The U.S. Dept. of Transportation has awarded $1 billion in grants for improvements to roadways, streets and other infrastructure to prevent highway deaths and injuries in communities around the U.S.
The grants, which DOT announced on Sept. 5, will go to 354 projects and plans in cities, suburbs, rural areas and tribal communities.
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U.S. DOT Secretary Pete Buttigieg said in a Sept. 4 media call to preview the funding announcement that the grant-winning projects include redesigning intersections and improvements to sidewalks, streets, crosswalks and bike lanes.
The funds continue the DOT's rollout of funds from the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. The landmark legislation includes $5 billion over five years for the Safe Streets and Roads for All (SS4A) program.
To date, the DOT has awarded $2.7 billion for SS4A grants.
Grantees include Memphis, Milwaukee
Also on the media call was Memphis, Tenn., Mayor Paul Young, whose city won a $13.1-million grant to make improvements at what he called the city's “most dangerous intersection” and “the No. 1 location for crash frequency in the city.”
Young said of the new grant, “This is a big deal for the people of Memphis.”
The city plans to close one of the three roads at the six-way intersection, simplify the intersection’s geometry and operation and install a new traffic signal and facilities for pedestrians, as well as new green spaces.
Among the largest grants in the latest round is $25 million to the city of Milwaukee for planning, design and construction for two miles of busy Center Street. The corridor now has wide lanes for motor vehicles, but narrow, unprotected bike lanes. According to the DOT, the corridor also has "parking lanes that many drivers use to recklessly pass on the right."
Planned "safety interventions" include adding fully separated bike lanes, as well as curb extensions and raised intersections.
Another $25-million grant went to the City of Long Beach, Calif., to add two miles of protected, sidewalk-level cycle track, eight new pedestrian crossings and additional transit stops, plus other improvements.
The DOT said that it received 529 applications in the new round of S4S4 grants for a total of $2.6 billion. The DOT awarded slightly more than $1 billion to the 354 proposals selected.
Of the total selections, 70 are for implementation grants for safety projects and programs; 284 are for planning and demonstration activities.
DOT said it expects to announce the winners of its final 2024 SS4A round in November.
There has been some improvement in reducing highway fatalities, but Buttigieg said much more progress is needed.
Along with the SS4A grants, DOT also announced its latest quarterly early estimates of traffic fatalities. They show that deaths declined 3.2 % in the first half of 2024, to 18,720. It is the ninth-consecutive quarterly decrease in that key benchmark.
Still, Buttigieg said the number of traffic fatalities “is really at a crisis level in this country, comparable to gun violence in terms of the number of lives that we lose.”
