The Dulles Metrorail project would receive $85 million more from Congress and Metro would get $150 million in long-sought-after funding under a measure approved by a House subcommittee Monday.
The House Appropriations Committee’s transportation, housing and urban development subcommittee included the money in its 2010 spending bill, according to Rep. Frank Wolf, R-Va., who is a senior member of the subcommittee.
The addition brings the federal contribution to the Dulles Rail project to $440 million so far.
The current price tag of the rail extension project is $5.3 billion. The Federal Transit Administration committed $900 million in March, while the airports authority, and state and local agencies plan to pay for the rest through special tax districts, tolls and other revenues.
The 23-mile rail line, already under construction, is slated to extend Metrorail from Falls Church to Washington Dulles International Airport and beyond.
The $150 million allocated to the transit agency is part of a 10-year, $1.5 billion package that Congress promised to the transit agency last October to help pay to fix its aging infrastructure. Virginia, Maryland and the District must each match it with $50 million.
The full Appropriations Committee will consider the annual spending bill Friday, Wolf said, and the Senate will likely take it up later this summer.
