President Barack Obama made two campaign promises related to Amtrak: fight for funding and reform Amtrak to be more accountable.

In our last update, we established that the administration earmarked money for Amtrak in his economic stimulus package and in his budgets for 2010, 2011 and 2012. Obama also issued a statement in favor of the MAP-21 Act, a surface transportation bill that includes funding for rail. It passed the Senate in March and is now awaiting for a vote in the House. He also opposed a separate House bill that would have reduced Amtrak funding.

Obama didn't specify how he would reform Amtrak, but his promise did reference his co-sponsorship of a bill that became the Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act of 2008, the last major law to deal with Amtrak reform. In his promise, Obama also mentioned that he would work "to improve accountability."

That 2008 passenger rail law included accountability measures for Amtrak under a "Performance Improvement Plan." For instance, it directs Amtrak to evaluate and rank each of its long-distance routes, post improvement plans online for the worst routes, and then implement those plans in 2010.

We found that Amtrak published a chart ranking 15 long-distance routes based on customer satisfaction, on-time performance and cost recovery. It also published improvement plans for 10 of those routes.

The law had a separate provision for the Department of Transportation's Office of Inspector General to report to Congress on service delays and their causes for Amtrak's Coast Starlight and Cascades routes. The audit and its recommendations are online, in addition to an annual report on Amtrak's budget and five-year financial plan.

Last time we rated this promise In the Works because there was no evidence of reform efforts. With the Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act of 2008, the Obama administration has delivered on accountability reforms. We rate this a Promise Kept.