The ideal candidate will be: A compelling writer with something to say on transportation who is excited to have the outlet; familiar with the federal surface transportation reauthorization process, a relational person who already has or is eager to make connections with Hill offices and staffers, coalition partners, and advocates; well-versed in federal transportation policy and practice; a self-starter who doesn’t wait to be told what to do; and a team player who wants to be part of a team of passionate transportation nerds working to advance T4America’s principles and advancing our mission.

As part of the T4America policy team working on our full policy portfolio, this position will also serve as the lead for our passenger rail work, including direct support for local partners such as the Southern Rail Commission, management and oversight of federal rail grants, the development of new passenger service on various corridors, and working with longstanding champions in Congress to shape the rail provisions and funding in the next reauthorization. This associate may also serve as the lead on roadway safety policy, working with the National Complete Streets Coalition to build their policy knowledge in this area and focusing on building streets that are safe for all users.

Responsibilities:

• Support and communicate about T4America’s platform
  • Understand and explain T4America’s three priorities and the underlying policies required to turn them into reality.
  • Conceive and write regular blog posts, contribute to reports, conduct research, and collaborate with the T4America communications team to produce engaging content on our priorities. 
  • Effectively communicate T4America’s priorities and policies in person, online, and in various mediums.
• Understand, analyze, synthesize, and develop policy
  • Read and stay plugged in to the world of transportation policy at all levels. 
  • Analyze policy developments closely and produce insights to share with others through memos, briefings, presentations, blog posts, and other external content. 
  • Develop new policy ideas or legislative language in support of T4America’s platform
• Serve as the passenger rail lead 
  • Manage relationships with passenger rail stakeholders, make presentations, maintain and develop relationships with key Capitol Hill champions and stakeholders, support the senior policy advisor, administer rail grants, write and communicate about rail policy developments, and vision.
• Be a successful advocate
  • Strategically identify local, state, and federal policymakers to educate and persuade.
  • Build relationships on Capitol Hill with individual offices, notable caucuses, committee staff, and members of Congress by making frequent in-person (and online) outreach and regular connections.
  • Equip advocates (T4A members, supporters, coalition members, like-minded organizations) with the information and tools they need to engage in the process of policy reform.
  • Communicate to T4America members and partners about opportunities to impact transportation actions in Congress as well as best practices in local and state policy.
• Communicate effectively 
  • Draft portions of and edit reports (new and future editions) like Dangerous by Design, The Congestion Con, Divided by Design, and Driving Down Emissions
  • Write memos and other content for T4America members, clients, and advocacy purposes; 
  • Effectively communicate on organization priorities, especially equity, climate and public health; and
  • Participate in panels, conferences and other collaborations to present T4America’s priorities and reports.
  • Help develop and deliver education and training content for technical assistance offerings focused on equity in transportation.
• Contribute to Smart Growth America’s overall vision
  • Support SGA’s broader policy work across housing, transportation, land use, zoning, economic development, placemaking, and environmental protection.
  • Support the National Complete Streets Coalition’s policy work.
  • Contribute to technical assistance engagements with states, counties, and cities across the country.
    

Required skills:

• A college degree and at least 3-4 years of work experience.
• The ability to think strategically and work across partisan lines.
• Excellent written, verbal, and research skills—you should be a sharp writer.
• Ability to execute advocacy strategies and projects, including policy research and partner outreach and engagement.
• Excellent time management and the ability to complete multiple tasks with a high volume of work and minimal supervision.
• Comfortable working in a collaborative team environment and have strong interpersonal skills.

Compensation and location

The salary range for this position is $59,000-$65,000. A candidate for the top of this range would have an advanced degree in public policy, transportation, planning or other related field; experience working on Capitol Hill, in a state legislative body or city council or previous experience in local, state, or federal transportation agencies; tangible experience with passenger rail policy development or implementation; and/or experience managing federal grant processes and demonstrated administrative excellence and experience.

