Capital projects could come ‘off the shelf’ with federal funding
“Amtrak Joe” is living up to his reputation. President Joe Biden introduced a $2.3 trillion infrastructure package earlier this week that looks to make one of the biggest down payments in domestic clean energy, roads and transit in recent decades. Details on the proposal are still murky, but the Bay Area stands to benefit greatly from the package should it be approved by Congress. Local officials say capital projects that have been put on the back burner over a lack of funding could be beneficiaries of the proposal. Those projects include a BART connection between San Jose and Santa Clara, high-speed rail between the Central Valley and Silicon Valley and regionwide carpool and express lanes. “That’s what gets taken off the shelf with a big infusion of money,” said Randy Rentschler, legislative director for the Metropolitan Transportation Commission. Biden’s proposal allocates $621 billion for transportation-related efforts. Of that, $174 billion would go toward electric vehicles, including a nationwide network of 500,000 charging stations and support for local transit agencies to transition from diesel buses toward electric or hybrid vehicles — a process already underway at the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency. Roughly $115 billion would go toward roads and bridges, while $85 billion would be set aside for the modernization of transit systems, representing a near doubling of the current federal funding for public transportation across the country.
