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SALT LAKE CITY — It appears that a plan to restore commuter rail service between Boise, Salt Lake City and Las Vegas may have to wait at least a little longer.
The Federal Rail Administration declined to award a pair of $500,000 proposals to study the idea further in this year's round of Corridor Identification and Development program grants announced Friday. Utah, Idaho and Nevada transportation officials filed the paperwork earlier this year to study the cost, feasibility and other factors associated with bringing back Amtrak's Desert Wind and Pioneer lines, which were shut down in the 1990s.
No reason was given for why the Utah-Idaho-Arizona plan failed to receive a grant.
The federal agency instead announced that it will send out funds to help study 69 corridors across 44 states, including a line that would connect Chicago and Seattle via northern Idaho, as well as a line within Colorado linking Fort Collins to Pueblo via Denver in the Intermountain West.
Amit Bose, the agency's administrator, said the selected projects are a step forward in the Federal Rail Administration's goal to "advance transformative projects" to provide "convenient, climate-friendly alternatives to congested roads and airports" in the coming decades.
Utah Transit Authority officials said earlier this year that they were "pretty optimistic" about their chances after the application was submitted. Officials declined to comment on Friday's update, referring KSL.com to a statement that the Utah Department of Transportation provided.
A Utah Department of Transportation spokesperson told KSL.com that the agency had hoped to review "transportation solutions to address growth and help people get where they're going safely and conveniently," but it has "no current plans to move the study forward" at the moment.
But Salt Lake City transportation director Jon Larsen, who helped facilitate some of the project's earliest discussions, said Friday that the news won't deter the city's desire to reestablish commuter rail service.
"It's certainly disappointing. Those are corridors with tremendous potential, and we will keep pushing to advance them forward in the future," he said in a statement to KSL.com.
Federal Rail Administration officials also announced Friday that they've awarded $8.2 billion to help kick-start the construction of 10 new rail service projects, including a new high-speed rail service between Las Vegas and Southern California.
U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg touted all of the projects announced Friday, contending that they will provide "faster, more reliable (and) expanded train service" for parts of the country, including the West.
Today, we advance President Biden's vision for world-class passenger rail on American soil. Our historic funding will support some of the biggest rail projects of our time and create hundreds of thousands of good-paying American jobs. pic.twitter.com/3z2gFMksJK
— Secretary Pete Buttigieg (@SecretaryPete) December 8, 2023
"We'll deliver America's first high-speed rail on a route between Southern California and Las Vegas, complete major upgrades for riders in Virginia, North Carolina, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Maine, Montana and Alaska, and announce a comprehensive plan that makes it easier to expand passenger rail lines in 44 states," he said in a statement.
All of the funds come from a 2021 spending bill that allocated $66 billion toward advancing passenger rail projects, opening the door for many new or restored routes.
Boise city officials initiated the discussions over rekindling a regional rail service last year, contacting Salt Lake City leaders about it. They said at the time that the line would include stops in smaller communities between the two state capitals, especially those that lost regional air service. Salt Lake leaders also began looking into extending a line into Las Vegas shortly after starting discussions with Idaho officials.
Amtrak currently offers some Western services, but most of it is centered along the Pacific Coast and options within the Intermountain West are few and far between. Its Californa Zephyr line is the only train that cuts through Utah, crossing Salt Lake City in the early morning hours during trips to and from San Francisco and Chicago.
Officials from the corporation supported the idea of adding more Salt Lake City services during a UTA-led event last month.
"There really isn't a reason it can't be a transit center for intercity passenger rail — not just with long-distance service, but also state-supported service going up into Boise and down into Vegas," Alex Khalfin, Amtrak's director of government affairs, told KSL.com at the time.
Utah, Idaho and Nevada's inability to receive the grant this year may not change the trajectory of when service could return too much. Khalfin also estimated that service would not return until the 2030s at the earliest because the study is one of many steps needed to advance the project.
The Federal Rail Administration will likely announce the next Corridor Identification and Development program grant winners in December 2024, should the three states apply again.
