as we all know, covid hysteria has been over for a while now. for amtrak, right our ship has nearly recovered to pre- pandemic levels so why is amtrak still going to lose so much money over the next few years and how is covid actually still impacting amtrak's business model? >> thank you, congressman. last year, we significantly reduced our losses year over year, last year the loss was 752 million, 120 million better than the prior year. this year will be somewhere around 670 million so we continue to improve, as i mentioned to the chairman, get better financials every year. the big issue facing amtrak in terms of cost structure, revenue is back, right our ship is back, what a significantly

higher is the cost. those have come in a couple different forms, labor cost significantly up, freight railroads started the pattern bargain with unions and we follow through, almost done with agreements, we have great relationships with our unions and i think we got really good deals. these costs are going up and they reflect larger wage increases across the economy, for us to be competitive, we have to pay competitive wages. those labor costs are up, fuel cost is a insurance is significantly higher, finds related expense also significantly, a lot of headwinds which is all before you get to the supply chain, all of the cost associated with hard materials we purchase have all increased so we are fighting that inflation but we are clawing back sort of year- by-year with better revenue and more service. >> amtrak claims to be a

private company but a private company, anyone i know of, could not keep its head above water when it is leading billions of dollars of that nature. what a private company like -- consider likely handing out bonuses of half a million dollars to 750,000, if their company were performing like that? i think not. mr. gardner, how do you justify handing out so much money to your executives if they are failing to get amtrak into the greene or the black , i should say. this performance have anything to do with bonus decisions or are the numbers decided on arbitrarily? is there some sort of calculation or metric that determines these bonuses, i would appreciate you sharing that with the committee today because we are very interested, or at least follow up with my office to share that? >> absolutely, happy to share that with you, as the term and

said, we will publish this information, we do provide the numbers to congress, able to talk through the way it works. i think to go to your first point, amtrak is a federally owned corporation chartered here in d.c. under the corporate act. certainly, we don't consider ourselves purely private corporation, loosely owned by the government and responsive to the taxpayer and a board appointed by the president. the dual mission to serve the nation and do so efficiently and be good stewards of the public's resources and try to generate as much as we can to cover this network from the users of the system. we work hard to do that and will continue to work hard to do that. in terms of the network itself, it is set by congress. to the extent that the network produces some services that require subsidy like transit all over the united states, that is because congress asked us to run those services, we believe they produce value so we are supportive of that. in

terms of incentives, we have to compete with folks that have stock options, that get many times the value, incentives in the freight railroads and others and drink the best folks they can manage multibillion- dollar program in amtrak in the united states. we are out there competing to try to get that value. >> very good, thank you, sir. i recognize mr. deluzio for five minutes . >> thank you, mr. chairman and good afternoon, folks, good to be here with you. i associate yourself with many of mr. martin's good comments about the profitability question, i suspect we have a very different discussion talking about the massive subsidies we provide for other forms of transportation not provided in a meaningful way that amtrak, passenger rail, the strong need for substantial federal investment in faster high-speed rail. with that, i recently rode capital limited from pittsburgh down here to washington,

beautiful ride, it takes you through lovely parts of pennsylvania, west virginia, maryland before you get to washington, 7 1/2 hours you do that for and one half hours by car, i think the scheduled flight time is a little more than an hour, less than that. i say that again recognizing we need to have substantial investment in high-speed rail. until that happens, until it should, 1941 found out, took six hours, 40 minutes to do that trip, the main problem is not just the topography, which causes issues, freight traffic, freight rail slows down a lot of what happens on that route and many others. the host railroad reports as freight interference among the top two largest reasons for delay for the two freight railroads there, norfolk southern and cfx area passenger rail has legal preference over freight on the track doj has sued a carrier one time, 1979,

