Virginia receives over $74 million to continue building high-speed rail

Virginia is getting an additional $74 million in federal money for high-speed rail. Upon closer inspection, it’s really higher speed rail that will top out at 110 m.p.h. The money will help pay for laying an extra 11-mile stretch of rail meant to speed freight and passenger travel between Washington, D.C. and Charlotte, N.C.

The funding will be used towards an 11-mile stretch of track in northern VA. Photo by Jon Curnow.

Republican governors in Wisconsin and Florida returned federal money, saying the plans were too expensive and the states would be on the hook for cost overruns. That leaves California as the the biggest beneficiary of federal money, for an ambitious nearly 400-mile plan to connect Los Angeles with San Francisco by high-speed rail.