The downsides to the federal derailment of the King of Prussia Rail construction have been well documented since the idea reached the end of its line. But nestled in the details of the SEPTA budget are several upsides, reported Thomas Fitzgerald in The Philadelphia Inquirer.

The lemonade-from-lemons result stems from $340 million the canceled project left in the SEPTA wallet.

The sum will now cover about a third of the transit authority’s budget for its next fiscal year.

“[The unused resource] allowed us to accelerate projects that were on the [12-year] capital plan,” Leslie Richards, SEPTA CEO and General Manager, said.

Projects expected to benefit from the capital infusion include:

• A fleet of new, disability-friendly trolleys and added and renovated stations to increase reliability and accessibility
• New rail cars on the Market-Frankford Line
• New Regional Rail cars, replacing those designed in the 1970s
• Improvement on bus routes to improve their stop timeliness by better traffic navigation technology

Even with a local injection to the infrastructure funding pot, SEPTA will still need to maximize sources such as competitive grants from Washington. Richards estimates that $1.8 billion in federal dollars may come to its aid.

“We don’t want to leave any money on the table there,” Richards concluded.

More on the KoP Rail’s effect on the SEPTA budget is at The Philadelphia Inquirer.

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One opinion from May 2022 on how Regional Rail can be best leveraged.