Georgia high-speed rail line gets $14.2 million study grant

By Ariel Hart

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

A proposed magnetically levitated rail line northwest from Atlanta has just won a $14.2-million study grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation, according to U.S. Rep. Zach Wamp (R-Tenn.).

Local advocates of the line, which could run from Atlanta to Chattanooga and possibly beyond, were disappointed this spring when the project was not included in the Obama administration’s map of proposed high-speed rail routes. But Georgia and Tennessee officials say the study will bring new steam to efforts to eventually include it in a national network as well as get the big bucks for construction.

“The project has seemed to gain momentum and credibility, and this just seems to validate that,” said Georgia Transportation Board member David Doss, an advocate for the line. “It’s a substantial grant.”

The grant for the line to Chattanooga is not part of the much larger high-speed rail initiative funded by the stimulus package. It comes from $90 million that was set aside for magnetically levitated — or “maglev” — rail a couple of years ago, said Wamp, who announced the grant Friday. He hopes the line can eventually go through Nashville to Chicago.

Maglev is just one type of high-speed rail. The larger high-speed rail program may end up building other types of lines to begin with, perhaps cheaper ones that are not as fast. Maglev can run well over 300 miles per hour.

U.S. DOT spokesman Mark Paustenbach said the maglev grant doesn’t guarantee the route’s inclusion in the national network. States would have to petition Washington to get the project officially designated, he said. Georgia and Tennessee asked to include it years ago but Washington wasn’t looking to expand the map then, said DOT Intermodal Director Erik Steavens.

This study will decide such issues as the route for the line to take and where stations could be built along the way. The next step would be design, Wamp said.

The biggest remaining question is funding for construction. Such projects are enormously expensive to build. Wamp said that though he opposed the stimulus, this type of project is the kind of thing it should fund, since it creates jobs and provides infrastructure. He pointed to President Dwight Eisenhower’s creation of the Interstate system as a similar initiative.

“It paid huge dividends,” Wamp said.

Local governments along the route will have to provide matching funds to the federal money and they have agreed to do so, Wamp said. He said he believed Washington had awarded the grant because of the enormous road congestion and air traffic into and out of Atlanta and the resulting need for a high-speed artery into and out of the city.

The Obama administration’s map of designated corridors released this spring included routes that could link Atlanta, Birmingham, Charlotte and Savannah.