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Today, American Public Transportation Association (APTA) Vice President of Policy Art Guzzetti hosted a media conference call, during which he outlined the top 10 challenges and opportunities to implementing high-speed rail in the United States.

Here are Guzzetti’s comments about each item on the list:

• How to ramp up to a high-performing HSR system
We are starting from scratch with the idea of high-speed rail in the U.S. We don’t have any domestic models for it. We can learn from international examples, but our environment is different, so it’s not as easy as saying, “Look at what they’ve done in Europe, Asia.” We’re mindful of different issues in the U.S., shared corridor issues, financing issues, regulatory issues. We do have some upcoming events, we’ve partnered with our European and Asian counterparts. U.S. decision makers will soon face many of the issues that others in Europe and Asia have already faced.

• Investment
We need a stable, dedicated funding source at the federal level, but we also have to have supporting state and local funding to go along with it. The $8 billion for high-speed rail that was part of the economic recovery legislation was a signal from Washington to the states and private sector that high-speed rail is a serious national priority. Following that, the FY2010 transportation appropriations bill included an additional $2.5 billion to supplement it. That shatters any notion that the stimulus funding was a one-time deal, but to keep momentum going, we need a sustained federal investment. There was $50 billion for high-speed rail included in Oberstar’s proposed surface transportation authorization bill, but states and regions have to have money for high-speed rail, too. Bonds, public-private partnerships are all important parts of finance that we need to be looking at. There’s a lot to figure out on the financial end, but financing is not funding and you can’t do financing without funding.

• Creation of a federal grant program    
The FRA is a great partner and they will be called upon to organize and implement this program, but they traditionally have not been a grant-making agency — they are a safety and regulatory agency first and foremost. They recently have had $30 million to award for intercity passenger rail, now that number is $10.5 billion. But they’re working on it. They have been direct in their outreach to people, they are increasing positions over there to administer this and we are confident in their leadership. It will be important to establish a multi-year mechanism for a federal grant program. From a grants perspective, you need some short-term projects, a few projects that can be chosen to move forward and build up quickly. Then you need additional projects that can be put into a pipeline. If a project’s not ready, perhaps there will be a lot of projects in a pipeline that will be next generation and that’s important in sustaining a national program.

• Regional authorities
State and multi-state high-speed rail authorities need to be created. Different states will have different financial investment and we need to create authorities accordingly. Those organizations will need voting structures that apply to them, as well as state legislation.

• Manufacturing
With high-speed rail, the U.S. will get a new manufacturing sector that will provide green-collar, clean-energy jobs, but we need to establish ground rules that will allow an industry to thrive, make sure we have proper standards in place, and make sure we have a consistent flow of orders to support that. In a rail manufacturing summit called by LaHood and the FRA [in December], that’s what was discussed, that we need a steady flow of funds to support the domestic rail industry. Combine high-speed rail with a transit sector that’s grown very much over the last 30 years — Amtrak, commuter rail, heavy rail, light rail — and there are numbers there to support an annual level of steady rail orders that can help the industry thrive.

• Safety and security
The safety record across the world with high-speed rail is extraordinarily positive, but new things have to be considered. We’re talking about new technology, grade separation at times … these are the things we need to do as we address safety and security.

• Use of existing infrastructure
We need to strategically utilize the corridors that already exist, they’re very precious. Without them, we have much more work to do. We need to figure out how we can use the corridors without negatively impacting current services. That means the high-speed rail industry needs to work with the freight-rail industry. We want to keep the freight-rail industry robust and growing. We need rules for the partnerships that will be forged; we can find a win-win solution in the use of those corridors that addresses reasonable limits of liability and access.

• Design a system with easy access in mind
We need to ensure that these systems connect seamlessly with local and regional transit systems to enable origin-to-destination trips with links to airports, and intercity rail and bus services. High-speed rail is part of the evolution of transportation systems, and we need to plan and design these systems as one.

• Community and livability benefits
We need to ensure station sites are magnets for development and urban revitalization, that they serve as portals to the region. Just like we have transit-oriented development, the high-speed rail stations would serve to increase commercial and residential development, revitalize communities, and increase livability for nearby residential property values to ramp up. It sounds easy, but it’s a challenge to do it right; it’s a new way of thinking and planning, thinking of communities in ways so you have the ability and option to get around without a car.

• Operating and managing a high-performing HSR system
We need to involve the private sector, state DOTs, universities — they need to be a part of this process. The money was a sudden and pleasant surprise, and we need to move forward but there are a lot of human resource issues to deal with. It’s a good problem to have — we’re talking about jobs and skills that need to be filled. Some state DOTs will have a lot of funding, planning to be done, a lot to discuss and they will need people to do those jobs. Universities will need to include training for high-speed rail professionals. We’re talking about a whole new workforce and training that will be needed to implement high-speed rail. We also need research and development that will spawn more jobs and opportunities.

— Angela Cotey