| We are finally starting to take rail seriously again in the U.S. I dare say that in the last year alone we've done more to advance high speed rail in New York than has been done over the past 30 years combined.
That's because last January, I convened the bipartisan Upstate Congressional Caucus to advance the Upstate economy and promote regional investments like high-speed rail. After several meetings with the key stakeholders, we all directed our efforts to advance the "Third Track Initiative," which is a program to construct a third new track dedicated to passenger rail reaching 110 miles per hour.
Within a month of convening the Upstate Caucus, Congress passed the Recovery Bill that included $8 billion to kick start high speed rail development. We capitalized on this opportunity and for the next eight months I personally worked with Secretary LaHood, the Federal Railroad Administration, NYDOT, Governor Paterson, Amtrak, CSX, and a number of other stakeholders to secure funding the build Upstate New York's high-speed rail network.
New York State was awarded $151 million to improve rail infrastructure and to being constructing a new third track dedicated exclusively to high-speed passenger rail. In fact New York received the 8th largest award - more than 42 other states. Today Secretary LaHood said that the Obama Administration is committed to building a high speed rail network in our nation. He said over the coming years billions in investments will be available to states for high speed rail and that New York is "in the ball game in a serious way."
This is a downpayment on a network that starts by connecting Buffalo to Albany to New York City and expands to connect our state to Toronto through Niagara Falls, and Montreal to Albany. Like Europe, Upstate New York's geography is uniquely suited to benefit from High Speed Rail. Upstate boast major urban areas each about 70-80 miles apart. The cities are too close for air travel and yet too far for daily commuters, which is why rail is a perfect fit.
Over the coming two years this funding will be put to work on eight different projects across Upstate to modernize our rail infrastructure, remove bottlenecks and pave the way for faster and more reliable passenger rail service. Although trains are now permitted to run as fast as 79 mph, the average Amtrak speed between Albany and Buffalo is only 51 mph due to our lacking infrastructure. For example, between Schenectady and Albany there is only 1 track. This routinely causes delays of up to a half hour since east and west bound trains must take turns traveling over this stretch. So with a portion of the funding we have received so far, we will add a second rail line to remove this bottleneck.
We will also make drastic improvements in Amtrak's on-time reliability. Right now because Amtrak trains ride on the same tracks that are owned and used by CSX for their fright operations, Amtrak trains are routinely delayed to accommodate the freight trains. Trains that carry people have to pull over giving the right-of-way to trains with cargo and that's not efficient for either. In fact, in 2008, conflicts with freight trains resulted in Amtrak having only a 44% on-time arrival performance between Penn Station and Niagara Falls.
That is why a significant share of funding will be devoted to build a separate track for Amtrak passenger trains. Without freight train interference, we expect Amtrak's on time performance in New York to reach over 90% and trains can run at speeds of 110 mph. And in the Empire State where we need to get things done "in a New York Minute" we can no longer tolerate anything less! The first segment of this new track is funded and will be built just west of here between Rochester and Buffalo.
High-speed rail will be a fantastic tool for economic development in New York State.
In Buffalo for example, improved rail service will make commuting from Rochester and Niagara Falls easier and more likely. With travel time less than an hour from point-to-point, the more mobile Western New York labor market expands to 955,562 workers, a greater draw for economic development. This would make the Buffalo-Niagara Falls-Rochester metro area the 26th largest in the nation. And making the workforce more mobile between Rochester and Syracuse, we create America's 38th largest metro area.
That's a powerful recruitment tool to help attract new business to New York. After all, we are now in an innovation age where a business' most sought-after raw material is brain-power. Each of the Upstate cities is blessed with an abundance of colleges, universities, and research and development centers of excellence. But our highly skilled and innovative workforce is largely siloed within each city's immediate area. The promise of high-speed rail is to allow people the opportunity to live in one city and work in another and permit businesses to draw from a larger labor pool.
Construction of the new high speed rail line also stands to provide immediate jobs for a number of New Yorkers and local businesses. In Upstate New York alone, 3,500 workers are employed by 30 companies that manufacture railroad equipment. Together these companies bring in more than $750 million in annual sales. And another 11,000 Upstate workers are employed by businesses that produce and distribute goods to sectors that are heavily relied upon by the railroad industry.
And High Speed Rail will also help us as we move to promote energy independence and address global climate change. Today's intercity passenger rail service consumes one-third less energy per passenger-mile than cars. It is estimated that if we built high speed rail lines on all federally-designated corridors, it could result in an annual reduction of 6 billion pounds of carbon dioxide.
Just as the interstate highway system we take for granted today was built over the past fifty years, completing a high speed rail network will take time. But as President Obama has pointed out, the fact is today we can take it for granted. We don't marvel that our home's driveway is the start of an uninterrupted network that leads across a continent. But it is a marvelous achievement: one that took vision, investment, and diligence.
Just as New York innovated and brought prosperity to Upstate by constructing the Erie Canal in the 19th Century, today New York State, and Upstate in particular, is leading the nation again is creating a 21st century high speed rail network. |
