title
FY21 RAISE Grant - Planning
end
|
DESCRIPTION: Grant application for federal funds to plan and design safe, reliable, and fast transit corridors |
AGENDA NO: Click or tap here to enter text. |
|
ACTION REQUEST: ☒ Approval ☐ Review Comment ☐ Information Only ☐ Other |
RECOMMENDATION:
recommendation
Authorize the Chief Executive Officer to seek federal funds in the amount not-to-exceed $2,400,000.00, to study, identify and design improvements to critical transit corridors to reduce high-incident crashes and unreliability. The local match is not-to-exceed $600,000.00 and the total project amount will be a maximum of $3,000,000.00.
end
ISSUE/BACKGROUND:
body
As identified RTA’s 2017 Strategic Mobility Plan, “Access to Destinations” and “Reliability” are the most important values for all rider types. In addition, fast and frequent service is the most important strategy desired by all riders. The start of that work was New Links, adopted in March 2021 by RTA Board of Commissioners with implementation of the bus network redesign underway.
While New Links recommendations will go a long way to improve connectivity and access, the project specifically designed those recommendations assuming no change in existing transit operating conditions and stopped short of improvements to roadways, boarding’s, turning conflicts and other physical elements affecting safety, capacity, spend and reliability. That work is a part of a series of actions in the SMP (BR9-12) and is the primer for development of High Capacity Corridors (action item CO1) that are frequent and fast. Increasing reliability and speed has also been shown in many case studies to improve the on-time performance and ridership.
end
DISCUSSION:
The RTA staff is requesting $2.4 million in federal funding for planning and design of a program of improvements for transit corridors with the goal of improving safety, reliability, capacity, and speed of the system in high-value/high-need corridors. The proposal for the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity (RAISE) Grant program will provide funding to allow the agency to conduct a detailed study of the extensive existing data available to understand patterns of consistent hazard and unreliability and develop and design a program of improvements to address them.
This project will take the next step to improve transit operating conditions. First, the project will develop an adapted methodology, specific to the New Orleans region, for estimating bus and streetcar safety, capacity, speed, and reliability. Next it will assess the impact of transit safety and preferential treatments (e.g. signal priority, transit-only lanes, and reduced/controlled vehicle turning) and other transit capacity improvements (e.g. stop design) on high frequency corridors identified in New Links and SMP plans and high-incident crash corridors. The final program will be complimentary to fare technology modernization (separate project pursuing other grant opportunities) as major leaps forward in reliability and world-class service. The RTA will work with its transportation partners the RPC, the City of New Orleans, Jefferson Parish and Louisiana Department of Transportation & Development to identify community-vetted, preferred alternatives. The final stage will be design of PA treatments and improvements to corridors and associated plans necessary for construction.
FINANCIAL IMPACT:
The RTA will be responsible for the local match if the grant is awarded. That amount is a not-to-exceed of $600,000.00.
The program of improvements will be designed to substantially increase the operating speed, safety and reliability of busses and streetcars which reduces the number of vehicles required to provide the same frequency of service. The project will estimate the amount of savings in platform hours anticipated by the improvements - savings that can then be reinvested in more service throughout the system when constructed/implemented.
NEXT STEPS:
This grant application is due to FTA on July 12, 2021.
ATTACHMENTS:
Resolution
Prepared By: Dwight Norton, dnorton@rtaforward.org
Title: Sr. Director of Strategic and Long-Range Planning
Reviewed By: Lona Edwards Hankins, lhankins@rtaforward.org
Title: Deputy CEO Planning and Infrastructure
Reviewed By: Gizelle Johnson Banks
Title: Chief Financial Officer
6/17/2021
Alex Wiggins Date
Chief Executive Officer