Our history and purpose

     In the fall of 2002, several leaders in the citizen-based rail advocacy community informally agreed that there was a  clear need for an independent, academically-oriented, rail policy research and development center in Virginia.

     The Virginia High Speed Rail Development Committee, more commonly known as Virginians for High Speed Rail  (“VHSR”), a Richmond-based advocacy organization, acting on its own initiative and hoping that its action would serve as a catalyst, formally agreed, at its December 16, 2002 board meeting, to create the Virginia Rail Policy Institute  (“VRPI”), the concept being that VHSR would only function as an organizing sponsor with no design or intent to  subsequently control.

     VRPI, which at that point was not an incorporated entity, produced a prospectus for the purpose of ascertaining  interest among Virginia universities having some transportation studies component. In addition, it was an early article  of faith among the organizers of VRPI that university-based rail policy research and studies should also be tempered  and enhanced through interaction with a group of yet-to-be-named VRPI fellows from across a wide spectrum of  backgrounds.

     The 2002-2003 VRPI prospectus, which was shopped around the Commonwealth for more than a year, included  the following points for consideration and discussion:

1. The Commonwealth is into the third century of rail (19th, 20th, and 21st) but lacks public consensus, and has no shared vision, for the future role of rail in Virginia. 
2. Rail policy issues are not going away; in fact rail is likely to be much more prominent on the public policy scene in the 21st century than it was in the 20th.
3. Legitimate questions remain as to just what role rail can, or should, play in the total mix of Virginia transportation alternatives and options. What can rail realistically be expected to do or not do in a highly competitive transportation environment?
4. Public policy has, largely by default, yielded the rail information and policy advisory field to private freight rail owners/operators, an important constituency but understandably with a rather parochial perspective.
5. Rail mergers, line abandonments, and capacity-reduction steps by the freight rails are yet on-going in some areas, while multi-modal planning and development remains, more often than not, a lofty public goal rather than a reality.
6. The broad public interest in rail, both freight and passenger, is rapidly increasing, and at some point may transcend public policy deference to the limited service and capacity-development interests, and capabilities, of the private owners of critical rail corridors.
7. The Commonwealth’s transportation policy-makers, at both the state and regional levels, deserve better support, with expanded rail data and policy option background resources, some of which could be supplied by independent, non-partisan, entity such as VRPI.

     In June of 2004, VRPI hosted a forum in Charlottesville, billed as a Transportation Connectivity Symposium, which  attracted a large number of participants representing all modes of transportation, and all major transportation user- groups. The result was a decision to proceed to formalize the VRPI organization and effort.

     VRPI was incorporated in early 2005, and shortly thereafter received IRS approval as a 501 (c) (3) organization.

     In late 2006, VRPI published its first major policy paper dealing with issues arising out of public funding of rail  infrastructure on privately-owned rail rights of way.

     Today, VRPI describes itself as the Commonwealth’s only independent, non-partisan research and policy analysis  forum dedicated to addressing the present and future role of rail transportation in Virginia.

     VRPI was intially funded by its own officers, directors and fellows, with limited office and administrative  support services provided by VHSR on an interim basis. This is now augmented by public and private grant funding for expanded  rail studies.

      R.L.B. Aug. 20, 2007.