Public Transit

Amtrak had more riders in March than it has had in any March in its 40 years of existence, the company said Thursday.
 
There were 137,000 more Amtrak riders this past month, the company said, which was the 17th straight month of increased ridership. That puts the company on track to break its annual ridership record, which was 28.7 million last year, Amtrak said.
 
From the first six months of the current fiscal year, October 2010 to March 2011, Amtrak ridership was up 5.9 percent over the same period from 2009 to 2010, the company said. 

Your morning transportation speed-read:

Virginia transportation officials do not dig plans to build a new Washington MetroRail stop at Dulles Airport underground.

Minnesota commuters will have to deal with $900 million worth of road construction projects this year.

It was supporters' turn to be heard in the debate over what to do with federal high-speed rail money North Carolina already has in mind.

The N.C. Department of Transportation isn't waiting for the argument over railways to be resolved before asking for more money.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said Wednesday that 24 states turned in applications for some or all of the $2.4 billion in high-speed rail money that was recently turned down by Florida.

There were 90 applications in total, including proposals from Amtrak and Washington, D.C. LaHood said the volume proves that Florida's lack of interest in building new railways was not indicative of the rest of the country's mood about the proposals.

“Today, we are another step closer to delivering an innovative, national transportation network that brings new jobs and economic opportunity to the American people," LaHood said in a statement.

Amtrak applied for more than half of the money rejected by the state of Florida for a proposed railway there.

On Monday, the national rail service requested $1.3 billion of the $2.4 billion that Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) turned down, according to a senator from one of the state's the proposed railway would run through.

“This funding would mark a critical step forward for the Gateway Project," Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) said in a statement Tuesday. "I am pleased with how Amtrak is moving ahead and putting the wheels in motion. Rail transportation is critical to the economic success of New Jersey and all of the Northeast Corridor, and these projects will benefit our commuters, businesses, and families.”

The Gateway Project would expand New York's Penn Station and add more commuter trains to New Jersey, as well as additional Amtrak service.

Your morning transportation speed-read:

More Southwest flights canceled.

Other airlines weren't questioning their 737s yet, though the FAA says now they'll have to.

The airline that is soon to be merged with Southwest got some better news.

Buses are still on the hot seat too.

States that want some or all of the $2.4 billion in high-speed rail money rejected by Florida have until Monday to submit applications to the Department of Transportation.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood reopened the application process for the money after Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) said he would not accept it. State lawmakers sought to force him to take the money by suing, but the Florida Supreme Court ruled Scott had the right to reject the Obama administration's rail money.

Had it been accepted, the money would have paid for 90 percent of the construction cost of a railway between Tampa and Orlando. But Scott said the railway would not generate enough riders to sustain itself, repeatedly calling it a "federal boondoggle."

Several states in the Northeast and California have expressed interest in the money.

LaHood has said Scott's rejection was not indicative of the support for building high-speed rail in the U.S. Scott became the third Republican governor to give back money from the Obama administration, following Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and Ohio Gov. John Kasich.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood will kick off the week with a trip Monday to Allentown, Pa., when Department of Transportation officials say he will shine a light on pipeline safety.

LaHood will take a tour of the site of a February explosion that resulted in five deaths and will make what officials are calling a “major announcement” about safety initiatives from the Obama administration.

The Transportation Department's Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety administrator, Cynthia Quarterman; Rep. Charlie Dent (R-Pa.); Allentown Mayor Ed Palowski; and the city’s fire chief, Robert Scheier, will join LaHood.

Your morning transportation speed-read:

Texas needs to step on the gas with its transportation funding, a new report finds.

San Francisco is mapping out its plan for moving people around during the America's Cup yachting tournament.

A Chicago casino is betting on a bridge to Indiana the state of Illinois said it wasn't planning to replace.

Ohio looking to the private sector for transportation funding.

The charter of the company that operated the bus involved in a fatal New Jersey crash has been suspended, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration announced Wednesday afternoon.

The FMCSA suspended the operating charter of the company, Pennsylvania-based Super Luxury Tours, which prohibits the company from operating interstate.

"Safety is our number one priority,” FMCSA Administrator Anne Ferro said in a statement. “FMCSA will use every available resource to pursue and shut down passenger bus companies that evade federal safety regulations and put motorists at risk.”

The announcement came in the middle of a Senate hearing into the issue of bus safety spurred by the Super Luxury Tours accident, which killed two people, and a crash involving a bus carrying senior citizens on the way to New York City from a Connecticut casino. In that accident, which took place in the Bronx, N.Y., 15 people were killed and 17 more were injured.

Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee's Surface Transportation subcommittee Chairman Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) said those accidents were why Congress needed to be involved in the issue.

“We owe it to all of the victims of bus accidents and their families to get to the bottom of why these crashes happened — and to do everything in our power to prevent crashes from happening in the future," he said. "We need to understand why these dangerous drivers and bus companies were not taken off the road before these disasters."

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said Wednesday that new bus drivers would soon be required to get learner's permits before they can obtain commercial driver's licenses.
 
The announcement comes as a congressional committee is set to convene hearings on bus safety later Wednesday following two deadly bus accidents in New York and New Jersey that killed 17 people.
 
The Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation panel’s Surface Transportation subcommittee is scheduled to hear from the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and others.