INVESTING IN AMERICA: U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg Joins Los Angeles Leaders at Exposition Park to Highlight Over $200 Million in New Federal Investments to Upgrade Mobility in the Region

Los Angeles, CA. – Today, U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg highlighted the more than $200 million in new federal investments to upgrade mobility in Los Angeles, as part of President Biden’s Investing in America agenda.  

The new federal funds will make it easier to get to and from transit stations, help reconnect communities, improve public transportation while reducing air pollution with American-made electric buses and help the Greater Los Angeles region prepare for the 2028 Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games. 

Secretary Buttigieg was joined at Exposition Park by Los Angeles Mayor and Metro Board Member Karen Bass, Metro Board Chair and County Supervisor Janice Hahn, Members of the Los Angeles Congressional Delegation, and other city and LA Metro leaders. 

The full transcript of Secretary Buttigieg’s remarks:   

Thank you.  

Thank you so much, Kerwin. Thank you for everything that you do every day. 

We Admire the role you play not just as part of one of the most important transit systems in the country, but most importantly, in your line of work part of people’s everyday lives. And whether you were one of those on a route that wind up knowing your name and, you know, their name and their routine, or whether they don’t really feel like talking to anybody, they just want to get home to their kids. You make sure they get to where they’re going safely and you and all of the operators like you, especially after what this career has been through in the last few years.  

We are so thankful for what you do and proud to be on behalf of the President to be investing in the future of your great career, so thank you very much.  

I want to thank Mayor [Karen] Bass for welcoming us to this city. Someone I came to know and admire back when I was mayor and she was a member of Congress—And if I have the best job in the federal government, I think she has the best and hardest job in government, leading a city and doing so many of the important things that really touch people’s lives every day.  

Our aspiration is to be a wind at the back of America’s Mayors and I always reflect that the job has only gotten harder since I proudly wore the title of mayor, but it would have been nice back when I was mayor if there was a trillion dollar infrastructure package coming out of Washington to help us get stuff done.  

And she, of course also deserves credit for helping to make that happen along with other members of your extraordinary delegation, like Representative Maxine Waters and Representative Ted Lieu and the others who were there for President Biden, who were there for this Administration, when a lot of people didn’t think it was going to be possible to get an infrastructure bill done.  

It’s far too easy now that we’re used to it being a reality to suppose that it was always going to be so, but the political obituary of that infrastructure bill was written half a dozen times. But leaders like your members of Congress, like Representatives Waters and Bass and Lieu were there, did not give up, and worked with us.  

I also want to acknowledge, though they couldn’t be here—Linda Sanchez, Nanette Barragan, and Adam Schiff, Jimmy Gomez and Robert Garcia, who we had a great event with earlier today, and Sydney Kamlager-Dove who everyone here already knew as a great leader, but who is coming to Congress right on time because she has immediately gotten to work—As demonstrated by the fact that she’s already letting us know the project she thinks we ought to fund. So, clearly has not wasted a moment in becoming an excellent member of Congress. 

LA28 Chair Casey Wasserman and your entire team. You’re doing such extraordinary work, I have lost count of the number of places and scenarios that I see Casey in , which is exactly as it should be because he is both, leading the team to get that work done here and representing the aspirations of this entire community, as he represents the games to the world—with a view toward 28.  

And thank you Andrea for that that great tour and for introducing us to the extraordinary capabilities and future of Exposition Park. It really is something I hope one day to take—I got a couple of toddlers who would love the things that you shared with us. I can’t wait to bring them here one day. So, maybe on our way to the Olympics, if you’ll have me. 

So, LA Metro Chair Hahn and Stephanie, and everybody who is part of operating this critically important asset. Officials from LA County, the City Council, the State Legislature, and the state government that understand the importance of infrastructure.  

I’m kind of the Secretary of trains, planes and automobiles and a lot of other things. Sometimes I have a good multimodal day, today might be a record-setting—started our day at the Port of Long Beach celebrating on-dock rail, which meant we actually took a train, a special all-electric train to get to the site at the port, where we had our announcement, then we drove over to take the light-rail metro, take that route only to get onto a golf cart or golf cart motorcade for our little parade or a tour I should say. And I’m sure for the only time in my career I’m speaking to a crowd within line of sight of a space shuttle, which is after all, technically transportation. So, we’ll claim it even though I can’t. It’s probably the only form of transportation that I can’t claim we are helping with the President’s infrastructure package.  

But I’ll tell you, it was a joy to ride on the train this morning, not just as a fan of rail, but the chance to experience how significant this season we’re in is for Los Angeles public transportation. 

Coming just a couple years after we were here celebrating the ribbon cutting on the Crenshaw/LAX Metro Line, and knowing the benefit that that’s going to bring. 

