[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 12]
[Senate]
[Pages 16709-16713]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                         POSITIVE TRAIN CONTROL

  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I do want to thank Senator Thune, Senator 
Nelson, Senator Inhofe, and others who did something good today, which 
is to allow us to vote to make sure that we have the head of the 
Federal Railroad Administration. Finally, after 8 months, Sarah 
Feinberg got a vote. It is very important. I am glad all this wrangling 
that we had back and forth led to that happy situation because we need 
her in place. Frankly, we need her in place to oversee this positive 
train control.
  I want to quote what she stated. She stated that worries of a train 
exploding in the middle of a city have caused her sleepless nights. 
This is an Administrator who cares deeply about her role in safety.
  There was an article written by someone today that said I stood alone 
in my opposition to moving forward with a 3- to 5-year extension and 
taking that extension out of the underlying bill and tacking it on to a 
3-week highway bill extension. I want to point out that I did not stand 
alone and I do not stand alone. Senator Blumenthal is hoping to come 
here later and make his remarks about the fact that he opposed this. I 
speak here for Senator Feinstein, my great colleague--my senior 
colleague--who actually wrote the original legislation because these 
crashes were occurring. And I want to read a little bit from Senator 
Gillibrand, who is on a train headed to a funeral for a firefighter in 
New York. This is her statement:

       After so many preventable railway tragedies that have led 
     to loss of life, it is an insult to the families who have 
     lost loved ones to let the rail lobby slip a multi-year 
     Positive Train Control delay into a three-week extension. The 
     rail industry has purposefully dragged its feet in meeting 
     its safety requirements, and now Congress is quietly aiding 
     them further. It is without debate that Positive Train 
     Control saves lives. The railroads must work as quickly as 
     possible to implement this life-saving technology, so that 
     the millions of Americans who commute by rail every day can 
     do so safely--and Congress needs to do its job and hold the 
     rail industry accountable.

  As I said when Senator McConnell offered the unanimous consent 
request, I think it is a terrible precedent to place a major safety 
rollback--I would not call it a repeal; I would say rollback--on a 3-
week extension of the highway trust fund. It just isn't right. I am 
very grateful to the Washington Post for writing a very strong 
statement--I would say article--about what happens when you don't have 
positive train control on a train. Positive train control is technology 
that allows the train to slowly come to a stop if there is a real 
problem, such as another train crossing or a car.
  It was in 2008 when we really moved on positive train control. A 
horrific accident occurred in Chatsworth, CA, where a Metrolink 
passenger train and a Union Pacific freight train collided. It was due 
to a distracted engineer. This preventable accident resulted in the 
deaths of 25 people and injury to 135 others.
  Friends, we are not talking about some scientific experiment here. We 
are talking about real life, where trains collide, where real people 
die and get hurt. I have met some of the families.
  Afterwards, Senator Feinstein and I got together. She was great, and 
it was great to work with her. We passed the Rail Safety Improvement 
Act of 2008, mandating the installation of positive train control on 
major passenger commuter and freight rail lines by the end of this 
year, 2015.
  Again, I speak for her in my remarks. She is distressed that the 2015 
deadline would be extended as much as it was without a chance to really 
look at the details in the conference, which we hope to have soon.
  For more than 45 years--45 years--the National Transportation Safety 
Board, or NTSB, has advocated PTC technology. This isn't something new. 
But it wasn't until 2008 that Senator Feinstein and I got the 
legislation done.
  Let me say this. NTSB is amazing. They are the ones who show up after 
horrible crashes of rail, of plane, and they are the ones who make 
really important safety recommendations. Well, actually, they work with 
the FAA. So they are the ones who come forward after an accident. They 
do the investigation, and they make the recommendations.
  Now, this is what they said: If we had put PTC in all those years 
ago, 146 accidents or derailments could have been avoided with 
implementation of the PTC, and at least 300 fatalities and 700 injuries 
could have been prevented. Since the California accident, 14 PTC-
preventable accidents or derailments have occurred.
  So let's be clear. People are dying and they are being injured 
because we don't have positive train control.
  Now, the good news--the great news for my State--is that Metrolink 
and Caltrain already have put PTC on. Amtrak has put it on certain of 
their runs. So it is happening. But some of the railroads are dragging 
their feet. They have every excuse in the book. Some of the reasons, I 
think, do need our attention.
  For example, there are problems with spectrum, and there are problems 
with rights-of-way. We can work on that. But as Senator Blumenthal 
said, instead of giving these 3-year delays, there need to be what he 
calls metrics so we can ascertain, before they get all this time, what 
they are doing. Are we going to be faced here in this body in years to 
come with more requests for delay? Well, if we are not really looking 
over the shoulder of the railroads, the answer is, clearly, yes. They 
don't want to save the money. And, by the way, the cost-benefit ratio 
on this is overwhelming. It is overwhelming.
  I said before, rhetorically, that it is very interesting that the 
only piece of freestanding legislation that was pulled out of the bill 
and placed on this 3-week extension was this delay in positive train 
control safety--nothing else, nothing else. This was cherry-picked--
nothing else.
  I have worked with several Senators because one of my constituents, 
Cally

