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The state Department of Transportation is aiming high, with a new list of requests for $4 billion in federal economic recovery funds to create fast and frequent train service between Charlotte and Washington, D.C.

The money would fund 90 proposed projects to double tracks, straighten curves, expand stations and build a rail shortcut between Richmond and Raleigh. Last week, state DOT officials outlined their requests for federal rail stimulus grants that will be announced starting this fall.

''North Carolina has an ambitious program and is going after all of the stimulus money we can qualify for, to put people back to work," said Patrick B. Simmons, the state DOT rail division director.

The Obama administration will distribute $8 billion under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to start a nationwide network of high-speed trains and improved intercity passenger service.

Obama also wants Congress to spend $1 billion a year on high-speed rail over the next five years. This week, House budget writers proposed $4 billion for next year alone.

''This is not a one-time shot of money," Simmons said. "This is a program trying very hard to get started."

North Carolina has plenty of competition for a share of the first $8 billion.

Ray LaHood, the U.S. transportation secretary, told a group of reporters in Washington that 40 states submitted wish lists last week for a combined $93 billion.

''We're going to consider proposals that are serious, proposals that have a kind of intermodality, multistate regional approach," LaHood said.

''And even those maybe not as far along as other regions will be considered."

Some of the money is restricted to improvements that can be finished in two years.

North Carolina will push 34 separate two-year projects it hopes will qualify for a combined $913 million. Federal transportation officials estimate that this much stimulus spending would create more than 25,000 jobs.

Big-ticket items on this list include $100 million to finish double-tracking the N.C. Railroad line between Greensboro and Charlotte, more than $200 million for Charlotte-area improvements, and $403 million to finish design work between Raleigh and Richmond.

North Carolina has the lead role in a partnership with Virginia to build the Southeast High Speed Rail corridor from Charlotte to Washington. The southeast plan calls for top speeds of 90 mph, rising to 110 mph between Raleigh and Richmond.

Most of the proposed rail projects would move toward that goal a step at a time, making incremental improvements that allow faster speeds in places where trains must stay below 50 mph now.

''Our focus is not on the ultimate top speed but on raising the low speeds," Simmons said. "We're looking for an average speed, including station stops, of 75 mph. That represents your time in the seat, and time is more important than top speed."

Most of North Carolina's request, $3.1 billion, would upgrade existing rail service and restore train traffic to the abandoned CSX corridor from Raleigh through Norlina and Petersburg, Va., to Richmond.

The state also seeks $6 million for engineering work on proposed new service in Eastern North Carolina -- linking Raleigh to Wilmington by way of Fayetteville and Goldsboro -- and between Asheville and Salisbury in Western North Carolina.

''We're taking advantage of the opportunity to build something that works not just to link North Carolina with other states, north and south, but links North Carolina east and west, from the mountains to the sea," Simmons said.