The Biden administration on Tuesday spent billions more on a similar project in California, but after 15 years and no progress, the Biden administration announced a $2.5 billion federal grant for a high-speed rail project linking Las Vegas to Southern California. approved the bond.
The $2.5 billion bond approved by the Department of Transportation (DOT) joins a $1 billion bond the department approved for rail construction company Brightline West in 2020 and a $30 million bond allocated to the company's projects in December 2023. Based on $1 billion in grants. according to Go to press release. The increased federal support for the project comes as a federally-funded high-speed rail project in California still hasn't laid a mile of track after 15 years.
The DOT is optimistic about its Brightline West project, which runs from Las Vegas to Rancho Cucamonga in San Bernardino County, California. (Related: California spends more than $600 million on environmental review of yet-to-be-built high-speed rail)
“President Biden's historic infrastructure package gives us an opportunity to build a safe, green, and accessible rail system that will serve Americans for generations to come,” said Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg. It will bring benefits.”
This aerial photo taken on August 26, 2021 shows the Cedar Viaduct standing during construction of a high-speed rail project through the Central Valley in Fresno, California. (Photo by Patrick T. Fallon/AFP via Getty Images)
But other federally funded high-speed rail projects have struggled.
California voted to build the nation's first high-speed rail in 2008, approving $9 billion in bonds, News Nation report. Fifteen years later, as of December 2023, the state has not built a single mile of track, and the California High Speed Rail Authority estimates the project to connect San Francisco and Los Angeles will cost between $88 billion and $128 billion.
In December 2023, the Biden administration awarded more than $3 billion in grants to support high-speed rail projects in California.
Some critics say the federal government is pouring money into projects that have made little progress.
Former Republican House Speaker Kevin McCarthy: “The federal government should not allocate any new funding to California's incompetent high-speed rail system in any way.'' Said Calmatters.
“The California High-Speed Rail Authority has ignored countless timelines and misled the public about costs that were exorbitantly higher than originally estimated.”
DOT approved a private activity bond for the Las Vegas project. The bonds are tax-exempt and will reduce the cost of the project, according to a DOT press release.
DOT and Brightline West did not immediately respond to requests for comment from the Daily Caller News Foundation.
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