if i'm wrong, you will correct me. mr. gardner, my question, does amtrak have the tools you think are necessary to reduce freight train interference that causes delays on routes like that capital limit? >> thank you, congressman for that question. let me first start by saying, each route is different, there is always a combination of both . the infrastructure and geography and other things, we are always looking to have competitive service, that is congress' instructions to us in our mission and one of the things we are driving. we are similarly frustrated we cannot connect washington and pittsburgh and other parts of pennsylvania in a way competitive to auto. it used to be some of the routes were faster, a lot of that comes from two things, one is the change with the infrastructure configuration, sometimes railroads that were once two tracks have gone to one and there is less capacity and it

makes trains meeting each other pose opportunities for delay. the second issue is preference, as you mentioned. amtrak and passenger service getting the preferences is accorded. the infrastructure made smaller, those conflicts, more often, opportunity for amtrak to not get the preference. that is not always the case but we do have issue across the united states where amtrak does not always receive the preference it is entitled to under law and we don't have effective enforcement regime presently so this is a major issue, one we think more focus on will produce better results. and in a way that does not interfere with freight traffic. frankly, we have a train a day on this route. tiny impact. >> we have to move things by

freight rail for a lot of reasons, i agree. i will ask with a little time left in terms of enforcement, congress went performance drops below 80% to investigate why, the capital limit, pennsylvania, and pittsburgh, two routes where that is the case, why have we not seen those kind of investigations requested from amtrak? >> we did start as soon as we have the authority to, there was a long lead up to that point. we did initiate and petition to investigate and decision on sunset route. that is underway. we would like to see that investigation advance as quickly as it can, stb has the resources to do that. but we support this measure to determine what the root causes are for delays. there may be a variety of delays, infrastructure, maintenance, et cetera. we have poor performance on a

number of routes and we are responsible on behalf of the american people and on your behalf to make sure we get to the bottom of what the root is and make sure all the parties responsible are working together to get better service for the american people and the taxpayers. >> thank you. mr. chairman, i yield back. >> thank you. i recognize mr. stauber for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chair. i think we do ourselves the service when we operate with rose-colored glasses on i understand passenger rail is well-liked by some and well used in certain geographic areas of our country. however, no two states are exactly alike and practicality must be applied judiciously when considering future investments. spending billions of dollars should have certain qualifiers like efficiency and cost- effectiveness. i would like to read excerpts from op-ed piece in the duluth,

minnesota news tribune from april 2021. this comes from john phelan, economist at the center for american experiment, when reflecting for proposed train from duluth, minnesota to minneapolis, minnesota would be quicker than driving, mr. phelan stated, quote, no, the train will take 150 minutes. at present, you can drive from the depot in duluth to target field where the minnesota twins play, in 140 minutes. that assumes you want to go rectally from the depot to target field. you want to go from hermantown to the mall of america, hermantown is the city right next to duluth, you have to add travel time on either end of the train, 18 minute drive from hermantown to the depot and 46 minute light rail ride to the mall of america for total journey time is 214 minutes. the drive, on the other hand,

is 143 minutes, 71 minutes of savings. all of this does not account for the waiting time on train timetables. any mode of transportation fails to reduce cost, time or ease for our constituents and wintry feasibility isn't clear, we should really consider if this is the wisest way to spend taxpayer dollars. i want to ask a couple of quick questions. mr. gardner, you responded to one of mr. babin's questions, in part, you responded by amtrak is owned by the government, paid for by the taxpayers, did you say that? >> yes, sir, along with the revenues that we received. >> and amtrak, transparency is

important when you're making decisions and allow the public to not be part of the decision but understand your decision- making? i'm getting at, in your meetings , would you ever propose to make your meetings public, transcripts, make those transcripts public? >> congressman, i think the chairman mentioned today, our response to first fulfilling the requirements of the new rules for the board and having more engagement and transparency and i think the board's willingness to further engage and create more transparency and visibility. obviously, we are excited by the engagement of folks who want to be part of amtrak and understand what we are doing and create more opportunities

