T4America Blog

News, press releases and other updates

Smart Cities Collaborative hits the ground running in year two

Returning in a bigger fashion than the first year with 23 cities instead of 16, our Smart Cities Collaborative picked up where we left off with the launch of year two last week in Denver, CO.

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The TIGER program is no more….in name

The TIGER grant program is now being called BUILD. While the criteria are essentially the same, there’s one big caveat. Under BUILD, USDOT will now require applicants to provide evidence that they have secured and committed new, non-federal revenue for projects requesting funding. And there’s a whole list of reasons why that’s a problem.

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Hawaii can reach their clean energy goals with the help of smarter growth and land use

Ten years ago, Hawaii set ambitious goals to reduce their dependence on imported oil and create a clean energy future by 2045. To meet those goals, Hawaii must pair electrifying their vehicle fleet and increased renewable energy with smarter land use.

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On National Walking Day, too many Americans are still having to endure unsafe streets

While we missed recognizing National Walking Day last week while the Complete Streets conference was happening in Nashville, we wanted to come back this week and revisit a post from 2012 looking at what’s actually keeping more people from walking in many of our metro areas.

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Three communities selected to receive training to help improve transportation projects through arts & culture

Transportation for America is pleased to announce that Bozeman, Montana; Buffalo, New York; and Mariposa County, California have been selected to receive State of the Art Transportation Trainings. These three communities will each receive tailored technical assistance to equip them to utilize arts, culture and other creative approaches for solving specific transportation problems.

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Investing in transit fuels local economies across the country

Last week, we traveled to Indiana to bring Republican Rep. Jackie Walorski together with one of the 60 companies in her working-class district who build components for public transportation systems across the country, demonstrating how the public dollars devoted to transit support thousands of manufacturing jobs in communities all across the country.

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How should cities price access to their curb spaces and right-of-way?

The second year of our Smart Cities Collaborative—which launched today—will examine how emerging technologies and new mobility options are reshaping the right-of-way and curb space via four key topics. Our fourth and final post covering these topics is about how pricing strategies can be employed in service of a city’s long-term outcomes.

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22 communities selected to participate in the second cohort of T4America’s Smart Cities Collaborative

Transportation for America (T4America) announced today the 22 communities selected to participate in the second cohort of the organization’s Smart Cities Collaborative program that will continue exploring how emerging technologies and new mobility options can improve urban transportation. Over the coming year, the Collaborative will once again bring together cities to cooperatively tackle the challenges related to implementing smart mobility policies and projects.

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TIGER grants focus on rural areas, recognize the value of complete streets, and ignore transit

Just a month after the Trump administration proposed a budget that would eliminate the competitive TIGER grant program entirely next year, the US Department of Transportation announced the winners of this year’s awards. This year’s winners show a clear shift in priorities — this round is decidedly rural or small town in nature and nearly devoid of transit projects. However, the winners also show that this administration recognizes how smaller-scale complete streets projects bring tremendous value to local communities.

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Senate Democrats’ infrastructure plan provides more funding, but as with the president’s plan, it fails to prioritize repair & maintenance

press release

Upon the release of the Senate Democratic Jobs & Infrastructure Plan, T4A Director Kevin F. Thompson released the following statement:

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Smart cities proactively manage their partnerships to drive long-term outcomes

The second year of our Smart Cities Collaborative will tackle how new technologies and new mobility are reshaping the right-of-way and curb space via four key topics. Our third post in a series on these four topics examines how cities can develop public-private partnerships and use curb management strategies to drive long-term outcomes.

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Over 50 cities applied to join the second year of our smart cities collaborative

Over 50 local governments from nearly 20 states applied to join the second year of our Smart Cities Collaborative, a forum for collaboration and direct technical assistance to cities advancing smart mobility policies and projects.

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Eight things to know about the president’s budget and infrastructure plan

After promising the release of an infrastructure plan since the early days of his administration over a year ago, President Trump finally released his long-awaited plan for infrastructure investment. Since he did it on the same day he released his budget request for the next fiscal year, it’s worth considering them together and asking: what do these proposals mean for infrastructure?

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The infrastructure plan that cuts infrastructure funding

After the release of the Trump administration’s long awaited infrastructure plan yesterday (along with the administration’s FY19 budget request), Beth Osborne, vice president of technical assistance at T4America, joined CBC News to talk about some of the issues with the plan in particular.

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“One cannot claim to invest in infrastructure while also cutting it”—T4 statement on President Trump’s infrastructure proposal and 2019 budget request

press release

Upon the release of the president’s infrastructure plan and his budget request for FY19, T4America Director Kevin F. Thompson offered the following statement:

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Decarbonize the city, a few blocks at a time

Today, we’re releasing the second episode of Building Better Communities with Transit: “Decarbonize the city, a few blocks at a time.” This month we explore a new smart city concept taking shape in Denver, CO: Peña Station Next.

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Helping cities use data to measure progress and outcomes

The second year of our Smart Cities Collaborative will tackle how new technologies and new mobility are reshaping the right-of-way and curb space via four key topics. Our second post in a series on these topics examines the concept of using data to measure progress and outcomes.

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Catch up with the launch discussion of our new guide for improving & expanding transit

Catch up with yesterday’s launch webinar for T4America’s new guidebook, Fight for Your Ride: An advocate’s guide for expanding and improving transit, which offers tangible ways to improve transit in your city and region.

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Fight for your ride: An advocate’s guide for expanding and improving transit

This new guide offers local advocates and transit champions practical advice for making real improvements to public transit.

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Webinar recap on State of the Art Transportation Training

Catch up with our webinar on new creative placemaking technical assistance workshops This past Tuesday, Ben Stone, T4America’s Director of Arts & Culture, and Patricia Walsh, Americans for the Arts’ Public Art Program Manager, spoke about our upcoming State of the Art Transportation Training. During the webinar we discussed the opportunity for three communities in […]

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