[[Page 16710]]

Houck, lost two daughters who rented a car to go on vacation. They were 
in their twenties. The car was under recall, but the agency rented it 
to them anyway. It exploded. They died. Mrs. Houck couldn't believe we 
didn't have a law that said you can't rent a car that is under recall. 
I bet, if I asked anybody--any stranger to me--if they think they are 
allowed to rent a car that is under recall, they would say: Of course 
not. Well, you can. I have fought for years, and I have gotten help 
from Senator Schumer, and Senator McCaskill actually got the bill 
passed. I am very grateful to her. That is in the underlying bill. Why 
didn't we take that out and put it on immediately so this can go into 
effect immediately?
  I think the Washington Post gave us what they think. They wrote a 
story--a very important story--in the front page yesterday or the day 
before, Monday. I want to just say we all know that there are special 
interests here. By the way, I like to work with the railroads because 
they do a lot of good things. They are very powerful, they are very 
strong, and they have a very powerful lobby. It is not a Republican 
lobby or a Democratic lobby. It is a lobby that covers everybody.
  Let me quote what the Washington Post article notes:

       Rail safety has never been a more pressing issue than it is 
     today. So far, the people who have died in U.S. accidents 
     that PTC could have prevented have generally been crew 
     members or passengers. That could change in dramatic, 
     catastrophic fashion.
       The number of rail tank cars carrying flammable material in 
     the United States has grown from 9,500 seven years ago to 
     493,126 last year.

  Let me say that again:

       The number of rail tank cars carrying flammable material in 
     the United States has grown from 9,500 seven years ago to 
     493,126 last year.

