How Will Second Trump Administration Affect Transportation Policy?
Date Posted: November 7, 2024
Posted In: Discussion, News,
From Construction Dive: Former President Donald Trump will become the next president of the United States. Following the Biden administration, which put billions of dollars into Amtrak, high-speed rail, public transportation and the transition to electric vehicles and buses, what might change under the incoming administration?
On transportation policy that affects cities and states nationwide, Trump has a mixed record. In his first term, he proposed a trillion-dollar infrastructure plan that never came to fruition. He repeatedly tried and failed to cut funding for Amtrak’s long-distance trains and attempted to take back nearly $3.5 billion in already-awarded federal grants for the California high-speed rail project to connect Los Angeles and San Francisco. Instead, the first Trump administration largely favored highway expansion projects.
Smart Cities Dive asked experts Wednesday morning for their thoughts on how the second Trump administration could affect forthcoming transportation policy impacting U.S. cities.
“The Trump administration in the past and the Republican Party’s general approach has been to advocate for significant cuts in public transportation,” said Yonah Freemark, research director of the Land Use Lab at Urban Institute. He added that pursuing those policies next year “could be absolutely devastating for urban transit systems.”
Federal grant programs under the Trump administration will likely focus on roads and rural areas, marking a big shift from the Biden administration’s prioritization of transit, cyclists and pedestrians, Freemark said.
However, rural Americans want more trains, not less, some rail advocates say. Staff from the Rail Passengers Association have traveled across the country over the last two years in an effort to bring back discontinued train routes, and “we’ve heard from rural communities that they feel disconnected and left behind,” said Sean Jeans-Gail, RPA vice president of government affairs and policy.