The Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Transportation and Housing recently advanced a transportation budget that will provide $11.8 billion for transit.
The Fiscal Year 2018 Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies (THUD) Appropriations Act follows the funding structure established by the Fixing America’s Surface Transportation Act.
The budget includes restoring the $550 million the House cut from the Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery grants and providing the New Starts program with $2.133 billion in funding. This is $380 million higher than the House budget.
Amtrak will also receive $1.7 billion while $5 million will be used to connect communities to the rail network. The rail network received $5 million more than the House bill but $16 million less than the Trump Administration authorized.
Additional budget inclusions will cover aging infrastructure in the form of $26 million in upgrades, which is less than both the House budget and the Administration requested, and providing $92.5 million to upgrade rail infrastructure safety. This is $67.5 million more than the Administration requested.
There are some differences between previous versions of the budget. The House version focused more on regional projects in the Northeast Corridor while Senate Appropriations Chairwoman Susan Collins (R-ME) had wanted to fund national programs but deemphasized inter-city rail.
The bill is now headed to the full Senate committee for consideration.