A 2008 report by the Federal Transit Administration, “Transit State of Good Repair,” said one-quarter of the nation’s bus and rail assets are in marginal or poor condition. Still, any federal mass-transit inspections or findings are nothing but symbolic at-best. Unlike with the Food and Drug Administration, for example, the government cannot recall flawed equipment or issue citations for ignoring recommendations.

The Monday Metro accident in Washington, D.C., when a train car rear-ended another killing nine people, involved some of the oldest cars in the city’s young subway system. The cars had already been said to have vulnerabilities. Washington, however, is not the exception for using equipment that is outdated.

Though the cause of the accident is still speculated, especially following two recent rail accidents nationally in the past year, officials said today the Metro train car involved was two months past due for scheduled maintenance on its brakes, and the car was an older model that federal officials had recommended be replaced because of concerns about its safety in a crash.

Blueprint America: Public Works is an effort by 18 public television stations across the country that concentrates on the state of their local infrastructure. Communities -- big and small, urban and rural -- are, for the first time, collectively rethinking what it takes to make a place livable. PBS stations are producing radio and television segments, hosting discussions between policy makers and their communities, and offering further content online, all as a part of Blueprint America.

New York Now on WMHT public television in New York - as a part of Blueprint America - looks at the politics New York State spending on infrastructure.

An introduction to congestion pricing, its failure in New York City, and a Worldfocus report on the system in Singapore.

Blueprint America -- with The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer -- in a two part report looks at the bottlenecks of America's freight rail network, and the communities the trains intersect.

New York mayor Michael Bloomberg unveiled six infrastructure projects across the city that will receive $261 million in stimulus funds, including the Brooklyn Bridge. Check out our interactive map for more about each project.

Two-thirds of all mass transit riders in the United States use the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) of New York’s system. The MTA board voted Wednesday “to enact a series of fare hikes and service cutbacks needed to keep the transit system from going broke.”