Infra Insight Blog

Imagine you are sitting in your car at a traffic signal. The signal turns green and you begin to accelerate. Without you doing anything, your car suddenly screeches to a halt as another car runs a red light and whizzes past. Your car, equipped with sensors and an array of wireless connections, was able to communicate with other vehicles and the surrounding infrastructure to avoid collision. If your car had not stopped, you would have been involved in a serious accident. According to a recent plan released by the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT), this is exactly the type of ...

On September 23, 2024, the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky issued an Opinion and Order in Mid-America Milling Co., LLC, et al., v. U.S. Department of Transportation, et. al., No. 3:23-CV-00072-GFVT, 2024 WL 4267183 (E.D. Ky. Sept. 23, 2024), granting a preliminary injunction on the basis that the race- and gender-based rebuttable presumptions used in the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) Disadvantaged Business Enterprise (DBE) program violates the United States Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection under the Fourteenth Amendment. ... 

The U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) recently announced a long-awaited Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) for public agencies to enhance technical capacity to deliver projects using a public-private partnership (P3) model. Authorized by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (P.L. 117-58; also known as the IIJA), $57.72 million is available through the Innovative Finance and Asset Concessions Grant Program (Program) for public agencies to hire technical, financial and legal experts (either on staff or as consultants) to support the evaluation and delivery ...

The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (P.L. 117-58; IIJA) expanded the scope of the Buy America preference by requiring that all construction materials, iron and steel, and manufactured products used in federally supported infrastructure projects be produced in the United States. Prior to the IIJA, Buy America requirements did not apply to construction materials.

The federal government began implementing the new requirements earlier this year, beginning with the Office of Management and Budget’s implementation guidance, followed by the U.S. Department of ...

As anticipated by project sponsors and industry participants, the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) issued a temporary waiver of Buy America requirements for construction materials on May 19, 2022.

The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) expanded the applicability of Buy America and required the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to promulgate guidance extending the current Buy America requirements regarding iron and steel and manufactured products to include construction materials, as well. OMB issued initial IIJA-implementing guidance effective ...

The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act or “IIJA” (P.L. 117-58) passed on a bipartisan basis in both the House and Senate and was signed by the President one month ago today, on November 15, 2021. One could have assumed that federal agencies would begin allocating the new funding and commence implementation of the IIJA as soon as it became effective. Unfortunately, that is not the case, but for reasons that may not be readily apparent.

The federal government is actually constrained in its ability to implement the IIJA because it is currently funded and operating under a ...

Have you ever wished there was a comprehensive, easily accessible project cost database for major US transportation projects?  It would be populated following an in depth review of information available from State DOT’s and would capture not just the capital cost of the project, but it’s operation and maintenance cost and delivery and financing approach.  The information could be valuable in many ways, including assessing the project performance outcomes for P3’s and non P3’s.

As I found out a couple of weeks ago at the Transportation Research Board annual meeting, there ...

Sponsors of critical maritime transportation projects received welcome news this week, as the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) published a Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) for America’s Marine Highway Projects. This notice makes available roughly $7 million in recently-appropriated funds for the Short Sea Transportation Program (46 U.S.C. § 55601), commonly referred to as America’s Marine Highway Program (AMHP).

The U.S. Maritime Administration (MARAD) is in charge of this important, but perhaps not well-known, program:  The America’s Marine Highway ...

The United States has the largest emerging public-private partnership (P3) market in the world for infrastructure projects. Due to decreased tax revenue and shrinking budgets, many state and local governments in the southern United States have embraced alternative methods of project delivery. Public entities in the southern United States boast some of the most extensive P3 experience in the U.S. and it dates back to before the turn of the century with the Pocahontas Parkway in Virginia, Texas, and Florida pioneering several complex P3s.

Public officials and industry partners ...

On Tuesday, May 16, 2017 the Senate’s Committee on Environment and Public Works Subcommittee on Transportation and Infrastructure will hold a hearing titled Leveraging Federal Funding; Innovative Solutions for Infrastructure.

The stated purpose of the hearing is for Senators to examine the need for more public sector funding and private sector financing in the Federal Highway Program.  To this end, the Subcommittee has scheduled the following individuals to testify on this topic:

• Eric Garcetti (Mayor, City of Los Angeles; Chair of U.S. Conference of Mayors Infrastructure ...

The U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) is calling for project applications for $850 million in transportation infrastructure grants, representing the second opportunity for funding from a program that has already received tremendous interest from public project sponsors and the infrastructure community. The grants, announced in a Notice of Funding Opportunity posted on the USDOT website on October 28, find their genesis and funding authorization in the FAST Act (P.L. 114-94), which President Obama signed into law on December 4, 2015.

The FAST Act created a ...

