funding

The Virginia Department of Transportation needs $709 million to maintain state highways next year, but it's budget is only $318.2 million. "We're beating the existing lane-miles to death," said J. Douglas Koelemay, a Commonwealth Transportation Board member from Springfield. "We don't even have the resources to do what we say our priorities are."

VDOT officials say a fifth of Virginia's interstate highways and almost a third of all state-maintained secondary roads are deficient. "Thirty percent substandard," transportation board member James A. Davis of Winchester said of the secondary roads, "and we don't have money to keep them from getting worse."

Transportation infrastructure can be be an important factor for home buyers, and can therefor have an impact on home value.

Read more in the Richmond Times-Dispatch....

Virgina officials were disappointed in the announcement of federal stimulus grants for high-speed passenger rail projects. The Commonwealth sought $1.8 billion but got just $75 million for its top rail initiative.

Efforts to improve rail service between Richmond and Washington, and ultimately the rest of the state, will continue, according to Thelma Drake, director of the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation. "Whether you like rail or not, it is the future," she said. More opportunities for federal funding will come up, and she expects to be on the spot, applications in hand. "A big part of my job is the Washington component," she said.

High speed rail service allows trains to operate at 90 to 110 miles per hour. Currently, the fastest trains in Virginia operate at 79 mph.

Read more at The Daily Press...