Benefits include fully paid medical insurance, optional dental and vision coverage, 401 (k) contributions, life and disability insurance, three weeks of vacation in the first year, and 12 paid annual holidays. This position reports to the Senior Policy Manager and is based in Washington, DC. SGA staff work in the office at 1350 Eye St. NW, Tuesdays-Thursdays. No relocation assistance is offered at this time.

How to apply

Please send a cover letter and resume to jobs@smartgrowthamerica.org with “T4America Senior Policy Associate” in the subject line. In your cover letter, please indicate how you’ve learned of this opportunity.

Commitment to diversity and inclusion

Smart Growth America and Transportation for America are committed to building a diverse staff and strongly encourage applications from all backgrounds, including candidates of color. Employment and promotional opportunities are based upon individual capabilities and qualifications without regard to race, color, religion, gender, pregnancy, sexual orientation/preference, age, national origin, marital status, citizenship, disability, veteran status, or any other protected characteristic as established under law.

About Smart Growth America

Smart Growth America envisions a country where no matter where you live, or who you are, you can enjoy living in a place that is healthy, prosperous, and resilient.  We empower communities through technical assistance, advocacy, and thought leadership to realize this vision of livable places, healthy people, and shared prosperity.

About Transportation for America

Transportation for America is a national nonprofit made up of local, regional, and state leaders who seek a transportation system that safely, affordably, and conveniently connects people of all means and ability to jobs, services, and opportunity through multiple modes of travel.

The post We’re hiring: T4America Senior Policy Associate appeared first on Transportation For America.

The ideal candidate will be: an entrepreneurial and creative self-starter who is eager to produce research and report ideas; experienced with analytical tools like GIS, data visualization, AI; knowledgeable about available federal, state, and local transportation data; a compelling writer who can produce research-backed content like in-depth reports, but also brief analyses, blog posts, and visuals; well connected to the world of transportation policy and practice; and is ready to both collaborate with others and produce their own creative ideas for research and other content to advance our mission.

Please send a cover letter and resume to jobs@smartgrowthamerica.org with “T4America Research Manager” in the subject line. In your cover letter, please indicate how you’ve learned of this opportunity.

Responsibilities and requirements

Produce strategic research:

• Produce creative research and analytical ideas to advance T4America’s priorities and support our work on reauthorization
• Research and examine the impacts of possible legislative, regulatory, and other executive actions at all levels of government with regard to T4America’s priorities.
• Produce creative research and analytical ideas to advance SGA’s broader transportation work, including the National Complete Streets Coalition.
• Provide research support for SGA’s technical assistance engagements, which could include tasks like running benefit-cost analyses, analyzing projects or plans, providing research-based policy recommendations, or creating bespoke products to assist SGA/T4A’s expansive technical assistance work.
• Help conceive of creative new reports like Fueling the Crisis, World-Class American Transit, Dangerous by Design, The Congestion Con, Divided by Design, and Driving Down Emissions, or produce updated versions of these existing reports.
• Build relationships with our allies and other stakeholders (especially other researchers) to inform and support collaborative research opportunities. 

Produce research-based content and communicate about it

• Collaborate with staff and the SGA communications team to produce engaging research-based content for all channels, including blog posts, social media posts, quick hit research, and others to further our mission and advance our policy strategies.
• Be a part of the team closely following, analyzing, and communicating about broader transportation trends and the impact on T4America’s priorities;
• Identify research opportunities, oversee and draft reports that explain challenges in transportation in the areas related to our key principles, as well as other important priorities like reducing emissions and improving access to destinations.
• Potentially speak about research and content on behalf of the organization, including at workshops, conferences, and other events (some travel included).

