President Joe Biden signed into law today the largest infrastructure bill in recent history making available new funding to connect the Gulf Coast states of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama to the national passenger rail network and potentially offering significant funding for launching passenger service between city pairs such as Baton Rouge to New Orleans, Meridian to Dallas, and New Orleans to Mobile.

The signing of this bill marks the second time Biden has committed funding for passenger rail that could potentially be available for Louisiana to start passenger rail service between New Orleans and Baton Rouge. When he visited New Orleans in 2016 as Vice President, he spoke about the $300 million in stimulus funds that were available for the project that were rejected by the former governor stating he “wished he could bring them back.”

“Biden has delivered on his commitment to passenger rail and the timing for this infrastructure bill couldn’t be better as the SRC has been working towards the fruition of our priority projects, and we now intend to seize the opportunity to take full advantage of the funding to implement our vision,” said Knox Ross, SRC Chairman. “We also extend the SRC’s sincere thanks to Senator Cassidy of Louisiana who worked tirelessly on the details of the bill and Senator Wicker of Mississippi who has long championed the needs of more rural areas by making sure they can meet the demands for passenger rail and access federal funding to connect these areas to the national network.”

This bipartisan bill provides funding for substantial upgrades to stations, railways, and passenger rail connections across the country. The SRC recently announced other grant funding for stations along the New Orleans to Mobile rail route in anticipation of passenger rail service starting in 2022. That decision is pending the Surface Transportation Board’s hearing scheduled for February 15, 2022, of Amtrak’s case asking the STB to require CSX to allow passenger trains to operate on the Gulf Coast route.