Wilmington? Fayetteville? Winston? Feds help NC study new passenger train routes
The federal government is providing money to the N.C. Department of Transportation to study the possibility of establishing new passenger rail service to cities that haven’t had it in decades.
The grants, announced by U.S. Sen. Thom Tillis on Tuesday, include money to look at reestablishing rail service between Raleigh and Wilmington; Raleigh and Fayetteville; Raleigh and Winston-Salem; Salisbury and Asheville; and Charlotte and Kings Mountain.
The work is very preliminary. NCDOT will receive $500,000 for each corridor to develop the scope, schedule and cost estimates for actually creating a service development plan.
The U.S. Department of Transportation will also provide two $500,000 grants for improving existing rail service on the Carolinian, which runs daily between Charlotte and New York City, and on the rail corridor between Charlotte and Atlanta.
“This $3.5 million in grant funding to identify and develop potential rail lines across North Carolina could be transformational in how North Carolinians travel,” Tillis, a Republican, said in a written statement. “I’m proud these investments were made possible by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law that I helped negotiate, write and pass into law.”
States across the country sought the federal grants to begin planning new passenger train service. A formal announcement is expected by the end of the week, but as politicians such as Tillis announced grants in their states, rail advocates cheered.
Among them was Beau Mills, executive director of the N.C. Metro Mayors Coalition.
“Mayors all across the state have been advocating for just this sort of opportunity to connect our cities and towns with passenger rail service,” Mills wrote in an email. “The growing ridership on NCDOT’s service between Charlotte and Raleigh demonstrates how we can successfully serve communities like Asheville and Winston-Salem in the west and Wilmington and Fayetteville in the east — and urban, suburban and rural communities in between.”
North Carolina was awarded seven of the 12 federal planning grants it had sought.
Three of the new lines under study would begin or end in Raleigh. They include:
▪ Raleigh-Wilmington: Trains would follow an existing rail corridor that is partly abandoned and would need to be rebuilt.
▪ Raleigh-Fayetteville: Trains would also follow an existing rail corridor, with stops in Fuquay-Varina and Lillington.
▪ Raleigh-Winston-Salem: This train would follow the existing corridor used by the Piedmont and Carolinian trains between Raleigh and Greensboro, with a connection west to Winston-Salem.
The line between Salisbury and Asheville would provide the first passenger train service to the mountains of North Carolina in decades. It would follow a route last used by passenger trains in 1975.
In addition to these planning grants, the federal government will award $1 billion to NCDOT to begin building a high-speed train line north of Raleigh. It’s the first leg of a line that North Carolina and Virginia want to establish between Raleigh and Richmond, cutting travel times between the state and the Northeast and providing an alternative to congested Interstate 95.
This story was originally published December 5, 2023 at 5:32 PM with the headline "Wilmington? Fayetteville? Winston? Feds help NC study new passenger train routes."
