DALLAS – States are expected to use almost $800 million of new federal grants aimed at smooth freight shipments to leverage another $3.6 billion of infrastructure investments from other sources.
Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx officially awarded the $759 million of first-year FASTLANE grants to 18 projects in 15 states and the District of Columbia on Wednesday, two months after the proposed grants were announced.
Three key congressional committees had 60 days to review the project list before the grants became official.
FASTLANE is an acronym for Fostering Advancements in Shipping and Transportation for the Long-term Achievement of National Efficiencies. The grant program was authorized by the Fixing America's Surface Transportation Act, which was enacted in late 2015.
The five-year federal funding law allocates a total of $4.5 billion for the FASTLANE program through fiscal 2020. The annual program will increase by $50 million each year until then, with $1 billion of FASTLANE grants in the final year.
The projects funded by the FASTLANE grants will eliminate traffic bottlenecks, enhance port capacity, and overhaul major freight corridors, Foxx said.
"The FAST Act gave us a set of tools to begin addressing America's infrastructure deficit, and we have been moving full speed ahead to get critical road, rail, and port projects off the ground across the country," he said.
The 18 projects were chosen from 212 applicants that submitted grant proposals totaling $9.8 billion, Foxx said.
The new Build America Bureau at the Transportation Department will oversee the FASTLANE grants.
The office created by the FAST Act will help states and local governments fund transportation projects by streamlining credit and grant opportunities, said Andrew Right, acting director of the Build America Bureau.
"The Build America Bureau brings together FASTLANE grants, credit programs, and technical support into a one-stop-shop designed to get infrastructure projects funded and built," Right said.
But one group complained about the grants.
The FASTLANE funding is insufficient, as was the freight portion of the $500 million of competitive grants from the Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery program, said Leslie Blakey, executive director of the Coalition for America's Trade Gateways and Corridors.
Freight projects were allocated less than 26% of the fiscal 2016 TIGER grants, unlike earlier rounds that devoted up to 53% to freight, she said.
"We were disappointed in both TIGER and FASTLANE," Blakey said. "These grant programs are intended to prioritize projects based on objective criteria that identifies the public benefits of the investment. Unfortunately, the Transportation Department seems to be tuned in to something else in making these grant awards."
Meanwhile, the Transportation Department said Thursday it would distribute bus grants totaling nearly $211 million to fund 61 projects in 41 states, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Indian nations. The grants will be used to buy, replace, and rehabilitate transit buses and buy or build bus-related facilities.
"These grants will improve mobility for thousands of transit riders who depend on bus service every day," Foxx said.
Carolyn Flowers, acting director of the Federal Transit Administration, said the FTA received 284 grant applications totaling $1.6 billion from 236 applicants in 47 states.
The competitive transit grant program was also authorized by the FAST Act.