  Now, just imagine what happens when this flammable material is 
involved in a collision. We know. We have seen the balls of toxic fire. 
Seven trains have derailed this year alone, and their contents 
exploded.
  Now, I understand the pleas for delay. That is why I offered a 1-year 
delay to my friend, the chairman of the commerce committee. I offered 
him a 1-year delay. Nobody can tell me that a 1-year delay wouldn't 
work for now. We can look at it in the conference. If we need to extend 
it, that is fine. No, we weren't able to get it. To me, the only answer 
that keeps coming back is special interests earmark provision--special 
interests earmark provision--because it is the only provision that 
benefits one special interest that was put on this 3-week extension.
  Some people say: Why do you care so much? The House voted by voice 
vote. Do you know what? They were wrong. They shouldn't have. They 
shouldn't have put it on this bill. This was put on by the House, and 
it was wrong, wrong, wrong.
  Now, when I spoke with my chairman--my really good friend, Senator 
Inhofe--on the floor, I did say I am so pleased at the way we are 
moving in terms of the underlying bill. I believe we will have that 
bill, and I believe we will have that bill next week. Then why on earth 
did we have to take this out? If we are moving this bill forward, we 
didn't have to pluck out one of the provisions. I just don't understand 
it, other than what the Washington Post wrote in their story.
  I have to say that there are 60,000-plus bridges that are deficient--
structurally deficient. They are in the Presiding Officer's State, and 
they are in my State. Why didn't they pull out a couple of worst 
bridges and say ``fix those bridges''? All they did was pull out a 
provision that the railroads wanted--not a provision that commuters 
want, not a safety provision that will save lives. It is very 
discouraging.
  We all know about the Amtrak crash. I am going to show you a picture 
of that. It was splayed all across the paper. This is a photo of a 
destroyed Amtrak train in Philadelphia. We all know the disaster that 
occurred there. This could have been prevented. As a matter of fact, if 
I remember right, they were about to put positive train control on this 
stretch. They were getting ready to do it. Look at this--the suffering 
and the deaths, needless. If there was positive train control and if 
another train was coming, simply slow down that train and automatically 
avoid such a disaster as this.
  I am passionate about transportation. I am passionate about safety. I 
know my colleagues are, but we had a very different view about this. I 
can only say if anything good came out of this, it was the fact that we 
now have an Administrator of the Federal Railroad Administration. I 
think that was good because I feel better now knowing that someone who 
really cares about this now has officially been given the power to 
assert her authority.
  I look forward to working with Senator Thune as we move the 
underlying bill through. He knows how I feel. I want to thank him 
because he waited around until we had reached an agreement. I 
appreciate that because otherwise we could have had a complete shutdown 
of the entire highway program. We averted that because, with respect 
for our differences, we worked together all day and have the 
Administrator in place.
  I thank Senator Nelson and his staff as well as Senator Thune's 
staff. For me, having that done is something that means a lot and means 
a lot for safety across the board. I hope we will not be doing this in 
the future. I hope regular order will prevail. I hope we will not be 
pulling out important pieces of other bills and passing them as stand-
alone bills when we are up against a deadline. I don't think it is the 
right way to govern. I don't think it is good governance. I think a lot 
of my colleagues feel the same way.
  This is behind us. Now we are going to work together. We are never 
going to take our eyes off this positive train control. We are going to 
make sure the railroads are stepping up, doing the right thing--and, by 
the way, some of them have. I told you two of my railroads have been 
fantastic. They put it all in place. They met the deadline. There are 
many others that are close to meeting the deadline, but there are too 
many that are hiding behind excuses and some that have real reasons why 
they haven't moved forward. I hope they are watching this today because 
I am not going away. None of us are going away. We are going to be 
watching this carefully and making sure this deadline is really a 
deadline, not some kind of political cover so the railroads can get out 
of doing what they have to do to save lives. When we take these jobs, 
that is our overwhelming responsibility--to protect and defend our 
people, whether it is abroad or at home.
  I again thank my staff, Senator Thune's staff, Senator Nelson's 
staff, Senator Blumenthal's staff, Senator Feinstein's staff--I hope I 
am not leaving anybody out--Senator Gillibrand's staff, and Senator 
Murphy's staff for getting us to a place where we are accepting this 
with a heavy heart. We are moving on. We are thankful we now do have in 
place an Administrator--a wonderful, wonderful Administrator of the 
Federal Railroad Administration.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Cassidy). The Senator from South Dakota.
  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, the one thing the Senator from California 
and I share is a commitment, a longstanding commitment to getting a 
multiyear highway bill through here. I hope that is going to happen in 
the next few weeks.
  We did need to move on a positive train control extension, and I am 
going to get into the reasons for that in just a minute. I think 
probably the most important fact is, as we look at this particular 
issue, that nearly every railroad in the country--including every major 
freight railroad--will not meet what is an unrealistic December 31, 
2015, deadline for positive train control.
  Positive train control--or PTC--when working as intended, is a 
critical safety technology that will prevent certain types of rail 
accidents and save lives. We have the ability to make rail 
transportation even safer by ensuring full implementation of positive 
train control.
  As the chairman of the Commerce, Science, and Transportation 
Committee, I can assure my colleagues that these disruptions would have 
caused

[[Page 16711]]

