The first high-speed train line in the United States should see the light of day in 2028, between Las Vegas and Los Angeles, the flagship project of around ten rail investments announced Friday by the Joe Biden administration.
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Called Brightline West, after the name of the private company which will be responsible for building it and then running the trains, this project “will receive up to 3 billion dollars”, details the administration in a press release.
This very first American high-speed train will then connect Los Angeles (California) to Las Vegas (Nevada) in just over two hours, compared to double that by car.
President Joe Biden, a loyal train user when he was a senator, earning him the nickname “Amtrak Joe”, named after the state-owned railway company, will travel to Las Vegas, Nevada, on Friday to officially announce the launch of this future line, and detail other modernization projects which will benefit from funding.
In total, “$8.2 billion for ten passenger rail projects across the country,” Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg announced during a conference call.
These investments are part of the gigantic infrastructure investment plan that Joe Biden had adopted in November 2021, and which provides $66 billion for passenger rail transport.
Several projects have already been announced in recent months. This latest tranche brings the amount now allocated to $30 billion.
The place of 1st “TGV” in the United States should therefore ultimately not be for the San Francisco-Los Angeles line, an old sea serpent which has fallen considerably behind schedule, causing costs to explode. However, it will benefit from $3 billion to accelerate its completion, the administration further announced.
“The investments will make it possible to repair the aging railway infrastructure”, and thus benefit the American economy, but also to “create well-paid union jobs”, further notes the Biden administration.
And to specify that these electric trains “will remove millions of cars from the roads and reduce emissions, thus consolidating intercity rail as an ecological alternative to the plane or the car and allowing millions of Americans to save time” .
The administration also announced on Friday, “$34.5 million” in investments, still within the framework of the Biden plan, to develop rail transport in 44 states.
