Coming off the heels of Sunday’s drenching rains that flooded portions of Canandaigua as well as the Hudson Valley, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand is pushing legislation that aims to improve highway and transit resilience against what she classified as “extreme weather events.”
According to Gillibrand’s office, this week’s flooding has shut down vital transportation corridors across New York, including certain Metro-North lines. Gillibrand’s legislation would provide millions in federal funding to help Metro-North and other transit agencies prepare for future extreme weather like flooding, storm surges, and extreme heat by making proactive upgrades to subways, trains, buses, and ferries.
“This week’s storms have made it clear that our roads and railways are highly vulnerable to flooding and other extreme weather,” said Senator Gillibrand. “We can’t wait until the next devastating storm to fix weaknesses in such critical infrastructure. That’s why I’m announcing the Resilient Transit Act. This bill will help bus and train systems proactively prepare for severe storms, restore service quickly afterward, and get New Yorkers where they need to go.”
Gillibrand says her Resilient Transit Act would add an additional source of funding to the Federal Transit Administration’s State of Good Repair Grants Program that is specifically for resilience improvement projects. The State of Good Repair Grants Program provides capital assistance for maintenance, replacement, and rehabilitation projects of public transportation systems. This legislation would authorize $300 million for each of fiscal years 2024 through 2027 for resilience improvement grants and apportion those funds in accordance with the existing State of Good Repair formula. Recipients would be able to use the funds to finance stand-alone resilience improvement projects or resilience improvement components of larger projects carried out under the State of Good Repair Grants Program. Buses, light rail, ferries, commuter rail, street cars, and subways would be eligible to receive funding under the Resilient Transit Act.