to do that and make sure the company can undertake its business. >> with that being said, you stand by your comment amtrak is owned by the government and paid for by the taxpayers? what is your salary per year? >> it is roughly $499,000 a year. >> 500,000, half a million? >> yes. >> what was your bonus last year? >> between the long-term program and short-term program, about $620,000. >> you made about 1.1 million last year? >> correct. >> mr. coscia , the one answer that question ? >> i'm very sensitive to the concerns that you and others have expressed here. let me sort of answer your question in part by saying that, i kind of approach this from the perspective that has been on the amtrak board since 2010. i have actually seen the transformation of amtrak, that

has significant leadership change within the management of the company. amtrak is running into the comet runs a business, to some degree, prescribed by the congress. >> mr. coscia , i have 10 seconds left, what is your salary per year ? >> my salary, we are unpaid. the board is paid board fees for the days -- >> what did you make last year? >> $18,000. >> any bonuses? >> no. >> you're not on salary? >> no. >> i yield back, mr. chair. >> i recognize mr. carter for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman for the witnesses joining us today. my district in southeast louisiana has historically been a leader in transportation. famously, the city of new orleans once had a large network of streetcars and one of the first american cities to use electric trolleys. today, we are home to the port

of south louisiana, one of the nation's leaders in total tonnage as well as the port of new orleans. the only deepwater port served by six class one railroads. however, louisiana has fallen behind other areas of the nation in terms of passenger rail options. transportation leaders in louisiana like john spain and southern rail commission are now planning to further connect the state by commuter rail including lines connecting new orleans, new orleans west to baton rouge, and east to mobile, alabama. with stops at the communities between those cities. doing so will reduce our transportation emissions, increase travel choices, create good paying jobs, and add additional evacuation options in the face of stronger and faster hurricanes area i'm also proud to say the development of these routes both have

benefited from the massive investments in the rail infrastructure made possible by the bipartisan infrastructure law. the question for mr. gardner and mr. coscia , last year, antagonist agreement to restore gulf coast service between new orleans and mobile which has been out of service since hurricane katrina damage the lines in 2005. that project was aided by roughly $178 million awarded through funding from the bipartisan infrastructure law, which helped make the return to service a reality. amtrak and southern rail commission have said service would restart by the end of this year. is this still a realistic timeframe? what is the status of negotiations of the city of mobile and their station improvements? >> thank you, congressman. as you know, we are very big supporters of returning service to the gulf coast, it has been

a multiyear effort, a lot of work over the years and strong partnership with the southern rail commission. we are, hopefully very soon, concluding our work with the city of mobile, they need to work with us on a property agreement to allow us to undertake station station work in mobile and support their contribution to the grant funds so we are trying to finalize that with them working hard and i believe they are working with other folks. >> is the end of the year still realistic? >> we will have to see if the work can be concluded in the next month or so in terms of agreement, that is what allows csx to undertake the capital work necessary, certainly from amtrak's perspective, we are ready. we have trains, crews, ready to go but we need the work to advance and we will do everything we can to get the service started as soon as

possible. i will be able to update you sent and i would be happy to come to your office. >> needless to say, it is incredibly important to the people of our region, economically, environmentally, every possible way you can imagine. you missed the boat years ago when then governor opted to not take the resources to degree this advancement, fortunately, we are moving forward now and repair to help in any way we can. mr. coscia , do you have anything to add ? >> no, only to indicate the board follow this particular expansion very closely and we are very hopeful it will be initiated. >> thank you. how would you describe your experience working with the freight rail awards -- railroads to restart service? >> it is good, for a long time there was debate between us, we have come to agreement, the fra, amazing partner and department of transportation has invested, spent a lot of time helping to

bring the parties together here, they have been doing important work. two big infrastructure components, positive train control insulation by norfolk southern in louisiana and additional work needed in mobile so we have a station truck. those are the two predicate projects before service. both partners are strong working with us, we need to get the elements done with mobile and be able to move forward. >> 18 seconds, proposed new orleans to baton rouge line, operate through area, some doubt, not proud of. referred to as cancer alley because the amounts of petrochemical and industrial activity in that area. in terms of pollution reduction, can you speak to how communities in the area will benefit from the mass reduction of car trips near their homes due to passenger rail lines? >> congressman, we are excited about the baton rouge service. that corridor is in the program and developing here. we are working with host

