http://syn2.thecanadianpress.com:8080/mrss/feed/fcf7391a2f354311807f0501c16bde6a MSN - AP World Copyright © 2010-2018 The Canadian Press. All rights reserved. http://www.rssboard.org/rss-specification Tue, 13 May 2025 02:08:05 +0000 http://syn2.thecanadianpress.com:8080/mrss/feed/fcf7391a2f354311807f0501c16bde6a/75e18bdaa1d64ebf90e621c5414e0d21 75e18bdaa1d64ebf90e621c5414e0d21 Mon, 30 Jan 2023 22:56:39 +0000 SHOTLIST:RESTRICTION SUMMARY:US NETWORK POOLBaltimore, Maryland - 30 January 20231. President Joe Biden walks up to podium2. SOUNDBITE (English) Joe Biden, U.S. President:"Let me (say) at the outset, this just the beginning, beginning of having a 21st century rail system that's been so long overdue in this country."3. SOUNDBITE (English) Joe Biden, U.S. President:"This tunnel is a major checkpoint for nine million Amtrak and MARC commuter rail passengers who pass through it each and every year."4. SOUNDBITE (English) Joe Biden, U.S. President:"99% of the weekdays, there's been a delay here somewhere. Trust me, I know. This tunnel is nearly, as I said, 150 years old. This is Civil War era when Ulysses S. Grant was president. The structure is deteriorating. The roof is leaking, the floor is sinking. This is the United States of America, for God's sake. We know better than that. We know we have to prove we're much better than that. Funding from the infrastructure laws will fully replace this tunnel. And we're naming the new tunnel after Frederick Douglass, who boarded this train to freedom right here in Baltimore."5. SOUNDBITE (English) Joe Biden, U.S. President:"Look, we have a lot to do. When the project is done, new trains will travel through this, this tunnel at 110 miles an hour instead of 30 miles an hour. MARC trains will go from here to Washington in 30 minutes. On an average weekday that will eliminate nearly 7 hours a day. The Frederick Douglass Tunnel will be all electric and we will continue to invest in rail to make it easier for people to use. Its potential to take thousands of vehicles, thousands of vehicles off the highways, including the interstate, and save millions of barrels of oil while reducing pollution, pollution."++WHITE FLASH++6. SOUNDBITE (English) Joe Biden, U.S. President:"This is going to be a game changer for the environment, as well. And so that's what we're doing across the country, not just here. Tomorrow, I'll be in New York for a similar announcement. The Hudson Tunnel project, a critical juncture in the Northeast corridor."7. SOUNDBITE (English) Joe Biden, U.S. President:"I know we can forge a path of building an economy where no one is left behind. That's what this project and others like it across the country are all about. It's about making investments in America's cities, towns, heartlands of rural America. It's about making things here in America again. It's about good jobs. It's about the dignity of work is about respect and self-worth. And it's about damn time we're doing it."STORYLINE:President Joe Biden traveled to Baltimore Monday to visit an aging rail tunnel that's slated to be replaced with help from bipartisan infrastructure legislation he signed in 2021. The Baltimore and Potomac Tunnel project is estimated to cost $4 billion and take a decade to finish. But it will eliminate a troublesome bottleneck that delays commuters and travelers up and down the East Coast. "This just the beginning, the beginning of having a 21st century rail system that's been so long overdue in this country," Biden said in remarks outside of the tunnel.Ulysses S. Grant was still president when travelers sped through the Baltimore and Potomac Tunnel, connecting Philadelphia and Washington by rail for the first time.A century and a half later, the tunnel that runs under Baltimore residential neighborhoods is more of a chokepoint than a lifeline. There's only one tube, and trains need to slow to just 30 mph (48 kilometers per hour) to navigate a tight turn on the southern end. It's a problem that President Joe Biden knows well, having commuted from Delaware to Washington on Amtrak for decades while serving as a U.S. senator. "The structure is deteriorating. The roof is leaking, the floor is sinking. This is the United States of America, for God's sake. We know better than that. We know we have to prove we're much better than that," Biden said.The tunnel is slated to be replaced with help from the $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure legislation championed by the Democratic president, and he was visiting Monday to talk about the massive investment.Once completed roughly a decade from now, the new tunnel is expected to have two tubes, with up to four tracks total, and allow trains to travel more than 100 mph. It will be named for Frederick Douglass, who escaped from slavery in Maryland and became a prominent abolitionist."The Frederick Douglass Tunnel will be all electric and we will continue to invest in rail to make it easier for people to use its potential to take thousands of vehicles, thousands of vehicles off the highways, including the interstate, and save millions of barrels of oil while reducing pollution," Biden said. "This is going to be a game changer for the environment, as well. And so that's what we're doing across the country, not just here," he added. It's the first of two rail-related stops this week for Biden, who was a regular Amtrak commuter  between his home in Wilmington, Delaware, and Washington during his years in the Senate. The Democratic president is visiting New York on Tuesday as another new tunnel is planned, this one under the Hudson River.===========================================================Clients are reminded: (i) to check the terms of their licence agreements for use of content outside news programming and that further advice and assistance can be obtained from the AP Archive on: Tel +44 (0) 20 7482 7482 Email: info@aparchive.com(ii) they should check with the applicable collecting society in their Territory regarding the clearance of any sound recording or performance included within the AP Television News service (iii) they have editorial responsibility for the use of all and any content included within the AP Television News service and for libel, privacy, compliance and third party rights applicable to their Territory. Biden visits Baltimore to tout rail tunnel project