USDOT announces $900 million in FY2019 BUILD grant awards

(Source: Progressive Railroading 11/13/19)

U.S. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao announced $900 million in federal grants will be awarded to 55 surface transportation infrastructure projects in 35 states under the fiscal-year 2019 Better Utilizing Investments to Leverage Development (BUILD) Transportation Discretionary Grants program.

The grants were awarded on a competitive basis to projects with a significant impact on their local or regional communities, U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) officials said in a press release.

“The [Trump] administration is targeting BUILD Transportation grants to repair, rebuild, and revitalize significant infrastructure projects across the country,” said Chao, who announced the awards yesterday at a press conference in Florida.

BUILD funding supports roads, bridges, transit, rail, ports or intermodal transportation.

Rail-related projects and their grant funds include:
• Phoenix Sky Harbor Northside Rail Expansion, $24 million. The project involves construction of a 2.3-mile trench to lower freight-rail tracks and eliminate five grade crossings on the Sky Harbor Airport’s north side. Twenty-fourth Street will extend over the trench to provide a new grade-separated access.
• Ala Moana Boulevard pedestrian bridge in Honolulu, $20 million. The project calls for constructing a bridge to connect Ala Moana Beach Park and Kewalo Harbor to Ward Village, the Ala Moana Center and the future Ward transit-rail station.
• Multimodal corridor expansion and improvement project, $18 million, awarded to the Port Beaumont Navigational District in Jefferson County, Texas. The project calls for reconstructing condemned wharves 2, 3 and 4 at the Main Street Terminal 1, adding 16,000 linear feet of new rail track and realigning and upgrading 4,275 feet of existing track at the Buford Rail Yard Interchange. The project also will replace a deteriorated grain dock.
• Southern Illinois Multimodal Station, $14 million, for the construction of a new multimodal transportation facility in downtown Carbondale, Illinois.
• Rail-truck transload facility project at the Spokane Airport, $11.3 million. The project calls for constructing a new rail-truck transload facility for train loading, offloading and circulation at the airport in Spokane, Washington.

A full list of the awards is available via this link.