mtuandrew wrote: ↑Mon Nov 16, 2020 6:35 pm
You could make an argument for restoring & improving a railroad signal system when capacity suddenly becomes an issue, rebuilding a line to a newly-critical port or base, and rerouting a railroad around (say) a catastrophic subsidence, contaminated area, or flood zone.
I'll argue a bit further, as capacity (pre-pandemic) was an issue. You can only do 12 trains per hour at 60 MPH per tube. During rush hour, the NJT trains were crush load. Amtrak is basically full around NYC (maybe not so much on with LD trains and at the dead of night). No signaling improvement is going to help that. The next step you can do is... build the tunnels. Of course... have a tube collapse, and the capacity issue becomes critical.
Maybe I'm looking at it wrong. Maybe the DPA could be used to get supplies, but the actual tunnels and building? That would be more a military issue (Army Corp of Engineers anyone?). (But then, I kinda want a lot of infrastructure projects "NOW" because the bill's past due).