The US’s busiest rail corridor just got a $16.4B boost – why that’s huge
The Biden administration just announced $16.4 billion to upgrade the Northeast Corridor’s rail infrastructure – here’s why that’s going to impact a lot of people.
The Biden administration’s Infrastructure Law, which passed in November 2021, earmarked $66 billion for rail investment – the most significant (and well overdue) investment in passenger rail since Amtrak was created in 1971. The $16.4 billion isn’t more money being spent; it’s coming out of the Infrastructure Law budget. And it’s going to pay for 25 passenger rail projects on Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor.
The investments announced today will rebuild 12 tunnels and bridges that are over 100 years old; upgrade tracks, power systems, signals, stations, and other infrastructure; and advance future projects to significantly improve travel times by increasing operating speeds and reducing delays.
Why the Northeast Corridor?
The Northeast Corridor runs from Boston to Washington, DC. It’s the most heavily traveled rail corridor in the US in a region representing 20% of the US gross domestic product. If the Northeast Corridor shut down for a single day, it would cost the US economy $100 million in lost productivity.
But there hasn’t been significant investment in the Northeast Corridor in generations. The Northeast Corridor that exists today is the product of investments that date back to the 1830s, and many of its existing bridges and tunnels were built in the early 20th century.
What’s getting an upgrade
The White House-released map above shows the awarded projects. Two standouts that are going to make a significant impact are:
Frederick Douglass Tunnel in Maryland is relied upon by around 24,000 Amtrak and Maryland Area Commuter passengers daily. The 150-year-old tunnel (pictured below) is the largest Northeast Corridor bottleneck between Washington and New Jersey, and $4.7 billion will be spent in a phased funding agreement to replace it. The electric upgrade (the main image) will increase speeds from 30 mph to 110 mph and reduce delays on the entire Northeast Corridor.
Penn Station Access in New York City will receive $1.6 billion in a phased funding agreement to repair and rehabilitate 19 miles of the Amtrak-owned Hell Gate Line, including tracks, bridges, and signals. The project will increase Amtrak service, introduce Metro-North service (which currently only leaves from Grand Central) to Penn Station, and cut local transit travel time from the Bronx to Manhattan by as much as 50 minutes.
US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said, “These investments will make our busiest passenger railroad safer, faster, and more reliable, which means fewer delays and shorter commutes for the 800,000 passengers who rely on the Northeast Corridor every day.”
Electrek’s Take
My initial reaction to this news was, “Well, it’s about time.”
Amtrak trains on the Northeast Corridor emit up to 83% less greenhouse gas emissions than car travel and up to 72% less greenhouse gas emissions than flying. More people will take trains if already-cleaner train travel becomes more efficient, faster, and more frequent in the Northeast. Plus, you can only electrify with the infrastructure to support it.
Read more: Check out Amtrak’s new state-of-the-art Airo trains
Photos: Amtrak
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If you’ve ever wondered what happens when you combine a fruit cart, a cargo bike, and a Piaggio Ape all in one vehicle, now you’ve got your answer. I submit, for your approval, this week’s feature for the Awesomely Weird Alibaba Electric Vehicle of the Week column – and it’s a beautiful doozie.
Feast your eyes on this salad slinging, coleslaw cruising, tuber taxiing produce chariot!
I think this electric vegetable trike might finally scratch the itch long felt by many of my readers. It seems every time I cover an electric trike, even the really cool ones, I always get commenters poo-poo-ing it for having two wheels in the rear instead of two wheels in the front. Well, here you go, folks!
Designed with two front wheels for maximum stability, this trike keeps your cucumbers in check through every corner. Because trust me, you don’t want to hit a pothole and suddenly be juggling peaches like you’re in Cirque du Soleil: Farmers Market Edition.
To avoid the extra cost of designing a linked steering system for a pair of front wheels, the engineers who brought this salad shuttle to life simply side-stepped that complexity altogether by steering the entire fixed front end. I’ve got articulating electric tractors that steer like this, and so if it works for a several-ton work machine, it should work for a couple hundred pounds of cargo bike.
