California Puts its Money Where its Mouth is on Active Transportation!

After working over the past several years with our partners to increase funding for the Active Transportation Program (ATP)–the state’s dedicated source of funding for walking, bicycling, and Safe Routes to School projects–the adoption of SB 1 earlier this year effectively doubled the size of the ATP with a boost of $100 million annually.

To get SB 1’s first two years’ of new funding awarded to ATP projects as quickly as possible, the California Transportation Commission (CTC) launched a supplemental call for projects this summer, dubbed the 2017 ATP Augmentation,  to get funding to shovel-ready projects right away. The ATP Augmentation allowed projects awarded last year in ATP Cycle 3 to “advance” funds–meaning walking/biking projects would be implemented much sooner than originally planned–as well as for projects that had applied for ATP Cycle 3 last year but were unawarded to have another shot.

We’re happy to report that the 2017 ATP Augmentation has resulted in 17 projects recommended for advancement and 53 new projects for funding in the Statewide component and 5 projects for advancement and 9 new projects for funded in the Small Urban/Rural component (CTC staff recommendations here and here). All told, $98.2 million and $18.5 million will be invested in previously unawarded ATP projects in the Statewide and Small Urban/Rural components, respectively.

We are also thrilled to see the Rexland Acres Community Sidewalk project we helped pull togetherrecommended for advancement–allowing Kern County Public Works to build sidewalks and create safer crossings for residents as early as next year, a full two years earlier than the original awarded timeframe.

We would like to thank Senator Beall for his leadership on getting increased investments to the ATP and the CTC staff for working overtime to get this new funding out the door in record time.