Last month, the United States Department of Transportation (USDOT) formally unveiled its Build America Transportation Investment Center (BATIC). BATIC’s mission is to:

• Expand the use of federal transportation credit programs;

• Innovate new approaches to project development processes and funding challenges and institutionalize technology and best practice across credit programs and modal teams; and

• Deliver streamlined technical and financial assistance to accelerate project delivery

BATIC is intended to serve as a single point of contact for project sponsors to obtain ...

Earlier today, President Barack Obama released his approximately $4 trillion budget proposal for Fiscal Year 2016, which begins on October 1 of this year.  While the President’s proposed budget covers everything from defense to diseases, he has included a particularly ambitious proposal for transportation.

The President’s proposed budget provides $94.7 billion in funding for the Department of Transportation (US DOT), covering infrastructure development and safety enhancement in highways and bridges, transit, railroads, and aviation.  The President is proposing a ...

On September 17, the House Transportation & Infrastructure Committee’s Panel on Public-Private Partnerships (P3s) released its report and recommendations.  The group, empaneled in February of this year, was tasked with examining issues regarding public-private partnerships across all aspects of the Committee’s jurisdiction.  The panel held two hearings and seven roundtable discussions in addition to other meetings and briefings. The report recognizes that the nation’s infrastructure needs are extraordinary and P3s in certain situations can provide innovative ...

Victor Mendez, Acting Deputy Secretary at the U.S. Department of Transportation, participated this morning in a Bloomberg Government panel entitled America on the Move: Investing in U.S. Infrastructure. In a wide-ranging discussion, he addressed the issue of long-term funding for U.S. infrastructure.

He commented that there is a need for many funding options and we need the private sector in the mix. The TIFIA program has been successful, financing 40 or so projects so far with the private sector, many of them toll roads.  Some of the projects are very long term, up to 50 years.

Mendez ...

The U.S. Department of Transportation is looking to hire a new Director of the Office of Infrastructure Finance and Innovation.

The Office of Transportation Policy is responsible for recommending overall surface transportation policy initiatives to the Secretary as well as reviewing all proposed Department of Transportation (DOT) rulemakings, legislation, testimony and reports to Congress.  Additionally, the office is responsible for reviewing economic analyses of air safety regulations, reviewing airport infrastructure programs, and planning air freight ...

In anticipation of the US federal shutdown which occurred on October 1st, this year, the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) on September 27th outlined its shutdown plan, which includes furloughs for more than 18,000 of its approximately 55,000 employees.

The various agencies within USDOT have been impacted differently by the shutdown, depending on the extent to which their activities are funded through the federal government’s annual appropriations process, which lapsed this year and resulted in the current funding gap that caused the shutdown.

The shutdown’s ...

This morning, U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) Secretary Anthony Foxx announced the winners of the fifth round of the Department’s highly competitive Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery (TIGER) discretionary grant program.  From 585 applications requesting more than $9 billion, USDOT selected 52 transportation infrastructure projects in 37 states that will receive a total of $474 million. 

Notable grants awarded today include more than $9 million to the Michigan Department of Transportation for its Kalamazoo to Dearborn passenger rail ...

Following up on our previous post regarding the uncertainty surrounding the application of Buy America requirements to utility relocations, the United States Department of Transportation (USDOT) has recently released two documents that provide further clarification on the matter.

On July 11, 2013, USDOT circulated an internal memorandum to Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) Division Administrators and the Directors of Field Services acknowledging that the broadened application of Buy America has created implementation issues for the utility industry and caused ...

Showing concern for the TIFIA JPO’s slow pace of credit approvals for major US transportation, on July 24, 2013, the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works conducted an oversight hearing on the implementation of the TIFIA Program following MAP 21’s expansion of the program almost a year ago.  We are aware of only one project that has received credit approval in that time frame.

Geoff Yarema, a partner in the Infrastructure Practice Group and a member of the National Surface Transportation Infrastructure Financing Commission, provided testimony today at the hearing.

In ...

In addition to taking testimony from public agency project sponsors and industry leaders during the July 24, 2013 oversight hearing on TIFIA conducted by the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, the Committee heard from the Secretary of Transportation, Anthony Foxx, regarding the U.S. Department of Transportation’s (USDOT) implementation of the TIFIA Program since the July 6, 2012 enactment of MAP-21. 

While touting the overall success of the TIFIA program and detailing USDOT’s efforts to move projects through the TIFIA pipeline, Secretary Foxx also announced ...

The U.S. Department of Transportation announced Monday that it is making $474 million in financing available through its transportation investments grant program pursuant to the Full-Year Continuing Appropriations Act, 2013 (Pub. L. 113-6, March 26, 2013).  The appropriation is similar to the appropriation for the TIGER program and USDOT will continue to refer to the program as ‘‘TIGER Discretionary Grants.’’ As with previous rounds of TIGER, funds for the FY 2013 TIGER program will be awarded on a competitive basis for projects that will have a significant impact on the ...

