Transit Cost Project Issues Report

The purpose of this report is to make concrete recommendations to speed up the delivery of true high-speed rail, high-speed rail achieving a minimum speed of 155 miles per hour in accordance with the International Union of Railroads’ definition of high-speed rail, in the United States. As noted above, to do that, we need to recognize that the task ahead of us is distinct from what we have accomplished to date and requires a departure from what we are doing. When speaking to high-speed rail experts who have worked in Spain, France, China, Taiwan, Germany, Turkey, and Japan, all mentioned that there was uniform agreement that high-speed rail was a national priority, and that national intervention, be it in terms of establishing design standards, creating space within a national ministry to carry out planning, or a recognition that technology transfer from successful systems was needed to catalyze their domestic market, there was broad enough political support to complete projects.