8/6/2018

Rail News: Federal Legislation & Regulation

The U.S. Senate last week agreed to a one-year ban on new procurements of mass transit rail cars or buses from China if the procurements use federal funding.



The ban was included in amendments to H.R. 6147, the second "minibus" package of appropriations bills for fiscal-year 2019, according to a report in Eno Transportation Weekly (ETW).



The measure would prohibit new rail-car and bus procurements from companies owned or subsidized by China if the procurements use any Federal Transit Administration formula or bus funding, ETW reported.



The Senate language in the amendment is more "precise" than language included in the House's version of the legislation. Among the differences: The Senate prohibition prevents the expansion of existing contracts executed prior to the date of the legislation's enactment to include any more rolling stock vehicles or rail cars than were already in the contract.



"Since some version of a ban on new Chinese rolling stock is now in both the House and Senate versions of the bill, it seems certain that some version of the ban will be enacted into law in the final 2019 [U.S. Department of Transportation] appropriations act," according to ETW.