railroad, cp kc, we think there will be real appetite for this service and major opportunity for folks to have alternative to driving and as you say, remove carbon emissions associated with them in that corridor. >> any idea to quantify the amount of reductions? >> that is part of the corridor i.d. planning process? >> $500,000 awarded >> that is the start, it allows him to going to step two. >> good omens time has expired, we have votes coming up. we want to finish the hearing before votes. i recognize the demand for five minutes. >> mr. gardner, i asked you a year ago about proposed operating loss, you told me it would be over $800 million, what is the new and will projected operating loss? >> 670. >> last year, you also confirmed amtrak plan for fiscal year 2022 and through 2027, amtrak

expects to lose 1 billion every year, is your expected loss increased due to inflation? >> no, i think from five-year plan beginning 2022 anticipated higher losses than we have experienced. we have been able to drive the number down last year and this year so we continue to drive the number down below that. >> to what point? >> our goal is that and of the decade to reach a position of breakeven, recognize there's a big portion of operating expenses associated with capital work, to help you see that, the goal is to contaminate progress. we are setting our targets for next year so that will be something we work on with the board to year-over-year improvement from last year and continue to make improvement next year and reducing the loss.

>> your executives were paid between 500,000 and 780,000, on top of that, executives received bonuses last year, at least $200,000, i don't blame you, i blame the board and the contract you signed up under. i'm wondering how to explain to folks in east tennessee who are currently struggling paying 600 more dollars a month out of pocket just for living expenses through all of this biden inflation, the executives company not profitable get annual bonus is worth more than some of their homes? mr. coscia . >> congressman, i assume you are addressing that question to me. i was starting to respond to this in part to your colleague 's question, i have been on the board since 2010, i can only answer that question within the context of seeing the before and after picture. i would say that amtrak, for decades, probably 40 decades, suffered from both chronic

underinvestment in capital in capital intensive business and frankly, weak management that allowed many practices to develop at the company that were not best practices. i spent nearly 40 years in the private sector, much of it with very successful companies can i know what good looks like, it did not exist when we showed up. we intentionally revise the compensation program at the company because at the time, the company had a very, very lucrative pension and post retirement plan that would have cost us more than triple of what the incentive compensation plan had cost. we are paying the amount of bonuses we are paying at the incentive, we understand the anxiety it creates on the hill and other places, with a company like amtrak serving this public purpose. i will also tell you, an operating company that has to compete with employees, the freight railroads, the airlines, the hospitality business, engineering companies, all of whom pay

their employees far more than we do, we have no chance of succeeding without bringing in a team and putting them on the field that have the ability to do it. this team brought amtrak, the first time in its 50 year history, within $27 million in fiscal '19 to breaking even. that has never come close. in 2020, had the pandemic not occurred, we would be blacking operating level for the first time ever. all of the headwinds mr. gardner described to you, creating a struggle for us to get back, we will get through them and we will be back in blacking i can tell you the board's objective for how quickly to get there is even quicker than i'm assuming is otherwise considered. >> i appreciate that, we are running out of time. one thing crystal clear to me, the american taxpayer is being forced to fund you all and for instance, you subpart dining experience, ironically contributes to amtrak's operating deficit all while these executives make $200,000

bonuses. to me, that is unacceptable. to yield the remainder of my time. day i now recognize mr. garcia for five minutes. >> thank you, chair, ranking member, and all of our witnesses. all of my district, half is located outside chicago, deeply tied to the rail industry, many parts of chicagoland, the real capital of the country and growing economic hub, chicago is a prime location for expanding intercity passenger rail. mr. gardner, chip is a large project to improve the service and eliminate delays in and around chicago union station for intercity connections throughout the midwest. 30 million riders passed through the station annually and 400 train movements each day, how is this project progressing and has the infrastructures and jobs benefited this project? >> yes, thank you, congressman. appreciate your support and

