Since 1971, when it created Amtrak to operate a skeletal network of passenger trains, which were being discontinued by freight railroads, Congress has provided funding to support intercity passenger rail service. Until recently, almost all of that money went to Amtrak, a government-owned corporation, to cover its operating losses and finance capital improvements to Amtrak-owned infrastructure, mainly in the Northeast and Michigan. Amtrak's Northeast Corridor—between Washington, DC, and Boston, with spurs to Harrisburg, PA, and Springfield, MA—offers the fastest rail service in the United States; the route, laid out over a century ago, allows trains to hit 160 miles per hour (mph) for short distances, but the fastest service between major cities averages around 80 mph. This is far slower than many high-speed rail services in other countries. In 2008 and 2009, Congress took a different approach, appropriating significant amounts to finance development of higher-speed intercity passenger rail services by state governments. To date, however, the results of this investment are not readily apparent in the form of new, faster, or more frequent services. This report examines the High-Speed Intercity Passenger Rail (HSIPR) Grant Program and highlights related issues of potential interest to Congress. Prior to 2008, Congress rarely provided funding for intercity passenger rail purposes outside of the annual funding for Amtrak. This changed with passage of the Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act of 2008 (PRIIA, Division B of P.L. 110-432 ) in the fall of 2008. PRIIA, which reauthorized Amtrak, included language authorizing the first federal grants to states to develop intercity passenger rail service. Two grant programs for helping states finance rail facilities, infrastructure, and equipment were authorized at a total of $2.225 billion over five years. This legislation was passed after a number of states expressed interest in expanding intercity passenger rail operations. President Barack Obama, who took office in January 2009, proposed spending on high-speed rail projects as part of a larger economic stimulus program to address a deep recession. Congress approved the passenger rail program in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA, P.L. 111-5 ), which appropriated $8 billion for grants to states to develop high-speed and intercity passenger rail services. In April 2009, two months after the passage of ARRA, the President declared that development of high-speed rail (HSR) was a priority for his Administration and said he would ask Congress to appropriate an additional $1 billion annually for that purpose. This priority was reflected in the FY2010 Department of Transportation Appropriations Act (Division A, Title I, P.L. 111-117 ), in which Congress appropriated $2.5 billion for high-speed and intercity passenger rail grants to states. Since that time, Congress has not appropriated further amounts for the HSIPR program, although the Administration has repeatedly requested billions of dollars in additional funding for intercity passenger rail development. Indeed, the 112 th Congress rescinded $400 million previously appropriated for this purpose. In December 2015 Congress reauthorized federal surface transportation programs in the Fixing America's Surface Transportation (FAST) Act ( P.L. 114-94 ). The act authorized $2.2 billion for grants to states and rail carriers for improving intercity passenger and freight rail transportation systems, in addition to funding for Amtrak. However, this funding was authorized from the general fund, not from dedicated funds, and whether any of the funding is actually appropriated will be determined by Congress through the annual Department of Transportation (DOT) appropriations acts. For FY2016, the FAST Act authorized $200 million for such grants, but Congress did not appropriate any funding for this purpose. Table 1 provides a detailed chronology of recent congressional actions to support new or improved intercity passenger rail service. There is no single statutory definition of what constitutes "high-speed rail." At different times Congress has defined high-speed rail as having maximum speeds above 90 miles per hour, 110 miles per hour, and 125 miles per hour. The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), prior to the HSIPR program, had developed a functional definition that did not specify the speed that qualified a service as high-speed; it defined high-speed rail as service "that is time-competitive with air and/or auto for travel markets in the approximate range of 100 to 500 miles." For the purpose of the HSIPR program, FRA used the standard in the U.S. Code : service "reasonably expected to reach speeds of at least 110 mph." FRA often refers to routes with track speeds above 79 mph but below 110 mph as "higher-speed" rail. FRA also describes three tiers of intercity rail service: Core Express (125 mph-250+ mph); Regional (90 mph-125 mph); and Emerging (up to 90 mph). FRA in DOT has primary responsibility for federal grants for passenger rail projects. The FRA had primarily been a rail safety regulatory agency throughout its history, with virtually no experience in grantmaking until September 2008, when it awarded the $30 million Congress appropriated for grants in FY2008. Five months later, Congress appropriated almost 300 times that amount—$8 billion—for rail grants in ARRA, giving FRA four months to issue interim guidance to implement the new program. Although high-speed rail grabbed the headlines, Congress directed that the ARRA funding was also to be used for other intercity passenger rail service and for grants to relieve congestion on the railroad network. In its program guidance FRA combined the grant programs authorized in PRIIA, the funding in ARRA, and the FY2009 DOT appropriations act to produce four categories ("tracks") of grants: Track 1—Projects: for small-scale construction that could be completed within two years; Track 2—Programs: for a set of interrelated projects that improve all or a portion of a corridor; Track 3—Planning: to support work needed to advance a project to the point of applying for funding under Tracks 1 or 2 to create a pipeline of future construction projects; and Track 4—FY2009 Appropriations Projects: an alternative to Track 1, using the FY2009 funding (which required a 50% match, while the ARRA funding did not require a match). FRA gave states a relatively short window for submitting grant applications, although it provided a bit more time for the more complex applications for Track 2 grants (see Table 2 ). It required would-be applicants to submit preapplications, in part to help FRA judge the staff resources it would need to administer the program. FRA received 278 preapplications requesting $102 billion in the first round of HSIPR grants in 2009, and ultimately received 229 applications for $57.8 billion from 39 states, the District of Columbia, and Amtrak. It awarded 108 grants in the first round and 50 in the second (and final) round to 32 states and the District of Columbia. Table 3 shows the grant awards by track. Reflecting the two distinct goals of the high-speed rail funding in ARRA—the short-term goal of stimulating the economy and the long-term goal of developing a high-speed rail network—the HSIPR grants fell into two categories. Many small grants were awarded for work that could be completed quickly; 36 grants were for less than $1 million each, and another 53 were for less than $10 million each. A relatively small number of grants funded large-scale projects involving heavy construction: 16 grants, roughly 10% of the total number awarded, accounted for 84% ($8.4 billion) of the total HSIPR grant funding. After the awards were announced, prominent grants for the development of high-speed rail projects in Florida ($2.4 billion), Wisconsin ($810 million), and Ohio ($400 million) were declined by the newly elected governors of those states, who expressed concern that the construction and operating costs for their rail projects might exceed initial estimates and ultimately require additional state funding. Congress had directed that funding not used by a grantee should be returned to DOT and used for other intercity passenger rail projects at the discretion of the Secretary of Transportation, so the money was reallocated to other grantees. These forgone and reallocated grants represented nearly one-third of the total funding awarded through the HSIPR program. Congress provided that the $8 billion appropriated for high-speed and intercity passenger rail development in ARRA, which made up the majority of the HSIPR grant funding, had to be expended by the end of FY2017. On July 14, 2016, FRA testified that over half of the projects funded under the HSIPR program have been completed. Following is a brief survey of the status of the major HSIPR grants, defined as those exceeding $100 million. A total of 15 grants exceeding $100 million were awarded for six corridors. The California High-Speed Rail Authority proposes to build a 520-mile dedicated rail line between San Francisco and Los Angeles that will allow trains to reach speeds up to 220 mph. The project, approved by California voters in a 2008 referendum that authorized the sale of $9 billion of bonds for the initial phase, is to provide service linking San Francisco and Los Angeles in as little as two hours and 40 minutes. A recent change to the first phase would also provide service between San Francisco and the Central Valley city of Merced. A second phase is to serve Sacramento and San Diego. The total cost of the stretch between San Francisco and Los Angeles, including the link to Merced and some improvements to commuter train infrastructure that will eventually benefit high-speed rail, is estimated to be $55.3 billion in 2015 dollars.