Knowledge and skills

Required:

• Commitment to the organization’s priorities and a vision of how to achieve them;
• Minimum of five years’ experience in the transportation arena or a closely related policy field;
• The ability to use data to tell a clear story that can support advocacy goals;
• An entrepreneurial ability to analyze the transportation sector and spot emerging trends;
• Deep familiarity with available federal, state, and local transportation data
• Experience with GIS or other data visualization software, as well as programming with R or other data analysis tools;
• Project management skills and experience;
• Excellent time management and organization, and the ability to work independently with minimal supervision;
• Ability to strategically prioritize workload and complete multiple tasks and a high volume of work;
• Excellent written/verbal skills, with a high degree of accuracy and attention to detail.

Preferred:

• An advanced degree in public policy, political science, urban planning, or other related field;
• Knowledge of the legislative process at multiple levels of government
• Experience working within a state or local transportation agency at the local, MPO, or state level;
• Knowledge of the broader SGA set of issues, including land use, housing, and zoning, and ideas to produce or conceive of other research work for SGA’s other teams and work across the organization

Compensation and location

The salary range for this position is $68,000-$74,000. A candidate for the top of this range would have been involved in producing similar research on the outcomes of the federal transportation program, have 5-plus years of experience, and possess one or more of the knowledge and skills listed as preferred above. Benefits include fully paid medical insurance, optional dental and vision coverage, 401 (k) contributions, life and disability insurance, three weeks of vacation in the first year, and 12 paid annual holidays. This position reports to the Senior Policy Manager and is based in Washington, DC. SGA staff work in the office at 1350 Eye St. NW, Tuesdays-Thursdays. No relocation assistance is offered at this time.

How to apply

Please send a cover letter and resume to jobs@smartgrowthamerica.org with “T4America Research Manager” in the subject line. In your cover letter, please indicate how you’ve learned of this opportunity.

Commitment to building a diverse team

Smart Growth America and Transportation for America are committed to building a diverse staff and strongly encourage applications from all backgrounds, including candidates of color. Employment and promotional opportunities are based upon individual capabilities and qualifications without regard to race, color, religion, gender, pregnancy, sexual orientation/preference, age, national origin, marital status, citizenship, disability, veteran status, or any other protected characteristic as established under law.

About Smart Growth America

Smart Growth America envisions a country where no matter where you live, or who you are, you can enjoy living in a place that is healthy, prosperous, and resilient.  We empower communities through technical assistance, advocacy, and thought leadership to realize this vision of livable places, healthy people, and shared prosperity.

About Transportation for America

Transportation for America is a national nonprofit made up of local, regional, and state leaders who seek a transportation system that safely, affordably, and conveniently connects people of all means and ability to jobs, services, and opportunity through multiple modes of travel.

The post We’re hiring: T4America Research Manager appeared first on Transportation For America.

BUILD America 250 allocates $474 billion to the federal surface transportation program, but these funds aren’t set to improve safety, repair infrastructure, or support public transit, even as Americans face increasingly dangerous roads, rising gas prices, and an ongoing affordability crisis. Although the current bill includes language to address further grant cancellations by the Trump administration and preserves some safety programs, these programs are limited by weak structures and accountability mechanisms and are likely to be implemented in bad faith. For more details on the different provisions, read our recent blog.

Before Congress votes on BUILD America 250, we need you to join us in urging members to vote no. Use the form below to contact your representative.

The post Tell your representative to vote “NO” on the BUILD America 250 Act appeared first on Transportation For America.

After a year of hearing that “the House is definitely going to release and markup a draft bill sometime this month,” Lucy kept the football on the ground, and the House finally released a five-year, $474 billion reauthorization proposal last Sunday on the eve of this year’s Infrastructure Week. Predict the same thing every month, and eventually it will come true. 

How will Congress pay for this enormous bill? The short answer is they won’t—your grandkids will. A modest amount of new funding will come via a controversial new fee on electric vehicles, but that’s a drop in the bucket compared to the enormous gap between revenues and spending. Just like the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), an enormous subsidy from all taxpayers would be required to cover annual spending that is roughly double what the gas tax brings in each year. And all that for a fairly status quo proposal that fails to meet the moment and will not deliver a transportation system that safely, affordably, and reliably gets us all where we need to go. 