focus on chicago. as you say, the epicenter of the nation's rail network and the heart of amtrak's national network. the chip program is simply about getting passenger favorable routes into chicago union station, the heart of the long distance trains and chicago hub so service where we serve illinois trains, michigan, wisconsin, now minnesota and other services. really important. the program has been a recipient of funds under the i ij and most recently, appropriations bill. we are focused on concourse expansion, really improving the outdated concourse that serves our passengers and metro passengers so that we can provide much better level of service at the station. at the same time, looking to connect our routings out of the yard and terminal facility to

get those passenger focused routes so we do not incur delays for both the trains to the east and the south. >> thank you. chip involves bringing together wide array of stakeholders, amtrak, metro, commuter rail, illinois, chicago, department of transportation, how does amtrak work with freight and commuter railroads to advance the chip improvements? what having access to guaranteed funding, similar to what highways half, help the project get finished? >> let me start with your last point is, absolute guaranteed funding is essential to undertake a program like this. this program is a multi-year massive tragic that will involve many different stakeholders. we talk sometimes about big projects in the northeast corridor, this is even more complex because we have many more railroads, many elements of government, different states. we all need to come together and work as a team to accomplish this work and having

dedicated funding and support for planning and execution will be absolutely critical, otherwise, we simply will not be able to advance this kind of multi-your work. in terms of working together, we have a strong working relationship, obviously with illinois d.o.t., freight railroad partners, and metro at the core along with the city, cta, et cetera, where we are looking to find those win-win opportunities that enhance today's service but create capacity for the future. another important piece is building more capacity for future growth on the yard side so we have more mechanical capacity because as the states look to grow service, we need a place to park trains and service them in chicago. >> thank you. my last question, how does amtrak prioritize high-speed rail projects across the country and what obstacles exist in terms of investment and infrastructure needs?

>> that is a great question. as i said earlier, high-speed rail, we think it's a lot of sense at certain markets in the united states not all, certain markets really have the density and possible travel time that really support high-speed as we see all over the world. we are working to support those corridors in development, several funded through the corridor i.d. program fsr's leading, opportunities in texas, evaluating those. and we see great work happened in the st. louis corridor of providing service up to 110. that certainly is not the high- speed we all could envision and hope for but it makes a material difference because it creates the trip time, competitive reliable service. we are focused on both near-term opportunities, one of the best is the s line, we are working with our colleague in north carolina. the opportunity to take that corridor and dedicate dedicated 110 or 120 mile-an-

hour corridor that relieves congestion on the rail site and create a faster trip is hugely important. the core of this is -- >> thank you, mr. gardner. i yield back. >> time has expired. >> thank you, mr. chairman and thank you to the witnesses for being here today. earlier today, the hearing held the meeting on the role commuter rail lines play in our communities. i was pleased the south shore line, which operates in my district was able to participate and share the benefits of north central indiana. additionally, south shore shared the challenges they face. last month, after a decade of planning, financing, and construction, the south shore opened its $650 million double track service. it was incredible accomplishment that will greatly benefit the hoosiers that i represent. my question, mr. gardner, it is good to see you again, by the

way, we have spoken a few times on prior occasions both in my office as well as this committee. as we discussed, the double track capital project was not funded by amtrak in any way, yet of course, amtrak is inviting itself onto the double track. can you reaffirm your commitment if amtrak invokes this authority, you will work with the south shore on the timing of those routes and compensate them appropriately? >> thank you for the question, good to see you again, i did have a chance to congratulate mike colleague on the launch of service and very excited for the work accomplished. as i said before, amtrak in the process of evading different options, doing this together with the fra and states to look at ways, the south of the lake challenge providing service from the east to chicago and looking at the different opportunities long-term. we are still in the planning phase. i will, and continue to commit