Is for a lot of people when they think of LA, they, of course, think of cars, a lot of cars, a lot of cars on a lot of freeways and cars are always going to be part of LA’s story. 

But in the last few years, it’s been extraordinary to see transit ridership, Metro ridership growing. And that’s a good thing.  

It is, there’s such good important work happening around LA County to make public transportation, more robust, more accessible as this region moves closer to the goals outlined in that Vision for 2028. And I believe this work is going to change that commonly held perception, that you need to be in a car in order to get to where you need to go in this community, we are giving people options, you are giving people options. And we are here to help.  

That’s why on behalf of the Biden-Harris Administration, I’m so proud to be here to recognize how federal dollars are helping to connect even more people across LA County with affordable and reliable public transportation.  

This is funding made possible by President Biden’s infrastructure package, which, as we said, was passed with the help of so many who are here today. And as we’re investing in transportation systems from coast to coast, we’re also working to make sure the work that we’re doing benefits every community. 

Because we have to face the reality that infrastructure choices of the past—like the location and manner of the construction of freeways, all too often played out in ways that perpetuated or sometimes even worsened inequities. And often the neighborhoods most impacted by that were low-income communities, or communities of color that lack the political power to resist or to reshape infrastructure plans that divided their communities, that then made it harder for them to reach friends, and schools, and jobs. And those same communities were disproportionately impacted by smog and by air pollution, causing higher rates of respiratory disease and cancer.  

And we talk about that, not because we want to wallow in the past, or spend our time assigning blame. But rather to accept our responsibility for making sure current and future generations are better off. And that means listening to local leaders and advocates, who know what good transportation ought to look like in their neighborhoods.  

The main construct of this infrastructure package in the [60,000] 54,000 projects that it’s supporting, is based on the awareness that none of the ideas have to come from Washington—the ideas come from the community, the funding comes from Washington to help turn those ideas into reality. 

For starters, we’ve awarded $139 million through our Reconnecting Communities initiative that’ll improve public transportation, benefiting this community. That means bus is running more frequently, more priority bus lanes—which means not only more bus service but it’s going to be more quick and efficient, and reliable. 

Investments in the firs/last mile connections are going to focus on improving accessibility and safety on the roads and the sidewalks that surround rail stations and bus stops. Because we know the overwhelming majority of riders will walk or cycle or roll to the location where they board public transit. 

And this funding will build out more multimodal transportation options at five of LA’s busiest stations. It will create new bike share stations, and it’ll extend that GoPass program to provide fareless transit to low-income college students, so they don’t have to worry about whether they can afford a ride or bus or train while they are bettering themselves in investing in their own future and education.  

This is about making everyday life better and easier. Getting people better access to good paying jobs, to doctor’s offices, to grocery stores, to wherever it is they need to be.  

And I also want to note that last week in a separate investment, as was noted DOT awarded $77 million to put toward dozens of new, zero-emission buses in LA County, like the one that we see right over there.  

That’s building on a previous $104 million investment for electric buses because we know that having more buses and zero-emission buses at that helps increase Metro ridership, it helps get more cars off the road, it helps make the air in LA cleaner for every single child and adult who breaths it in every day. 

And the reality is better transit, more people using it, benefits people, even if they don’t use it, because that means there’s less competition for those congested freeways and roads.  

Meanwhile, you can see the entrance of the Coliseum as we know that we’re just days away from that opening ceremony of the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris. And I’m trying not to be offended that everybody up here who’s headed there has not insisted that I come along to inspect the transportation situation there in Paris. But they’re going to be taking good notes about how to make sure that there are world-class games here. Because of course, that means we are just four years away from the opening ceremony of the 2028 games right here in LA.  

Not for your first time, not for your second time, but for the third time and, you know, when LA hosted in 1984 and I’ll refrain from telling you what I was up to in 1984—but one of the big conversations was how a city that was so defined in the public imagination by his freeways, efficiently and effectively, made sure that people could get to where they needed to go. The residents could get around. The Olympians, got to their venues and competitions.  

And now, four decades later, you’re redefining this model of success, you’re creating a public transportation system that’ll make it more convenient to get around LA by train or bus, that’s going to create better opportunities for jobs and education. It’s going to make the air easier to breathe for generations to come.  

So, four years from now and just knowing the kinds of folks who animate this community, as you prepare for your fourth Olympic Games, which I imagine is only a matter of time—Angelenos and Olympians are going to know, just how efficient this region’s public transit can be.  

This is an investment in the future. It’s an investment in, as Casey said, what is sorely needed, which is things that can bring us together, inspire hope and unity and pride, and you’ve got a lot to take pride in here, in LA and LA County.  

Thank you so much for the chance to join you.  

Congratulations on your great work and on these awards.  

Thank you very much.