But in a bill with less money than the IIJA, it’s transit and passenger rail that take the hit. 

Though leadership on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee describes it as a $580 billion bill, in reality, it includes only $474 billion in guaranteed funding, representing a cut from the $539 billion guaranteed by the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. Nearly all of that difference comes from cuts to transit, passenger rail, and scrapped competitive grant programs. Highways? They get a healthy bump in guaranteed funding.

1) There was a notable attempt to prevent a repeat of the Trump administration’s massive flood of grant cancellations

This administration has been unwilling to follow the current transportation law, as evidenced most clearly by their abrupt 2025 cancellation of billions in grants that were previously awarded to states and local communities. The BUILD Act included some surprising language aimed at preventing a repeat: “the Secretary may not terminate, withhold, or delay the execution of a grant agreement for a grant or award (in part or in whole) made using funds made available under this Act” based on any arbitrary reasons or a change in preferences of a new administration.  While this provision would be a step in the right direction, it unfortunately does nothing to restore the billions in grants rescinded under the IIJA. 

Another way to think about this provision: it will successfully prevent the cancellation of grant funding for the kinds of projects that this administration will absolutely not select in the first place. This is a move in the right direction, but it’s slamming the proverbial barn door after the horses are already in another zip code.

Rep. Jared Huffman (D-CA) did attempt to restore the canceled IIJA grants via this amendment during Thursday’s marathon committee markup. This amendment, which failed on a voice vote, would have retroactively applied to all grants awarded under IIJA, noting that “the Secretary shall obligate and execute grant agreements for any project that was selected, awarded, or publicly announced for funding by the Department on or after November 15, 2021” via the IIJA or Inflation Reduction Act, and prevent the Secretary from canceling them. When it was offered during the markup, Chairman Sam Graves backed the Trump administration’s decision to cancel these grants, noting that Sec. Duffy inherited a backlog of unobligated funds, so the only solution was obviously to cancel them all and take back the money. 

Rep. Huffman had some support, but considering the fact that canceled grants spanned republican and democrat districts alike, you’d think that a sizable number of committee members—but especially those in the minority—would be loudly standing up for those communities and making the restoration of these grants one of their fundamental prerequisites for support. 

Apparently not.

Grant cancellations aside, here are nine other things to know about the BUILD America 250 Act, organized around our three simple principles. (Note: We’re just calling it the BUILD Act from here on.)

Fix it first

Overall, this bill fails to make meaningful strides towards prioritizing maintenance and repair on our roadways. States are not required to demonstrate progress toward any hard and fast targets for road or bridge conditions before building new road capacity with federal-aid highway programs. There is no change to the current paperwork exercise of performance management, and states are not required to set any targets they’d be held accountable for meeting. (Read more about this T4America principle)

2) Dedicated bridge repair funding is back, but lacks accountability

Congress eliminated a dedicated bridge repair program back in 2012, but what’s old is always eventually new again, and the BUILD Act creates a new dedicated formula program for bridge repair. Some IIJA bridge programs are consolidated into a new $9.2 billion annual program—creatively called the Bridge Program. Each state would receive $75 million, plus an amount based on factors like bridge area and the amount of bridge area in poor condition. Some money is set aside to be spent on the thousands of oft-overlooked bridges not on the federal-aid highway system (though states can opt out of this), and 25 percent is set aside for states to run a competition for awards to locally-owned bridges. States have to produce a new report describing progress made on reducing the number of bridges in poor condition, but there are no real penalties for failure. 

Beyond this formula program, there’s a new $2 billion annual competitive grant program (without guaranteed funding) that’s focused on improving the safety, efficiency, and reliability of bridges on the National Highway System only. While the details are different, with dedicated funding and little accountability, the BUILD Act’s approach is not that dissimilar from our pre-2012 approach to bridge repair. 

