What's New

The Federal Railroad Administration authorized the publication of the Pennsylvania High-speed Maglev Project (PA Project) Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) for public review in October 2005.

Since that time, the PA Project team has incorporated the oral testimony and written comments – and the analyses of and responses to those comments – obtained during the 60-day public comment period from October 7 to December 7, 2005 into a draft of the project’s Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS). This document is currently under review by the FRA.

EIS Next Steps

Work on the FEIS, including additional engineering and the identification of the preferred alternative for the PA Project, is expected to conclude in late 2007. After public review of the FEIS, it will be submitted to the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) for final review of all environmental work associated with the project. The FRA may consider issuing a Record of Decision (ROD) once project funding is more certain. The ROD is the federal approval that will allow the project to proceed into final design and property acquisition. Future progress on the PA Project is subject to federal approvals and funding availability.

Public Hearings Conclude December 2005

The Pennsylvania High-speed Maglev Project (PA Project) Team thanks the more than 390 people who attended the public hearings for the PA Project. Fifty-eight people offered oral testimony, and written testimony has been received from several property owners, businesses and residents along the 54-mile project corridor.

Date	Location	Number of people who attended	Number of people who gave public testimony	Number of people who gave private testimony
11/9/05	Regional Enterprise Tower - Downtown Pittsburgh	44	8	0
11/15/05	CCAC Boyce - Monroeville	38	4	1
11/16/05	Sheraton - Greensburg	45	9	0
11/17/05	Montour High School – Robinson Township	266	30	6
Totals		393	51	7

Public Information Sessions Conclude October 2005

Thank you to the more than 300 people who attended one of four public information sessions held in October 2005. The public information sessions offered attendees opportunities to become familiar with the project, ask questions of the project team regarding the DEIS and inquire about the public hearings for the PA Project. Maps of the alignments studied in depth in the DEIS and detailed maps of the environmentally preferred build alternative were also on display.