CRC Sound Bite with US Deputy Secretary of Transportation Polly Trottenberg

The Commuter Rail Coalition hosts United States Deputy Secretary of Transportation Polly Trottenberg and its spring meeting. Join us for as the Deputy Secretary addresses our membership in this special guest appearance. 

Transcript

Admin  0:10  
Thank you for joining us for a Commuter Rail Coalition Sound Bite where we bring you critical information impacting commuter railroads across North America. Today's Sound Bite is an excerpt from a Commuter Rail Coalition spring meeting, where United States Deputy Secretary of Transportation Polly Trottenberg addressed our members. Polly is introduced in the Sound Bite by Tom Prendergast, AECOM's Metro New York Executive for Design and Consulting Services, and Connecticut Department of Transportation Commissioner Joe Giulietti, both of whom served at the New York MTA when Miss Trottenberg was on the MTA board.

Tom Prendergast  1:00  
For those of you that don't know, Polly is been in transportation, I think the overwhelming majority, if not her entire career, and she's not only a strong advocate for transportation, but she understands commuter rail, and the importance it plays in a metropolitan region to knit together all the different transportation services. When she worked as a staff member for members of Congress, she was instrumental in a lot of the legislation and the funding. When she was a board member at the MTA she was one of, if not the only one who understood what the basic purpose and function of a public transportation agency was as an advocate for its customers, and a keen sense of knowing how to navigate the political waters to get something done. And we had the actual benefit and dual benefit of Polly not only being a board member, but (concurrently) the Commissioner for New York City Department of Transportation, and for the other mode, the other mode meaning buses, that was extremely important thing to do. But from a commuter rail perspective, she absolutely gets it and so, I hope you're doing well Polly.

Joe Giulietti  2:03  
Polly was one of the people that when I would be called to the shed for discussions with the Governor, I at least could see her outside there. It's wonderful to have somebody that not only understands what is going on, but  - you know, Polly served under Senator Patrick Monahan, Chuck Schumer, Barbara Boxer - she has an extensive background and has been down this road in Washington before. And we've had her looking at it from a national perspective, from a commuter rail perspective. 

I don't think in my 50 years, we've had an opportunity to have the type of funding that we see coming at us now.  And the team that she has been able to put together as well, where you've got Nuria (Fernandez), you've got Amit (Bose), you've got Stephanie Pollack, all sitting there with backgrounds and transportation that are making the decisions and helping support us as we're going forward. So Polly, I truly appreciate you coming forward. I know how busy your schedule is, but thank you for coming forward to come and talk with us. 

Polly Trottenberg  3:03  
Well thank you all. Thanks, Tom and Joe, for such a nice intro. Let me first start off by saying thanks to all of you. I say this to everyone: what a tough couple of years it's been. And you know, I look around this group of folks, and I know what amazing leaders you have been and the hardships and the challenges you have faced and particularly for commuter rail, the challenges you still face. And I know all of us who are in this line of work, when I had the fun of being in New York City DOT Commissioner and being on the MTA Board as the City's representative, I got hammered pretty regularly by all sides. So I know these can be very challenging times to be public servants. So thank you for all of that. And you know, I have a special fondness in my heart coming from the New York Region. I actually grew up in Pelham, New York. So we were the quintessential commuter rail suburb my father rode in on what was the precursor to Metro North every day, it had the bar car of which he availed himself. And you know, it's just a tremendous integral part of so many of the metro regions that you all serve. 

And thank you for mentioning both the team and the funding on the table and Tom saying, hope you're doing well, Polly. I am very busy. But I am like the luckiest woman ever right now, because you can work in your career for decades and never see the stars align like they have aligned for us at the moment. As you mentioned, tremendous, colleagues at the agency: Nuria, Stephanie, Amit and whole bunch of other fantastic folks. A wonderful Secretary who's just a lovely guy to work for, and just I think, kind of elevates transportation at the national level in a way you've never seen. A President who really loves it. It's been for any of you who spent time in Washington, this has been  the joke of US DOTs for decades -Republican and Democratic - about whether the President would say the word "transportation" during the State of the Union. In the Clinton years Bill Clinton mentioned something about a bridge to the future and everyone got excited. But you know, clearly we have a President where he mentioned infrastructure decade. And it's a pretty exciting moment. 

And then as I think I started off the conversation, though, also a moment of incredible challenges as we come out of COVID.  I don't want to talk for too long, because I really want to hear from you all, as we sort of look at, what's the future of mass transit, how are commuting patterns changing? How do we take the dollars and the collective leadership we have right at this moment, and do everything we can to build and strengthen and create the transit industry of the future. But I think you all know the bill has the largest dollar amount for transit that we have ever seen in history. And Tom's right some of us like myself have spent a lot of years on Capitol Hill in transit dollar fights: it's an incredible opportunity. And the better we spend the money, the more support we'll build for future funding. It is the most incredible passenger rail program. I mean, it is more passenger rail funding than Amtrak has seen in the 50 years of its existence. 

We also have a tremendous number of discretionary grant programs, which we can talk about, which can potentially present possibilities for a lot of you. And by the way, we were just looking at the new omnibus. That's even given DOT more funding. We are on a roll. I have to say, it's a great time to be in Washington when we have discretionary grant programs like RAISE and INFRA, there are some  that are specialized in terms of grade crossings and station accessibility. I think a bunch of larger and smaller discretionary grant programs. And, of course, the mega programs, which I think for some of you, I already perhaps know of some systems that are already eyeing the mega dollars. 

I also know you all have a lot of policy concerns. Insurance and liability issues, how you work with Amtrak, etc. So, I just want to say, we have, I think, Joe, as you said, a great team, we are so excited to roll up our sleeves, and work with you all. This is the chance for all of us to succeed collectively: we want to help you every step of the way. But we are going to need your success to have our success, and particularly for this sort of existential moment for the commuter railroads. Thinking through, you know, what sort of the model of the future we'll be in. 

And it is funny, because Tom remembers me, funnily, but one thing he and I used to spar over was the issue of how commuter rails serve the cities. And the old model, the Long Island Railroad model of we're trying to funnel everyone in, and we want to make sure they all have seats. So we don't want to make it too expensive for folks at the urban stops. But what I realize now, in this new sort of changing community patterns, I'm sure a lot of you are rethinking that model. 

So with that, I would just love to take questions. And I'll just start with a question for all of you. I'd love to hear how everybody's doing. And how you're thinking about the federal programs and what help you need from us because that's what we want to do. We want to try and help everyone come out of COVID and seize this moment.