President Obama’s Fiscal Year 2011 budget is a step forward for transportation options and livable communities and contains $1 billion in programs and grants to help turn this positive vision into reality.

In this budget, the President and his advisers attempt to thread a needle between the urgency of unemployment and the longer-term implications of debt. Given these realities, it is gratifying that Obama chose to boost funding on transportation and livability as other programs face cuts. It shows that his team gets it. They understand that investing in the neighborhoods and communities of tomorrow can both create jobs and lay the foundation for future prosperity. Indeed, that dual purpose has been a theme of Obama’s domestic agenda throughout 2009.

The administration had signaled a new path last year with its creation of the Partnership for Sustainable Communities, a joint effort among the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Department of Transportation. The administration recognized that making transportation choices, affordable housing and economic opportunity available to more Americans requires real collaboration among these key agencies. The partnership is on track to receive $830 million in the FY 2011 budget.

The budget also allocates $1 billion for high-speed rail, on top of the $2.5 billion in the current year’s budget and $8 million in grants from the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

Here are few other programs and pilots worth mentioning:

• $4 billion for the National Infrastructure Innovation and Finance Fund
• $150 for the Sustainable Communities Initiative, including an inter-agency research effort on the transportation and housing linkage
• $150 million for Catalytic Investment Competition Grants, a competitive program to support job-creation and large scale projects in disadvantaged areas
• $527 million for the Livable Communities Program
• $32 million for the Healthy Communities Initiative

This is a budget praise-worthy for both the help it delivers today and the investment ushered in for tomorrow. It deserves our support.

Washington, D.C. — James Corless, Director of the Transportation for America campaign, today issued a statement in support of President Barack Obama’s anticipated nomination of Victor Mendez for Federal Highway Administrator:

“Victor Mendez is a good choice to serve in this critical role atthe FHWA as our country is faced with some of the biggest challenges and opportunities for our transportation system since the 1950’s. Mr. Mendez is an experienced transportation hand and will be a valuable partner in the effort to build a 21st Century transportation system that works for the people who use it.

Transportation for America — a coalition of housing, environmental, equal opportunity, public health, urban planning and transportation organizations committed to moving America into the 21st Century by building a modernized infrastructure — stands ready to support President Obama, Secretary LaHood and Victor Mendez in any effort to help navigate this unprecedented opportunity.”