cascading and devastating effects for nearly every sector of the 
economy and every region of the country. Railroads have already started 
notifying customers that they will stop accepting certain chemical 
shipments in late November and early December to ensure that such 
cargoes are off their system when the existing deadline hits at the end 
of the year.
  As rail-dependent businesses and their customers prepare for the 
shutdown, they have already started to feel the negative supply chain 
effects on logistics and inventory management. The House-passed short-
term highway extension provided an option to avert this completely 
avoidable and unnecessary harm.
  This is not just about the railroads--contrary to what has been said 
on the floor that somehow this is a special benefit that only helps 
railroads. It is about the farmers--many of whom I represent in South 
Dakota--who depend upon the railroad for fertilizer. It is about the 
manufacturers and other businesses that depend upon rail for critical 
inputs, and it is about water treatment facilities that depend on rail 
for chemicals to purify drinking water. It is about all the workers and 
the households that benefit from this safe mode of transportation.
  Rail-dependent commuters and customers cannot afford a 
congressionally caused railroad shutdown. That is exactly what would 
happen if we failed to act. Each day well over 1 million riders in the 
United States board commuter railroads to get to and from their places 
of work. Over 2 million people work in industries that use hazardous 
chemicals hauled by rail, and the gross economic output of these 
industries alone is over $2 trillion. In fact, the effects of a looming 
railroad shutdown would have occurred well in advance of the year-end 
deadline, which is where we are today. Over 130 farmers, manufacturers, 
and retailers wrote to Congress last week, stating that ``rail 
customers are already starting to feel the impact . . . [w]ith a 
shutdown just around the corner rail customers must start putting 
contingency plans into motion, including adjusting production schedules 
and workforce loads.''
  This isn't just an economic issue. It has major implications for 
public health and safety. I mentioned earlier water treatment 
facilities across this country have urged a deadline extension and 
wrote a joint letter to me reiterating that point. I will quote from 
the letter, which is what they said: ``Even a temporary interruption of 
water disinfection chemical deliveries could risk a public health 
disaster for communities across this country.''
  The U.S. Conference of Mayors also urged a deadline extension and 
wrote that switching from rail to other modes of transportation would 
lead to additional accidents in our Nation's communities and greater 
exposure to the risks of hazardous materials.
  The Federal Railroad Administration's Acting Administrator, whom we 
just made permanent Railroad Administration Administrator, has the 
responsibility for conducting oversight of our Nation's rail network, 
and she expressed concern at a September commerce committee hearing. 
She said a rail shutdown would ``lead to significant congestion and it 
does lead to safety impacts.''
  Keep in mind, total train accidents per year have decreased by nearly 
50 percent since 2005. Rail is often the safest available way to haul 
many types of products, especially hazardous chemicals. It would take 
more than 600,000 trucks on our Nation's roads to replace freight rail, 
let alone the additional cars and buses needed to replace commuter 
rail.
  When Congress passed legislation in 2008 mandating the implementation 
of positive train control, it never intended to punish rail customers 
or to harm the economy, but this law failed to properly consider the 
complexity and time involved in developing, mass producing, installing, 
and testing a new technology involving a complex network of new 
computers and communications equipment deployed on more than 20,000 
locomotives and 60,000 miles of railroad track.
  There is plenty of finger-pointing to go around as to why it didn't 
get done. The bottom line is this: After 7 years of work, over $6 
billion of mostly private funds spent, and with about 2 months to go 
before the legal deadline, not one single railroad in this country--
commuter or freight--has fully implemented positive train control.
  For years, study after study, including those from the nonpartisan 
Government Accountability Office, found that the 2015 deadline for full 
implementation of PTC was unrealistic. The independent experts at the 
GAO concluded that the vast majority of railroads, including all 
freight railroads, would not meet the deadline by the end of the year.
  I am pleased the Senate came together and acted on a solution. The 
bipartisan, bicameral proposal I helped craft does not just extend the 
deadline for implementing positive train control, it significantly 
increases accountability and transparency. Our proposal gives the 
Secretary of Transportation the authority to fine railroads if they 
fall behind metrics and milestones on their way to completing 
installation and full implementation. It requires detailed and publicly 
available reporting to ensure progress each step of the way.
  Under our bipartisan proposal, railroads must implement positive 
train control by December 31, 2018. To ensure that PTC works as 
intended, the Secretary has very limited case-by-case discretion to 
allow railroads additional time for testing and certification but only 
if railroads complete all installation, spectrum acquisition, and 
employee training. To qualify for this additional time, freight 
railroads must have started using PTC on the majority of their 
territories or track. These accountability-focused changes, with 
objective criteria and rigorous oversight, are designed to ensure that 
we never need another extension.
  I wish to extend my thanks to our colleagues on the House side--
Representatives Schuster, DeFazio, Denham, and Capuano--for their 
strong bipartisan leadership and collaboration to address this major 
transportation issue. This issue has been extensively debated in the 
Senate. This proposal incorporates principles and text that have twice 
been reported out of the commerce committee and have passed the full 
Senate in July by a vote of 65 to 34. Let me repeat that. Everything we 
are talking about today--and it was modified a little bit when we 
negotiated this with the House--but the basic text, basic framework, 
basic outline of what we just passed had already passed the Senate as 
part of the Transportation bill with 65 votes earlier this year. The 
idea that this is somehow something that is being sprung on Members in 
the Senate is not consistent with the facts.
  I am grateful to Senator Blunt and Senator McCaskill for their 
partnership and leadership to bring Congress together to ensure that 
PTC is made safely available as soon as possible. Some have suggested 
different ways to approaching this issue. At a time when we are making 
progress to finally end the kick-the-can mentality through the 
enactment of a multiyear transportation reauthorization bill, this 
proposal will ensure that we are not injecting that same type of 
uncertainty into another transportation mode, which is our Nation's 
rail system.
  Attaching the bipartisan agreement on extending the PTC deadline as 
part of the short-term highway extension solves this problem while 
keeping pressure on the House of Representatives to pass a multiyear 
transportation bill that we can then reconcile with the Senate-passed 
DRIVE Act, the multiyear transportation bill that passed in this 
Chamber earlier this year.
  I wish to applaud Leader McConnell, Chairman Inhofe, Ranking Member 
Boxer, and Ranking Member Nelson for their continued efforts to push 
for the completion of a multiyear transportation reauthorization bill. 
Due to constant pressure from the Senate, as was noticed with last 
week's markup by the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, 
we can actually see the path to getting a bill done with our House 
colleagues.
  The fact that the short-term extension before the Senate sets a 
November

