Hiawatha rail route will better connect rural Montana - Daily Inter Lake

The newest member of the Big Sky Passenger Rail Authority could lie north of Missoula in Lake County and the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes, which have expressed interest in joining.

The vast majority of Americans want the federal government to invest in strengthening the national passenger rail network, according to a new poll by the Rail Passengers Association (RPA), the nation’s largest advocacy organization for rail passengers. Specifically, 78% of respondents said having a strong passenger rail system in the U.S. is “Important” and 66% said they support adding more routes to the current rail network.

Big Sky Passenger Rail Authority chair and Missoula County Commissioner Dave Strohmaier gave an update Monday on the status of connecting the state through passenger rail. One big development the organization has made involves collaborative efforts between counties along the trail.

Officials are confident that the long-defunct Amtrak line that once snaked through Montana’s southern tier en route to the West Coast will be part of a forthcoming federal study into discontinued intercity passenger rail lines — an important step in the mission to restore Amtrak service between the state’s most populous cities.

They are following a similar path to what is being done in Montana with the Big Sky Rail Passenger Authority as they look to connect residents in the southern half of the state.

Advocates urge Lewis & Clark County to back passenger rail campaign

83 per cent of Americans polled in 2021 agree that there should be more shift of trips to passenger rail and public transit, as well as more freight to trains to reduce greenhouse gas emissions

For passenger rail, post-pandemic favorability ratings showed strong gains, increasing from 65 per cent in 2020 to 75 per cent in 2021

Tester’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Legislation is Signed into Law

We examine what President Biden's infrastructure bill could mean for rural America and interview BSPRA’s Dave Strohmaier.

Infrastructure bill boosts regional effort to restore passenger rail to southern MT

The Big Sky Passenger Rail Authority on Wednesday unveiled a preliminary report stating that restoration of the southern Amtrak route across Montana and six other states would generate more than $270 million in economic benefits.