3) The slightest of head nods toward repair accountability

The National Highway Performance Program (NHPP) is the largest highway-focused program that states have control of. Within this program, states will have to develop and maintain a state asset management plan. Under BUILD, any state that fails to develop and implement its asset management plan will see the federal share for projects within NHPP drop down to just 65 percent. While that sounds like a move in the right direction, there are no requirements that states set or meet binding, positive targets on repair. That’s not going to cut it.

UPDATE: This 65 percent provision already existed in current law. The updated language makes some small changes to how USDOT will assess compliance, but this is not a notable change in the BUILD Act. – Ed. 6/17/2026

4) Reconnecting Communities is functionally dead

This bill completely eliminates the Neighborhood Access and Equity Grant program, which was best understood as the authorized, long-term version of the Reconnecting Communities pilot program, which technically ended this year. This likely means the end of federal money spent on repairing divisive infrastructure, and the end of a program T4America helped create back in 2020. 

The concept of Reconnecting Communities survives as a project eligibility within a new grant program (STAG) that would replace the BUILD competitive grant program. (Yes, this is confusing. The BUILD grant program is the one formerly known as TIGER and RAISE.) But considering that this administration canceled nearly every single unobligated Neighborhood Access and Equity grant project, it’s unlikely that any reconnecting-style projects would win funding in this new grant program under this administration. The Senate should resuscitate this program, and there was an amendment offered during the markup to restore the Reconnecting Communities program and rename it.

Safety over speed

While there are a few changes that could be perceived as small improvements to safety policy, the program fails to make improving safety a centerpiece priority across the entire program and will do very little to reverse the U.S.’s roadway safety crisis. (Read more about this T4America principle)

5) Safe Streets for All local grant program survives

Perhaps the best news in this entire bill is the survival of the Safe Streets for All (SS4A) grant program, which is only available directly to cities and local communities (including tribes) for projects to make concrete changes to their streets to improve safety.  SS4A’s survival is good news for safety, and it was also moved into the highway title of the bill and given guaranteed funding through contract authority, sparing it from future appropriations fights.  In IIJA, 40 percent of SS4A funds were (likely mistakenly) set aside for planning, and one of the eligible uses was for quick-build demonstration projects. The BUILD Act reduces that set-aside to a much more rational 5 percent. That might seem too low, but considering how much money has been put into planning over the last five years, it’s time to pour more money into implementation and actually building projects to improve safety.

The bad news is that the program is roughly half the size it was during the IIJA, and all mentions of Vision Zero were eliminated. And we’re putting a lot of faith in a program that has already been weaponized by this USDOT. USDOT has selectively canceled SS4A grants they didn’t like and also changed the criteria to let applicants know they won’t select projects that make people safer by removing parking or repurposing lane space. This USDOT wants to improve safety with SS4A grants, as long as those improvements don’t come at the expense of their other, higher priorities. 

6) States aiming for more people to die on their roads have to inform the Secretary

Under our weak system of measuring performance, numerous states have routinely set targets for more people to be injured/killed on their roadways. These targets have been posted publicly on FHWA’s website, but the BUILD Act makes a subtle change to require the Secretary to notify Congress when states do it in the future. But there will continue to be no penalty for setting these regressive targets, and Congress has not shown any appetite to create actual accountability for reducing roadway deaths. But it will be harder for Congress to claim they didn’t know that states were aiming for such bad performance. 

Invest in the rest 

While the BUILD Act increases guaranteed funding for highways, guaranteed transit funding is going down. There are a few changes to provide some modest flexibility to use capital dollars for operations, but there are none of the dramatic increases in transit capital or operations funding on par with what it would truly take to invest in the rest and build a world-class transit system. (Read more about this T4America principle.)

7) Guaranteed highway money is going up while transit is decreasing. 

IIJA provided an historic increase in guaranteed funding for highways and transit. That’s only the case for highways this time around. 