[[Page 16712]]

20 deadline, along with the House planning to take up a multiyear 
transportation bill next week, indicates that it is, in fact, possible 
to soon get a multiyear transportation bill across the finish line.
  Nobody should misinterpret my work and my efforts with my colleagues 
here in the Senate in addressing the harms associated with failing to 
fix the looming positive train control deadline. As a major part of the 
overall DRIVE Act, the transportation bill that passed Senate, the 
legislative text originated from the Senate commerce committee, and I 
will not be backing down in my efforts to see a host of transportation, 
safety freight, and rail provisions signed into law in the coming 
weeks.
  Together we have averted the potential harm that would come with a 
congressionally caused rail shutdown. We have set a realistic positive 
train control deadline. We have held the railroads accountable and 
ensured the job is done swiftly and safely. It was important that be 
done in a swift and safe way.
  Earlier my colleague from California quoted a story from the 
Washington Post that ran earlier this week. The Washington Post 
editorial board, the very same paper that my colleague from California 
cited, opined: ``Congress should revise the 2008 legislation to give 
railroads more time to come into compliance, with consequences for 
those who fail to produce concrete plans for immediate improvement and 
meet milestones along the way.''
  But the very newspaper that the Senator from California was quoting 
actually editorialized on their editorial page that Congress needed to 
fix and to put in place an extension that would allow the railroads to 
come into compliance. That was echoed by a lot of the large newspapers 
across the country.
  The Chicago Tribune's editorial board wrote:

       PTC is coming. It's just not coming fast enough to meet 
     what was always an unrealistic deadline. So if your commute 
     is a mess come January, don't blame Metra. Blame Congress.

