Public and private officials from New York State’s North Country this month announced the founding of the North American Center of Excellence for Transportation Equipment, a partnership intended to build upon the Plattsburgh area’s demonstrated strength in building transit vehicles.

Plattsburgh has become a perhaps unlikely center for the construction of trains and buses in recent years. Anchored by demand from the MTA—perhaps the only transit system in the US capable of anchoring an entire manufacturing cluster on its own—Plattsburgh is now home to three major transit vehicle assembly plants. The first, serving Bombardier’s rail division, moved to Plattsburgh in 1995, followed by Nova Bus in 2009 and intercity coach manufacturer Prevost in 2014. The opening of several large plants has spawned a network of spin-off companies that supply specialized work and components in Plattsburgh and across Upstate.

The North Country transit manufacturing cluster has had a significant economic impact. In 2012 transportation manufacturing exports amounted to $7.2 billion, a significant chunk of which came from Upstate and North Country plants, and in 2013 it paid the third-highest average wage of any cluster in the region — $58,300 according to an analysis by the New York State Department of Labor. The MTA’s 2005-2009 capital plan sustained 8,714 jobs and had a $1.1 billion economic impact on the North Country, and impact has only increased since then.

The emergence of the North Country transit manufacturing cluster honors the highest ideals of Governor Cuomo’s economic development policy, which centers on cooperation between the public and private sectors and on building economic clusters. But the North Country’s future economic success is in jeopardy because the 2015-2019 MTA capital plan remains unfunded. The capital plan holds the promise (and need) for significant new orders, including 940 R-211 subway cars, 1,844 new buses, and between 88 and 164 new M-9 cars for the Long Island Railroad — but those orders won’t be placed without proper state funding.

The Plattsburgh area plants wouldn’t be the only New York State transit manufacturing companies impacted; Alstom’s plant in Hornell and Kawasaki’s plant in Yonkers, and possibly CAF in Elmira, are also expected to bid for new contracts.

The MTA funding gap doesn’t just make it impossible to retire aging equipment like the C train’s R32 cars — it also threatens the Upstate-Downstate partnership that has sustained Upstate communities while helping to meet the demands of Downstate travelers. And if the gap is not filled soon, Upstate could fall behind in the race for transit manufacturing: Chinese transit manufacturer CNR has won a contract to build new cars for the MBTA and will begin building a new plant in Springfield, Mass. next year. So the threat of New York State investment crossing the border to Massachusetts looms.

It might seem surprising to some that the North Country Chamber of Commerce lists a fully-funded MTA capital plan as its top legislative priority for this session, but in truth, a healthy MTA means a healthy New York State, and that should be everyone’s top priority.