Though the bill’s authors are quick to note that transit contract authority is increasing over IIJA levels, the guaranteed amount for transit is actually going down, thanks to the loss of advance appropriations. Transit goes from $91.2 billion in guaranteed funding in the IIJA down to $87.6 billion in BUILD. Highways, meanwhile, jump from $351 billion up to $376 billion in guaranteed funding. This also means that transit is dipping below its typical 20 percent share of the overall bill. The 80/20 split has often fluctuated slightly above or below that 20 percent threshold, but the decrease is still notable.

8) Changes to the transit capital program…which is currently frozen by the Trump administration

No one should be celebrating any positive changes in the program for building and expanding transit systems, considering that it has been ground to a halt by the current administration. The bipartisan authors in the House have failed to recognize this reality nor have they done anything in this bill to attempt to require this administration to follow the law and administer this program in this new five-year proposal.

There are some changes to streamline transit capital project delivery, including rewarding transit agencies that have recently navigated the federal process successfully with a speedier process. Likely recognizing the increasing costs of bus rapid transit projects and other “Small Starts” projects, BUILD raises the funding threshold for these projects up to $1 billion (with a 50 percent max federal share) and changes their name to Streamlined Starts. The law would broaden the eligibility for Core Capacity projects, which could make it possible for projects to do things like investing in automation to increase throughput on a busy rail line. And transit projects in the pipeline can receive extra credit in the evaluation process for local policies in favor of housing development near transit. 

On the negative side, the IIJA-created program for procuring low- and no-emission buses is toast.

9) A new focus on transit safety, crime, and fare evasion

There’s a significant new focus on transit safety and fare evasion—both with funding set aside from transit formulas, but also in new policy requirements. 

Instead of just one percent, urban agencies will be required to spend 1.5 percent of their transit formula funds on a wide range of eligible transit safety and security projects, including fare evasion prevention, new technology, and new police officers. Agencies have to start gathering and reporting data to FTA on how much money they are losing to fare evasion, and there are requirements for making fare evasion a criminal or civil offense. There are no penalties for the states or cities that continue building streets and roads that ensure that anyone’s walking trip to transit might be the most dangerous part of their journey.

10) Passenger rail loses out big time

After $66 billion guaranteed in IIJA for rail, the BUILD Act provides zero dollars in guaranteed funding for passenger rail and reduces authorized spending below IIJA levels, while making some marginal improvements around rail permitting and Amtrak accountability, and logically combining several programs. 

The result of losing the guaranteed funding means that Congress will have to do something it didn’t have to do over the last five years: consider every year whether or not it will provide the authorized amounts of rail funding. Policy improvements aside, the rail title overall decreases federal investment in passenger rail and is a step back. We expect the Senate Commerce Committee to take a different approach.

The bill was approved by the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee on a 66-2 vote in the wee hours of Friday morning. Stay tuned on the blog for more on the law and the next steps.

The post Ten things to know about the BUILD Act’s failure to produce better outcomes appeared first on Transportation For America.

The backstory 

During the first Trump administration, T4America’s Stuck in the Station raised the alarm about USDOT failing to advance transit capital expansion projects for which Congress was appropriating billions of dollars. During that time, USDOT publicly insisted they were faithfully advancing transit projects, but by 2018, USDOT had awarded less than 20 percent of the $2.3 billion Congress had appropriated for this specific purpose. “Future investments in new transit projects would be funded by the localities that use and benefit from these localized projects,” they said when defending their request for zeroing out the program in the president’s budget back in FY18.

After embarrassing hearings and public events where the FTA administrator had to answer for the slowdown, warnings from the Government Accountability Office that they were running “the risk of violating federal law,” and the unprecedented move by Congress of requiring FTA to obligate 85 percent of the transit capital program funds by the end of 2019, the administration finally relented and started signing grant agreements late in the first term. 

This time around, the Trump administration appears to be taking that hostility to a new level by tapping some novel mechanisms to achieve the same ends.

