T4America Blog

News, press releases and other updates

Posts Tagged "project selection"

Choosing transportation projects that actually match our priorities

Transportation for America recently wrapped up a year of work with six metro areas to direct their transportation dollars to projects that help them achieve their goals and become the kinds of places they aspire to be.

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Maryland’s governor is fighting a more objective process for choosing transportation projects

While other states and regions across the country are using new tools to evaluate potential transportation projects and pick the ones that offer the best return for taxpayer money, Maryland Governor Hogan and his administration are staunchly opposing similar new policies that add accountability and transparency to that process.

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Virginia approves its first transportation plan based on a new system of scoring and prioritizing projects

Today Virginia’s Commonwealth Transportation Board approved the first set of transportation projects selected and prioritized through the state’s new scoring process to objectively screen and score them based on their anticipated benefits. The newly renamed SMART Scale directs $1.7 billion to 163 projects across the state.

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Maryland attempting to bring accountability & transparency into process for selecting transportation projects

Maryland is attempting to join the growing movement of states trying to ensure that transportation projects are selected and built on their merits in a more transparent process. T4America testified today in favor of a bill that would move the needle in that direction.

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Update: North Carolina legislature adjourns without addressing political meddling in transportation selection process

The NC legislature adjourned their session without fixing a damaging cap on state funds intended for a Triangle area light rail project. Their widely decried actions circumvented a new bipartisan state process for evaluating transportation projects on the merits and awarding state funds to the best projects, intended to be free from political meddling.

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Politicians meddling with North Carolina’s shift to a merit-based process for choosing transportation projects

Just two years after instituting a new process to choose transportation projects based on merit and award funds in a more transparent process intended to be free of political interference, a handful of North Carolina legislators reinserted politics back into the process in an attempt to stop a light rail project in the Raleigh-Durham metro area.

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Louisiana legislature makes a paradigm shift to better prioritize transportation dollars and restore public confidence

Raising new state funds for transportation can be a tough sell, especially if taxpayers don’t have any faith in the process for spending the money already available. Making that process more transparent, accountable and understandable can be a smart first step to increase public support for raising new transportation funding — one hope behind a bill in Louisiana that cleared the state House and Senate by unanimous votes last week.

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