that we will of course work with partners at the south shore about any possible use of infrastructure, amtrak does have rights to use infrastructure but we would do so pursuant to the federal rules and only as a result of cooperation and partnership. a big choice here will be the rural state of indiana and other states in terms of investment. this is still early phase and we will work with mike and the team at south shore as we consider this and other options. >> thank you for that continued commitment, we will hold you to that. >> switching gears, according to progress report on amtrak's compliance with americans for disability act or a.d.a., amtrak addressed a.d.a. responsibility in 119 of the 385 stations, and others bipartisan frustration with amtrak's lackluster compliance with the a.d.a., which was

signed into law in 1990. my question is, amtrak will get $22 billion in funding from infrastructure and jobs act, how much money of echostor complying to the a.d.a.? >> great question, we share that frustration, over my tenure at the company, we have done a lot to change that trajectory investing over $800 million in a.d.a. improvements. right now, 190 stations compliant either entirely or although a accept the platform, that is another component. we are about 140 almost, 150 stations in design, all of the design will be done at that and of next year, another roughly 70 stations in construction at some form occurring this year so we are making great progress. about $1 billion, a little more than $1 billion of the $22 billion is dedicated to the a.d.a. improvements. we are on track and working with fra on that. >> amtrak with $22 billion to expand potentially new service

stations, you commit amtrak will not inaugurate any new service stations on routes that are not a.d.a. compliant? >> typically, the fra, when we go to start a new station, requirement is it is a.d.a. compliant. we do have instances where we have temporary stations before the final station is complete but we make sure it is accessible. we are required to have compliant stations. >> thank you, mr. chairman, i yield back. >> thank you, chair, ranking member, witnesses, mr. gardner, mr. coscia , great to see you and partner with you on these incredible important projects. the gateway program is one of the largest and most urgent infra structure project in the country and will improve reliability and resiliency for heavily trafficked lines of rather than the country. our district is home to the

bulk of the project in new jersey get this way, federal transit administration finance will funding grant agreement for the hudson tunnel project which will build new two track hudson river rail tunnel to connect new jersey to manhattan. this agreement is historic milestone for the project and the next step toward finalizing the largest ever mass transit in u.s. history. this is incredible news for our district, it not only makes significant strides in improving rail service, it will bring tens of thousands of jobs to our region. it is a privilege to sit on the committee and work with my colleagues on the committee and our district to see the project to completion. mr. gardner, can you explain how created more reliable service for those that use intercity passenger rail on a regular basis? >> thank you, congressman, we are overjoyed at the investments coming here to propel the gateway program forward. as you say, it is an incredible program, it is to take the biggest bottleneck on north american system, really, the

two track mainline between newark and new york, the busiest mainline in north america and create four track crossing that is reliable and can serve for decades, hopefully centuries ahead. really excited by that work. in addition to that project a number of others in the region, the northbridge program already underway funded by iija, sawtooth program, duck bridge, and whole series of improvements being propelled because of the bipartisan infrastructure law investments. it has been decades in the making making these deferred investments, many that we inherited taking over the corridor in 1976 and this is the first time we have the dollars available to make these improvements to in partnership with the state, not just amtrak and federal investments, the states have, as our colleague from north carolina has said,

looking for skin in the game, participants who can invest as well. in addition to the huge projects , we are spending a lot of money trying to rebuild the railroad today so we get more reliability, the same issue for the tunnels exist at the track levels, switching signals, overhead cat mary, these systems, in some cases, from the 1930s so we have to rebuild them. we are out there doing that trying to balance with service as it is hard to do that while running trans and find the right mix and get more and more investment out into the railroad and have that show up as better more reliable service for passengers. >> absolutely. with respect to the members, opportunity to follow up on this, we know the incident the last couple weeks with northeast corridor, et cetera, you alluded to this with the prior answer, i want you to speak directly to the commuters, residents of the district, how did the iija funding toward the northeast corridor, how will it minimize and eliminate incidents like we