As part of its effort to meet MAP-21’s legislative requirement to develop standard public-private partnership transaction model contracts for the most popular types of public-private partnerships, the Federal Highway Administration held a listening session with representatives from the transportation industry at the U.S. Department of Transportation in Washington D.C. on January 16.  Representatives from state departments of transportation, general contractors, trade associations, legal advisors and others were in attendance, and solicited to provide FHWA with the ...

The U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) announced a much-anticipated fourth round of funding for USDOT’s popular TIGER Discretionary Grants program, totalling $500 million for capital investments in surface transportation infrastructure.

Pre-applications must be submitted by Feb. 20, 2012 and final applications must be submitted by March 19, 2012.  Previous rounds of competitive TIGER grants were heavily over-subscribed.  The last round attracted 848 applications with funding requests for $14.29 billion, while USDOT awarded funds in December 2011 for 46 capital ...

This morning, U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) Secretary Ray LaHood announced the winners of the extremely competitive TIGER III grant application cycle.  Forty-six projects in 33 states will share $511 million in grant funds.  The announcement was made several months earlier than the originally scheduled date.

As has been the case with the previous two rounds of TIGER grants, this cycle was wildly oversubscribed.  According to the announcement, USDOT received 848 project applications from all 50 states, Puerto Rico, and Washington, DC, requesting a total of $14.29 ...

U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood plans to name Karen J. Hedlund as Deputy Administrator at the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA).  Hedlund moves to the Deputy Administrator position from her current role as Chief Counsel at FRA, replacing Karen Rae, who Gov. Cuomo recently appointed as New York State Deputy Transportation Secretary.  Before moving to FRA, Hedlund served as Federal Highway Administration Chief Counsel from June 2009-June 2010, where she helped implement the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, including new investments in highway ...

As discussed in a previous blog post, the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) recently set new level-entry boarding requirements for disabled passengers on intercity and commuter railroads through amended regulations implementing the Americans with Disabilities Act (76 Fed. Reg. 57924).

In the proposed rule, USDOT stated its intent to require passenger railroads to provide level-entry boarding at all new or altered station platforms, unless the passenger railroad could show that level boarding was infeasible.  In the final rule, USDOT retained the level-boarding ...

In a recent move that will have wide-ranging impact on the rail industry, the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) set new level-entry boarding requirements for the access of passengers with disabilities to passenger railroads, applicable to new and altered station platforms where construction or alteration begins on or after March 2, 2012.  Through a final rule promulgated on September 19, 2011, USDOT amended its Americans with Disabilities Act regulations to require intercity and commuter passenger railroads to provide that disabled passengers can access any passenger ...

USDOT’s TIFIA Office is hiring a new lead negotiator/financial policy advisor and a financial analyst.  Both positions are based in Washington, DC, and applications are due September 21st. 

The ideal candidate for the lead negotiator position will be a senior finance expert who has negotiated transportation finance and/or infrastructure project finance credit agreements as practiced in domestic and international capital markets.

For the financial analysts role, the ideal candidate is a mid-level professional with experience in the financial operations and practices of ...

Monday, U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood announced an additional $2 billion in High-Speed Intercity Passenger Rail Program funding, bringing the total awards for the program to $10.1 billion.  USDOT distributed the $2 billion to 22 projects in 15 states, but three big winners together received over $1.8 billion or about 90 percent of the additional money.

We said we will roll out our view of the big winners on three successive days, in reverse order.  On Monday, we explained why we think California is the third biggest winner in this latest round of funding. Yesterday, we ...

As discussed in yesterday's post on California, three big winners have emerged from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s announcement of $2 billion in federal funds to 15 states for 22 different high-speed and intercity passenger rail projects.  The second biggest winner of this funding round is the Midwest region.

Illinois received $186 million for upgrades and improvements to the Chicago – St. Louis corridor between Dwight and Joliet, Ill., to allow trains to operate at 110 mph (from 79 mph) and increase operational flexibility and reliability.  Also on the Chicago – St ...

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Today U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood announced an additional $2 billion in High-Speed Intercity Passenger Rail Program funding, bringing the total awards for the program to $10.1 billion.

The $2 billion awarded today by the Department of Transportation was largely redistributed from initial awards to Florida, whose governor canceled the state’s high-speed rail project due to concerns about cost overruns and operating subsidies.  DOT distributed today’s funds to 22 projects in 15 states, but three big winners together received over $1.8 billion or ...

The fiscally conservative House majority continues to pursue reductions in federal spending, and federal transportation spending is part of the mix.  Further use of the general fund to supplement the Highway Trust Fund motor fuel taxes, as well as increases in fuel taxes, are opposed by the House majority.  Cuts could come in several forms, including cuts in Title 23 programs overall or cuts to specific programs.

Given the diminishing role of the Highway Trust Fund in funding future transportation investment, federal credit assistance under the TIFIA program needs to grow in ...