Washington, DC - U.S. Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) today issued the following statement after he voted against final passage of the US Senate’s transportation reauthorization bill.
“New Jersey commuters are hurting right now. Every day, they deal with crumbling roads, dangerous bridges, and failing rail lines that lack modern safety technology. I worked hard to fix the transportation bill passed by the Senate today and secured some improvements, but the legislation just doesn’t do enough to make needed investments that will bring relief to New Jerseyans.
“America’s infrastructure is falling behind other nations, and it’s costing us jobs and economic growth. The only way to fix it is with smarter and much more significant investment in our infrastructure needs – needs that have been ignored for years at the federal and state levels, and which aren’t sufficiently addressed by this bill.
“The inclusion of my bipartisan passenger rail reform legislation is a step forward, but the overall bill lacks significant funding for passenger rail and for vital priorities like new Hudson River rail tunnels and the replacement of the Portal Bridge. The bill also delays by another threeyears the implementation deadline for life-saving Positive Train Control technology and only allocates $199 million to implement it, far short of the estimated $3 billion needed to finish the job.
“And even as crashes on our nation’s highways continue to claim thousands of lives each year, the transportation bill rolls back critical requirements that keep our roads safe.”