saw the last couple weeks on the northeast corridor? >> thank you, the events of the last couple weeks work domination of infrastructure and equipment failures. we share the railroad today, 24 trains an hour, the busiest railroad service in the u.s. here in this section, on the infrastructure side, the big issues we had were overhead wires. the system that supports the traction power for the transit is from the 1930s. we have fatigued, ancient designs and old equipment here. it is made more difficult because there's very little windows to go do the work. what the iija is allowing us to do in partnership with new jersey department of transportation, go out and address those known critical areas of failure so we can remove them. meanwhile, big projects have huge improvements as well because they will put new systems of power and signals in their locations and things like

portal bridge today, which sometimes opens and gets stuck, those kind of delays, that can throw a commute period into total chaos, they will be gone or dramatically reduced. it will take some time, we apologize to those impacted by this it is the last thing we want to do is to have unreliable service, we are working hard but we are digging out of a deep hole and it will take a lot of money and time. thankfully, congress' support has helped. >> thank you. i yield back. >> mr. kean is recognized. >> mr. gardner, mr. coscia , good to see you. business line in the u.s., vital for americans, constituents, extraordinarily important to livelihoods and economic and safety in the region. however, struggled with aging

infrastructure, leading to delays we just now recently discussed, $40 billion repair backlog, building on the previous question, what is next ? when you are looking for the importance of commerce and movement, what are the urgent needs that remain that have not already been authorized that amtrak is looking for? >> thank you, so much for the question and your support here. i know how important the railroad is to new jersey and mobility throughout the region. the big things i think remaining are really in three areas. one, we only started the process of the cat mary renewal and system upgrade and we need prolonged funding for that, the big dollars with the iija dedicated the massive projects, there is more work to do. the huge projects will deliver incredible benefits, they don't

resolve all the issues. having funding that will take us into the next tranche of investment will be important coming out of this core investment. additionally, we need to work together with our partners to create more time to undertake the construction work because that is a challenge tonight, there will be folks working on the railroad, they will probably get less than an hour of uninterrupted time before trains come by and if the pullback from the railroad with that on-again and off- again work makes it inefficient to get the work done and some work is impossible to complete without shutting down the railroad entirely for a period on the overnight. those are really important components and i think the other element here is there is a need for additional capacity in targeted areas beyond the gateway section just to accommodate the growth we anticipate coming from new jersey transit and amtrak over the long haul.

>> thank you. i have a question that i asked you for a very long time, both on state level and now here in this room, amtrak can it u.s. proposes new corridor service for 16 states expansion of service 20 states at a cost of 75 billion. it will similarly connect any seat to 2037 with frequent service, connections to new markets, additional capacity, reduced travel time on the northeast corridor over 15 years . the question here is, still unresolved, is more stops at trenton, right now there are not ? metropark, one a day, perhaps? facing one direction. looking at future expansion, why are we not looking at doing a better job and more frequent access to new jersey's state capital, economic and efficient entity that isn't around

metropark? we are looking at more consistent and predictable service in the state of new jersey. >> congressman, i know you are passionate about this. we have, as you said, changed some of the service levels in around the various stations in new jersey. in particular, increase of service in new brunswick, princeton junction, e wr of the airport rail station. we have seen some reduction, the service in trenton that you mentioned, small reduction in metropark service. we are, the new service and additional regional trans, the aricept that started showing up 2026, more capacity and relook at all of the service patterns. today, the demand has shifted in these markets that we will adopt continual view at the

demand here so we can get the service in the right markets because we understand how important it is to have service at trenton and we think there's opportunity. given the limited frequencies we have, in part, waiting for more equipment, the priority has been on some of the other places that produce more revenue -- >> we do what is necessary for the economic growth of new jersey's capital city and one of the main innovation centers in and around trenton and metropark, we need more service and predictability and more stops over the course of the entire day. >> thank you, i yield back. >> thank you. i represent phoenix, arizona, one of the fastest growing cities in the country and the largest metropolitan area in the united states without access to passenger rail service. amtrak sunset limited travel