  The Chicago Sun-Times editorial board opined: ``Congress should 
extend the deadline to give Metra and railroads a chance to get the job 
done.''
  The Los Angeles Times editorial board wrote: ``Rather than risk a 
shutdown of crucial transportation services, Congress ought to fast-
track a solution.''
  The problem we had here is that we didn't have the luxury of time, 
and so the vehicle that came over from the House of Representatives, 
which is a short-term extension of the highway bill, presented a chance 
for us to address this issue knowing full well that it had to be 
addressed and that it had to be addressed in a timely way. We have 
railroads and shippers in this country, that, as I mentioned earlier, 
have already indicated they are modifying and adjusting their 
operations and plans right now and notifying customers of the impacts 
and effects of Congress failing to act in a timely way.
  The reason that this needed to be fixed now is that if we hadn't 
fixed it, we would have started to see the disruptions in our economy 
that would have come with a shutdown because, as I said, no railroad, 
to date, has been able to meet the positive train control deadline. We 
approached this in a way that we felt was reasonable, rational, 
logical, and kept the pressure on the railroads and required the 
accountability that is necessary to see this done in a realistic way. I 
think the end result that just passed the Senate is a good outcome and 
a good solution, not just for the railroads in this country but for the 
shippers, farmers, and States such as South Dakota that depend upon 
those railroads, for the commuters around this country who rely on that 
form of transportation every day to get to work, and for the thousands 
and thousands and thousands of people who work in those railroad-
related industries across this country. This is one example where 
Congress demonstrated that it actually could, in a timely way, act 
responsibly to bring about a solution that will avoid what surely would 
have been not only an economic disaster but a public safety disaster as 
well.
  I am pleased that our colleagues here in the Senate found a way to 
approve this today, and I hope, as I said before, that we will continue 
to keep the heat on to get a multiyear transportation bill through the 
House and the Senate with this short-term extension through November 
20. It gives us a few weeks to complete action on that piece of 
legislation. But we didn't have the luxury of time nor could we afford 
to wait to act and to make sure that this positive train control 
extension was put in place in a timely way.
  I thank the Presiding Officer, and I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, by voice vote, this body has extended 
the highway funding program, which is a good thing. It has also 
included in that extension a delay in the deadline for positive train 
control, which was inevitable. None of us opposed a delay in positive 
train control; what we opposed was an extension of that delay with 
inadequate accountability and excessive time.
  Let's be absolutely clear. This delay in positive train control is 
really a delay until 2020, not 2018, because when railroads hit 2018, 
they can apply for 2 more years, and that second extension is dependent 
only on having completed work on half the system. Much of that 
determination is within the control of the railroad itself. That will 
be the 50 anniversary of the NTSB calling for positive train control.
  We are not talking about a novel, untested technology. In fact, five 
railroads will meet the deadline to implement this technology at the 
end of this year. Clearly, all could have at least sought plausibly to 
meet that deadline. If they had a reason for failing to do so, they 
should be required to present it case by case, year by year, with a 
firm deadline of 2018. That is the system I proposed in the legislation 
I offered 6 months ago--well before this deadline became an imminent 
necessity.
  Forty-six years ago, two passenger trains collided in Darien, CT, 
killing four people. There have been similar crashes and catastrophes 
since that time, resulting in nearly 300 deaths, 6,700 injuries, and 
incalculable economic loss. The worst of those cases was a crash in 
Southern California in 2008, killing 25 people. Another took place in 
the Bronx in 2013. Many of us visited the site in the Bronx and 
observed the remnants of this derailment and so are closely familiar 
with it. My colleagues in California and in New York have been ardent 
advocates of positive train control, and I thank them for their 
support.
  These are examples of only a few of the many instances of death and 
destruction over decades that could have been prevented by positive 
train control. Positive train control could have prevented Spuyten 
Duyvil. It could have prevented other repeated instances of death and 
destruction that resulted from trains speeding excessively and thereby 
derailing. It could have prevented trains from colliding. It could have 
prevented drivers from ignoring signals. It could have prevented death 
and injury around the country with economic losses far exceeding the 
cost of installing positive train control.
  Joe Boardman, head of Amtrak and former FRA Administrator, said: 
``PTC is the most important rail safety advancement of our time.''
  Today, the Senate delayed it by 5 years. There are reasons and there 
is blame enough to go around. The Federal Government--in all frankness, 
the Federal Communications Commission--perhaps bears part of that blame 
in the failure to allocate sufficient spending. But let's be honest 
today in saying that 5 years of delay was unnecessary. The railroads 
sought it, and they won it with a threat to shut down railroad service 
everywhere in the country--an unacceptable outcome.

[[Page 16713]]

The question is, Can we change this deadline in a smart, responsible 
way?
  Unfortunately, the action today rewards the dilatory with unnecessary 
delay. Congress has sent a message that these deadlines can be avoided 
without repercussions and responsibility. That is bad policy. It is a 
bad process. I regret it. There was a better way to act that would have 
ensured continued funding for our highways and continued accountability 
for positive train control, which is indeed the most important rail 
safety advancement of our time. This is not some abstract, novel 
system. It has been around. It has been used. It has been tested. I 
regret that today it has been delayed unnecessarily.
  Finally, I wish to congratulate and thank Sarah Feinberg, and the 
good news today is that her nomination has been approved. I look 
forward to working with her, and I welcome her as a new source of 
leadership, which she has already demonstrated. I hope she will act 
aggressively and responsibly to ensure that positive train control and 
other safety measures become the law and that the law is enforced as 
effectively and promptly as possible.
  Thank you, Mr. President.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oregon.

                          ____________________