Featuring a giant cargo bed up front with four cascading fruit baskets set up for roadside sales, this cargo bike is something of a blank slate. Sure, you could monetize grandma’s vegetable garden, or you could fill it with your own ideas and concoctions. Our exceedingly talented graphics wizard sees it as the perfect coffee and pastry e-bike for my new startup, The Handlebarista, and I’m not one to argue. Basically, the sky is the limit with a blank slate bike like this!
Sure, the quality doesn’t quite match something like a fancy Tern cargo bike. The rim brakes aren’t exactly confidence-inspiring, but at least there are three of them. And if they should all give out, or just not quite slow you down enough to avoid that quickly approaching brick wall, then at least you’ve got a couple hundred pounds of tomatoes as a tasty crumple zone.
The electrical system does seem a bit underpowered. With a 36V battery and a 250W motor, I don’t know if one-third of a horsepower is enough to haul a full load to the local farmer’s market. But I guess if the weight is a bit much for the little motor, you could always do some snacking along the way. On the other hand, all the pictures seem to show a non-electric version. So if this cart is presumably mobile on pedal power alone, then that extra motor assist, however small, is going to feel like a very welcome guest.
The $950 price is presumably for the electric version, since that’s what’s in the title of the listing, though I wouldn’t get too excited just yet. I’ve bought a LOT of stuff on Alibaba, including many electric vehicles, and the too-good-to-be-true price is always exactly that. In my experience, you can multiply the Alibaba price by 3-4x to get the actual landed price for things like these. Even so, $3,000-$4,000 wouldn’t be a terrible price, considering a lot of electric trikes stateside already cost that much and don’t even come with a quad-set of vegetable baskets on board!
I should also put my normal caveat in here about not actually buying one of these. Please, please don’t try to buy one of these awesome cargo e-trikes. This is a silly, tongue-in-cheek weekend column where I scour the ever-entertaining underbelly of China’s massive e-commerce site Alibaba in search of fun, quirky, and just plain awesomely weird electric vehicles. While I’ve successfully bought several fun things on the platform, I’ve also gotten scammed more than once, so this is not for the timid or the tight-budgeted among us.
That isn’t to say that some of my more stubborn readers haven’t followed in my footsteps before, ignoring my advice and setting out on their own wild journey. But please don’t be the one who risks it all and gets nothing in return. Don’t say I didn’t warn you; this is the warning.
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Environment
Podcast: Trump/GOP go after EV/solar, Tesla, Ford, GM EV sales, Electrek Formula Sun, and more
In the Electrek Podcast, we discuss the most popular news in the world of sustainable transport and energy. In this week’s episode, we discuss Trump’s Big Beautiful bill becoming law and going after EVs and solar, Tesla, Ford, and GM EV sales, Electrek Formula Sun, and more
Today’s episode is brought to you by Bosch Mobility Aftermarket—A global leader and trusted provider of automotive aftermarket parts. To celebrate Amazon Prime Day July 8th through 11th, Bosch Mobility is offering exclusive savings on must-have auto parts and tools. Learn more here.
The show is live every Friday at 4 p.m. ET on Electrek’s YouTube channel.
As a reminder, we’ll have an accompanying post, like this one, on the site with an embedded link to the live stream. Head to the YouTube channel to get your questions and comments in.
After the show ends at around 5 p.m. ET, the video will be archived on YouTube and the audio on all your favorite podcast apps:
We now have a Patreon if you want to help us avoid more ads and invest more in our content. We have some awesome gifts for our Patreons and more coming.
Here are a few of the articles that we will discuss during the podcast:
- Electrek FSGP 2025: New teams, new cars, same solar spirit
- Congress votes to send 2 million US jobs to China, increase deficit, energy costs
- Tesla (TSLA) confirms 384,000 deliveries in Q2 2025, right on expectations
- Tesla prototype sparks speculation: a Model Y, maybe slightly smaller
- Tesla launches Oasis Supercharger with solar farm and off-grid batteries
- Tesla unveils its LFP battery factory, claims it’s almost ready
- Here’s why Ford’s electric vehicle sales crashed by nearly a third in Q2
- The Chevy Equinox EV is GM’s breakout star, but that’s not the only surprise
- Xpeng launches G7, a new Tesla Model Y competitor for just $27,000
Here’s the live stream for today’s episode starting at 4:00 p.m. ET (or the video after 5 p.m. ET:
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