WASHINGTON, D.C. (October 15, 2021) – This week, on behalf of its 1,500 public- and private-sector member organizations, the American Public Transportation Association (APTA) provided written comments to FTA Administrator Nuria Fernandez on its Request for Information (RFI) concerning the Capital Investment Grants (CIG) Program. In response to the specific questions that FTA asked in the RFI published on July 15, 2021, APTA, on behalf of its members, supplied a detailed response to each of 19 questions.
“APTA strongly supports the CIG program, and we are grateful for the opportunity to provide this input. We appreciate that FTA is seeking feedback from the industry and all interested parties and is considering a myriad of ways that the CIG program and processes could be improved…. As APTA considers ways to improve the CIG program and processes, we urge the agency to undertake a zero-based review of all CIG requirements,” said APTA President and CEO Paul P. Skoutelas. “We are also excited that FTA’s RFI suggests that the CIG program expand ways for FTA to consider issues of equity, access to opportunity, human health, and other ways that transit can improve the lives of Americans.”
In conjunction with the submission of these comments, APTA also released a robust update of its dashboard of CIG projects in the Federal Transit Administration’s program pipeline. The dashboard includes all CIG projects in the pipeline, their differing stages of project development, and the amount of funds allocated for each project – with a link to each current project profile, as updated by FTA. This important advocacy tool shows the unmet need that remains for current CIG projects and how much funding remains available by project type. Currently, the CIG Project Pipeline includes 67 projects totaling almost $28 billion of unmet CIG funding.
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The American Public Transportation Association (APTA) is a nonprofit international association of 1,500 public- and private-sector organizations which represent a $80 billion industry that directly employs 448,000 people and supports millions of private sector jobs. APTA members are engaged in the areas of bus, paratransit, light rail, commuter rail, subways, waterborne services, and intercity and high-speed passenger rail. This includes: transit systems; planning, design, construction, and finance firms; product and service providers; academic institutions; transit associations and state departments of transportation. APTA is the only association in North America that represents all modes of public transportation. APTA members serve the public interest by providing safe, efficient and economical transit services and products.