Gabriel J. Lopez-Bernal is president of Icomera North America, a global provider of wireless connectivity for transportation, where he serves the national, regional and intercity rail, transit and road markets. He previously worked as a consultant with TranSystems, the U.S. Department of Transportation’s John A. Volpe National Transportation Systems Center and the Corradino Group.
The commuter rail industry gathered in Boston in November for the Commuter Rail Coalition’s annual summit, where transit agencies, policymakers and vendors met to discuss the needs of the industry.
The most common theme at the event was the transition from traditional commuter schedules — shuttling 9-to-5 workers into central business districts in the morning and out to the suburbs after work — to a regional rail model including more midday, evening and weekend service, accommodating both the modern workday rider and the leisure rider.
This regional rail trend is rapidly gaining momentum across the Northeast, as agencies in Boston, New York, and Washington, D.C., seek to create efficient crosstown connections. Their aim is to emulate the success of similar infrastructure in cities such as Philadelphia, Toronto and Paris, where rail plays a more prominent role in achieving regional mobility objectives. In Boston, a recent study demonstrated the potential of a new service linking their North and South rail stations: The move will generate an estimated 86 million additional riders for the MBTA.
While modifying service schedules can boost ridership, enhancing passenger comfort is equally vital. By upgrading their vehicles, transit agencies can attract more passengers. However, ongoing procurement challenges threaten to impede industry progress.
When transit operators decide to upgrade technology, they typically follow standard Federal Railroad Administration or Federal Transit Administration processes — the latter of which were last updated in 2012. The process begins with the transit agency securing funding for the upgrade. Next, it issues a request for proposals and selects a vendor to provide the best solution within the predetermined budget.
Although straightforward on paper, this process is complex and time-consuming in practice. It can take years for an agency to progress from issuing an RFP to deploying new technology. Consequently, the technology — ranging from entire vehicles to individual onboard components — can become outdated by the time it is operational.
In a 2021 report, the FTA explored creative and innovative procurement processes that could improve cost and effectiveness. That report recognized key benefits of innovative procurement approaches like joint procurements, public-private partnerships and accepting unsolicited proposals. However, the report noted that “innovative transit procurement has been constrained, in general, by unclear guidance, regulatory complexities, limited training opportunities, and lack of easily-accessible data on innovative approaches.”
Little has changed in transit procurement since the FTA issued that report. Updated guidance and streamlined regulations could make it easier for agencies to pursue innovation and shorten the timeline for new technologies to enter service.
Some states are already testing new approaches. In Idaho, the Office of Information Technology Services is experimenting with generative AI to accelerate the procurement process. The state’s ITS administrator and chief information officer, Alberto Gonzalez, stated in an interview with StateScoop that he hopes generative AI can expedite a process that can sometimes take years to complete. However, it remains to be seen whether generative AI can truly compress procurement cycles, and if the technology can be used without serious risks to cybersecurity, data privacy or bias.
This is the right time to rethink procurement practices and correct long-standing inefficiencies. The 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act allocated $33.5 billion in funding to modernize transportation infrastructure, and that investment has been making its way into the hands of transit agencies. In February 2024, the FTA distributed $631 million in grants to systems in Baltimore, Chicago, and Philadelphia to purchase new rail vehicles, for example.
Those three transit agencies will begin planning for and purchasing their new rolling stock. If those purchases are well-planned and well-executed, they will lead to better passenger experiences and increased ridership numbers. But if an obsolete and out-of-touch process hampers the purchases, the agencies may end up with inefficiencies and outmoded vehicles.
The investments flowing into the industry are too significant to waste on inefficiencies, and technology moves too fast to wait. The transportation industry needs to build on what it started with the FTA’s 2021 report and truly put its recommendations into action. Just because a procurement process worked in 2004 doesn’t mean it can’t be improved upon in 2024.
