Engagement Memo—Bridge Management Program

Amtrak (the company) maintains more than 1,300 railroad bridges across its network. These bridges, some of which are over a century old, have the potential to severely impact operations should they fail. Given the importance of bridges’ structural integrity to safe and efficient operations, we are initiating a review of company efforts to inventory, inspect, and otherwise manage its bridges.

Our objective will be to assess the company's railroad bridge management program. Our scope includes company processes to ensure it is conducting inspections compliant with federal regulations that provide useful data to maintain safe and efficient operations. We may expand our scope or modify our objective during the review. We plan to interview company officials; review related policies, documents, and procedures; and analyze relevant company data. We will work to minimize disruptions to the company by coordinating meetings with staff in advance.

We will perform our work in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. Our interactions with the company will be consistent with P/I 2.1.4, which sets forth the relationship between our office and the company. In particular, section 7.0 of the policy discusses coordination between company officials and our Office of Audits.