Passenger Rail did very well in the Stimulus Bill. Typically Amtrack gets $1.3 billion dollars per year. In the stimulus passenger rail gets $8 billion for capital investments on high speed corridors, in addition to an expanded yearly endowment. The struggle now becomes how to spend the money fast enough.

Politico has a must-read piece on how passenger rail became the "signature issue" the Obama administration focused on to the exclusion of other worthy projects like school renovation and modernizing the nation's electric grid.

Meanwhile, the Midwest High Speed Rail Inititive was clearly on the President's mind. The day may yet come when we can take the train from downtown Louisville to downtown Chicago in four hours without using a single drop of gasoline. My hope is to make it to my 20-year college reunion in Iowa without having to slog it out 200 miles on my bicycle.

In related news, the Midwest High Speed Rail Associantion's Annual Meeting is coming up, and I'll try to be there!

And let the record show that Gov. Strickland publicly declared a big push for passenger rail before it was cool: "We will work toward the restoration of passenger rail service between Cincinnati, Columbus and Cleveland ... for the first time in 40 years. This will be a first step toward a rail system that links neighborhoods within a city, and cities within our state." Its a shame that they're planning to shadow I-71 from Cleveland to Cincinnati, but they don't go to Louisville.

Hat tip to J.A. at the Environmental Law and Policy Center for both this and the great Politico article.