between new orleans and los angeles running through tucson in southern arizona, adding service in the phoenix area will open up the entire state to important economic opportunities, to be more successful and productive and more internationally competitive. the past december, we took the first step toward re- establishing service at the federal level. arizona department of transportation selected for the federal railroad administration corridor i.d. pregnant and granted initial funding under our bipartisan infrastructure law to develop a scope, schedule, and cost estimate. as you know, there is very strong but local bipartisan support for re-establishing this connection. mirrors of a dozen arizona communities along the proposed line have thrown their support behind the effort, including phoenix, mesa, tempe, and chandler, the communities that i represent in congress. and the state of arizona has

put substantial dedicated resources, and half a million dollars towards this critically important planning effort. arizona is sending a clear message to washington and amtrak, we are serious and ready to move on with this project. mr. gardner, phoenix to tucson is just one corridor i.d. project of many across the country, nearly 70 across 44 states as referenced by my colleague from new jersey. while i know amtrak may not engage with state corridor i.d. projects until phase two, what is amtrak doing right now to plan for the next phase of this project? >> well, thank you very much for the question. it is a great corridor, one we are very excited about. phoenix is the largest city we don't serve directly here, and really, it is a huge mission on our map, and something we have long believed needed to be remedied, so we are really excited. had a chance to meet with the governor and a number of mayors

across the corridor, as you said, incredible bipartisan, local support your and excitement to bring passenger rail into this oratorio. so, the corridor i.d. program, as you said is really the process by which this will be developed. we are supporting arizona and we will be able to undertake some additional work with them as they go through this program. we have two date given a fair amount of attention and focus on the opportunities here, but the fra program will really set the sort of pathway forward, but we continue to look for opportunities to partner with them, and phase 2 is really when we can undertake additional studies and work with them to drive things like revenue ridership and other opportunities. similarly, we are leading the return to seven-day service on the sunset route. there is obviously overlap here. this is an area we are excited to advance you're going to do that in partnership so we can

have an efficient planning process and get value from both planning projects together. let's once you get to phase 2 if amtrak is selected, and my expectation they will be, you can't say that, but i can't, we expect amtrak will be selected and i look forward to engaging closely with you. one of the reasons this issue is so important to me is because passenger rail will boost our economy is with more access to jobs, more private investment along this route, maybe talk a little bit about that in the little time i have left. can you talk about how expanded rail service drives private investment? >> absolutely, we have seen incredible investments that have followed the type of service you are describing here. whether it is a name where the houston service has established a whole program and sort of revitalization of communities in new england, whether it is what we see being planned already in colorado, as they look to develop front range service. there is a huge amount of interest and intensity that

gets developed, frankly, when we create this node of mobility with passenger rail. so, we expect both immediate improvements to current in the station area where folks locate both housing and commercial and office, because they want that benefit of being able to connect efficiently to other markets, and then beyond that, we see benefits in housing and community and overall attractiveness in terms of competitiveness for communities that have this kind of service, and particularly amongst the younger generation. i know congressman mentioned that folks are looking for competitive service, we completely agree, but there are many folks who would rather take the train and drive, even if it is a little bit longer. we have got to be sort of in the ballpark, but frankly, people find the train more productive and more relaxing than driving in any places, particularly younger generations. that is important. quick thank you so much.

mr. chairman? >> the gentleman yields, any further questions from the committee have not been recognized. seen on, this concludes our hearing for today. i would like to thank each one of you for being here, the committee stands adjourned.

two thursday, the head of the federal aviation administration, michael whitaker, testifies on boeing

manufacturing and aviation safety. this hearing follows an incident in january where i door plug flew out of the boeing plant during an alaskan airlines flight. you can watch this your life beginning at 10:00 a.m. eastern on c-span three , our free mobile video app, or online at c-span.org. ohio republican governor mike dewine highlighted investment and edio

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