Considering the sorry state of transit in this country before these slowdowns and how the lack of quality transit affects mobility, the economy, and access to opportunity, alarm bells should be ringing big time on Capitol Hill. Consider the state of U.S. transit, via Yonah Freemark at the Urban Institute:

In 1990, 4 of the world’s 14 longest metro networks—or those that include monorail, subway, elevated, and automated light metro—were located in the United States. Today, not a single U.S. network sits on that list. Over the past few decades, the U.S. has not expanded its urban railway systems to keep up with population growth. Compared with other wealthy nations, where transit is much more available, a smaller share of our population has easy access to a subway or elevated station. Without transit alternatives, most Americans have little choice but to drive expensive, polluting cars. And those without access to a car might not have a safe, reliable way to get around. The lack of investment in urban rail contributes to the high carbon dioxide emissions from the U.S. transport sector. It’s also left people in the U.S. spending a large share of their income on transportation, as many Americans struggle with the high costs of living.

As oil prices have continued to climb and new cars are reaching astronomical prices, the administration has responded by making electric cars more expensive, seizing the ability for cities to decide how to keep people safe on their streets and roads, and, as we will chronicle here, slowing down badly needed new transit projects. 

Some quick background on federal transit funding: 

Broadly speaking, transit gets federal dollars in two ways:

1) The most consistent source is annual formula dollars from the Highway Trust Fund (specifically the Mass Transit Account), which are used for capital expenses like buying new railcars or buses, making track upgrades, upgrading electrical equipment, or repairing/upgrading other aspects of hard transit infrastructure. Larger transit agencies get this money directly each year based on their population and levels of transit service, while smaller agencies might get it through their state DOT. But this money is not sufficient to cover the kind of big capital expenditures involved in building new transit service. To support these kinds of projects, money comes from… 

2) The transit Capital Investment Grants program, which comes from discretionary spending each year. The five-year authorization (like the IIJA) sets the basic levels, but unlike the trust fund formula money that flows automatically, appropriators in Congress have to set aside this money each year. There are three types of projects: New Starts for big multi-year projects, typically light or heavy rail; Small Starts, typically for bus rapid transit projects; and Core Capacity for doing things like costly capacity expansions on existing transit lines. 

Transit agencies apply and then wind through a (too long, complicated, and onerous) process within FTA to tick a million boxes and receive a grant agreement in which USDOT agrees to give X transit agency Y amount of dollars over a certain number of years to cover a share of the costs—typically no higher than 50 percent but more often closer to 30 or 40 percent. (Contrast that with the 80-90 percent of highway costs that are covered by the feds.)

The money appropriated by Congress each year is always intended to cover a mix of 1) payments for multi-year projects already approved by FTA, and 2) a suite of new transit projects expected to be approved for construction and funded over the next year. 

And this is where new problems are starting to arise.

An unprecedented slowdown in transit construction grants

The Trump administration is the first administration in at least three decades to fail to approve a new transit project in its first year, as noted back in early March by Yonah Freemark for Urban. Since taking office in January 2025, USDOT has not signed a single full-funding grant agreement for a new metro, light rail, or bus rapid transit line. This is even slower than their progress in the first term. 

While it may be true that transit projects are just simply not ready to sign an agreement and proceed to construction, it’s hard to believe that not a single project was ready to go over the last 14 months. It’s also important to remember that successfully shepherding projects through the federal process quickly and successfully is FTA’s mission.

Tracking the “pipeline” of projects

USDOT is required by law to issue a report by February (which is always late) detailing the ratings for all transit capital projects in the pipeline, a list of projects with recommended funding amounts, and an overview of the program’s next three years. It’s incredibly striking to see the evolution in the detail FTA provides in this annual report to Congress over the last few years.

