On September 14, the FTA announced $25M in transit planning grants through the Route Planning Restoration Program — a new planning grant program created by the American Rescue Plan Act. As many urban transit agencies were forced to cut service during the COVID-19 pandemic in response to escalating operational costs, the Route Planning Restoration Program aims to help agencies bring riders back to transit through thoughtful route design and service planning. Transit agencies are specifically tasked with tackling route planning activities that will increase ridership and reduce travel times or make service adjustments to increase the quality or frequency of service provided to low-income riders and disadvantaged communities.
The federal match for these projects is 100% and maximum grant funding is $1,000,000 per project. Only organizations that receive 5307 funding (urban area transit agencies with populations over 50k) are eligible to apply. You can find the Notice of Funding here for more details. At Via, we are invested in helping transit agencies plan, operate, and optimize the ideal network to meet their communities’ needs. We worked with our partner agencies during the early days of the pandemic to make smart service adjustments and maximize the impact of their transit spending, and are excited to offer tools and expertise that can help any agency welcome transit riders back into revitalized networks.
Remix’s planning tools enhance route and service design evaluations, allowing you to use data to make data-driven decisions. By providing over 50 Census layers out of the box, and the flexibility to bring in your ridership and local transportation data, Remix allows for insightful data analysis with a few clicks. With a renewed toolkit for equity analysis and stakeholder engagement, Remix allows agency staff to collaborate with local partners and community members in a transparent, easy-to-understand way.
Additionally, Remix's smart planning tools can help agencies model greenhouse gas emissions, a priority area for the Route Planning Restoration program. Our Via Strategies consulting team can help you with a service redesign project from start to finish, whether you’re considering fixed route changes or a microtransit service. Via Strategies has guided over two hundred partners through complex service planning exercises and feasibility studies.
If you’re interested in using either Remix or Via Strategies as part of your Route Planning Restoration Program grant application, please reach out to partnerships@ridewithvia.com. We’d love to help you through the application process and on the project itself. Applications are due on November 15th.
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