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Rail Czar Needed To Move Midwest Project Along
A former politician turned bureaucrat says if the midwest is to get high speed rail service, it needs to have a high speed rail czar.

Former 18th District Congressman and current U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood says midwestern states need a person to shepard the project through and answer questions from the USDOT. Without a midwest high speed rail czar, LaHood says the overall network will lack focus and will take longer to come to fruition.

LaHood says governors whom he has spoken to like the idea of a high speed rail czar.

"I'm hoping in a couple of weeks to visit with other governors. We were invited to Washington for a meeting on high speed rail. I've suggested it to a couple of them already, and I didn't get any push back on it. I think they feel it's a good idea."

LaHood says even with a high speed rail czar and billions of dollars in federal money, the idea to have high speed rail is still nearly a decade away.

The proposed high speed rail route would run from Chicago to St. Louis, Cincinnati, Detroit, Cleveland, St. Paul and Minneapolis. High speed rail, in this case, means trains traveling at top speeds of 110 miles per hour along a network of special tracks versus the current top speed the trains that operate now just short of 80 miles per hour.
06 06 09 by Newsroom
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