Here’s what the detailed page of projects and budget requests looks like in the report from the last year (FY25) of the Biden administration, for which they requested a total of ~$4 billion for the upcoming fiscal year to cover five ongoing projects with full funding agreements, plus five new New Starts projects and ten Small Starts projects slated for approval—mostly BRT projects.  (p. 4 in the March 2024 report)

We would compare that to the same page in this year’s FY27 report from Trump’s USDOT, but it doesn’t actually exist. This is what the comparable page looks like from this year’s report: 

Just by comparison, even in last year’s report—the first issued after taking office—the administration was requesting a typical amount of money for projects likely to be getting approved: 

• $1.4b for existing New Starts grant agreements, and $2.4 billion for new grant agreements for New Starts, Core Capacity, and Small Starts transit capital projects “that may become ready for a construction grant agreement” in the year ahead. They even listed 15 separate projects that may become ready.

Fast forward a full year later, after not signing a single grant agreement or awarding a single dollar of that $2.4 billion to any of those 15 projects, here’s their request for the upcoming fiscal year from this year’s report:

• “$1.202 billion for existing FFGAs and other projects that may become ready for construction funding during FY 2027”

Keep in mind that Congress has now appropriated nearly $6 billion for advancing these transit projects. $1.2 billion—their request for the year ahead—is basically what is needed to fulfill their existing contractual agreements to ongoing projects with grant agreements. While they mention “projects that may become ready for construction,” they are requesting only enough money to fulfill current obligations.

New strategies to stonewall transit projects 

Despite the polarization, Congress has continued to provide USDOT with billions for transit construction each year. But this is where some of the newer shenanigans are emerging. 

Even though Congress has appropriated more than $6 billion for ongoing and new transit capital projects, the Office of Management and Budget has employed a new strategy of apportioning only a fraction of that amount. (Simply put, apportionment means transferring it into the USDOT bank account.) While it’s relatively normal for OMB to make available only what’s needed for payments in any given year, or even by month, in this case, they’re holding back far more than is normal. 

Without those funds available to them, USDOT couldn’t approve a new transit project if it wanted to.

Though Congress was expecting USDOT to spend roughly $2.4 billion on new projects expected to sign a grant agreement during this current fiscal year, OMB has sent (apportioned) just $500 million more than the $1.2b they owe to ongoing projects. That means OMB is stonewalling $4.9 billion that Congress has appropriated. While OMB may just be holding onto those funds until USDOT is ready to approve a project or shifting them into the next fiscal year, it could also represent a new tactic for stalling out new transit expansions for the duration of this administration. 

If USDOT doesn’t sign grant agreements, there are points of pressure that Congress can tap, as they did back in 2018-2020. But if USDOT doesn’t have the money available in its bank account, that’s another thing entirely. This issue has been popping up elsewhere, as it’s become a new form of rescissions from the administration. 

It certainly appears that the administration is laying the groundwork to stop all transit capital construction in this program.

Is Congress asleep at the switch?

It’s been fairly shocking to share these developments on Capitol Hill and be met with looks of surprise from various offices. Members should be livid, raising the alarm on another way that the administration is flouting Congress’s duly passed laws and budgets. Instead, Democrats on the House transportation committee are rolling ahead to support a reauthorization proposal that will look a lot like the expiring IIJA—at the precise moment that the administration is failing to faithfully implement the existing bipartisan bill, and their negotiating partners on reauthorization are silent about it.

Why strike a bipartisan deal when it’s only your priorities that get cast aside the next day? Why negotiate in good faith with those who are not doing the same?

It’s time to call a few committee hearings, send some letters to USDOT, and mandate more information about the progress of transit projects in the pipeline. Congress needs to wake up and remember that they make the laws, and the executive branch implements them. If they allocate money to advance and approve new transit projects, that needs to happen, or someone at USDOT needs to explain why it’s not.

The truth is that when transit projects get artificially slowed down by bureaucrats and political appointees in Washington, it’s not the political opposition that pays the price. It’s the taxpayers who have to pay inflated costs for needlessly delayed projects, and the riders who have to wait for new or expanded transit service that will improve connections and access where they live—those who are again going to be stuck in the station.

The post USDOT’s historic failure to advance any new transit projects in 14 months may be a sign of things to come appeared first on Transportation For America.