More Must Be Done To Secure Nation's RailsMore Must Be Done To Secure Nation's Rails

Railway security in the United States is under scrutiny in the wake of the London rush-hour bombings, with renewed calls for money to be spent on technology to protect urban transit systems from terrorists.

Three and a half years after 9/11, "the sad fact is the train has still not left the station when it comes to genuine rail and transit security," Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn., said last week at a press conference. Lieberman, ranking member of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, and Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, chairman of that committee, were behind a Homeland Security Appropriations bill amendment approved last week that would authorize $2.93 billion for homeland security grants to states and require 25% of funding be spent on preventing terrorism.

In a letter sent July 8, the day after the London bombings, to Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, Lieberman and Sens. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., and Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., said the nation's rail and transit systems need more than $7 billion to adequately improve security and noted that only $300 million in federal funds had been allocated for that purpose since 9/11.

New York's Metropolitan Transit Authority recently has been criticized for spending only $30 million of the $591 million in federal and state funds it has received since 9/11 to improve security. The agency has responded that it plans by year's end to spend several hundred million dollars on security measures.

In Philadelphia, the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority last week said it plans by late September to deploy two HiEnergy Technologies Inc. Siegma 3E3 chemical-sensing devices to check for explosives that may be present in abandoned baggage. Says Jack Wenke, captain of support services for the authority's police department, "There's a need for technology, public awareness, bomb-sniffing dogs, and anything else we can use."