Infra Insight Blog

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 projects totaling $511 million.

USDOT did not make many substantive changes in this week's notice to the TIGER application and selection process as compared to previous TIGER funding rounds.  Authorizing legislation for this round allows for an amount not to exceed $175 million of the $500 million total to be used to pay the subsidy and administrative costs for a project receiving credit assistance under the Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act of 1998 (TIFIA) program.  Applicants for these TIGER TIFIA payments must submit a TIGER application and a separate TIFIA letter of interest.

USDOT will also specifically make up to $100 million in TIGER funds available to high speed and intercity passenger rail projects, which have fallen out of favor in Congress but remain an Obama Administration priority.

More detailed information can be found in USDOT’s Notice of Funding Availability published in the Jan. 31, 2012 Federal Register.