Bicycling Scores Big In New Federal Transportation Act

IMBA Trail News
Volume 11, Number 3
July-August 1998

Recreational Trails Funding More Than Doubles

by Gary Sprung

"TEA21 is a big son of a gun by any standards... huge increases for everything from roads to bikes, from buses to traffic signals and from planning to preservation.... the TEA21 legislation preserves and even advances ISTEA's emphasis on a more balanced transportation system ... It continues increased investment in public transit, and bicycle and pedestrian modes."
-- Hank Ditmar, Surface Transportation Policy Project

We won. The "we" is the national community of bicycling and alternative transportation advocates. The win is the inclusion of expanded pro-bicycling provisions in the six-year federal transportation act passed by Congress on May 22 and signed into law on June 9.

The Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century, dubbed "TEA-21," boosts federal spending on highways, transit, and alternative transportation -- a solution which satisfies the many varying interests lobbying Congress. It includes a 40% increase for the Transportation Enhancements program, which financed about a billion dollars in bicycling and pedestrian facilities during the six years of the previous ISTEA program.

For mountain bicyclists, the most direct benefit comes through more dollars to the National Recreational Trails Fund, and authorization for that money to be disbursed yearly without special acts of Congress. In the ISTEA program, the NRTF lacked "contract authority," so Congress had to specifically appropriate funds each year.

For a few years, the NRTF appropriation amount was zero. Now, the program will receive $30 million this year -- twice as much as in previous years -- and will increase to $40 million in Fiscal Year 1999, and to $50 million annually in FY 2000 through FY 2003. That money is divided into three pots: 30% goes to motorized recreational trails, 30% to non-motorized, and 40% to multi-use trails which may or may not include motorized. The NRTF money, like most federal transportation funds, is distributed to states based on formulas. Mountain bike activists who wish to tap into this now bountiful pot of federal cash need to work through their state governments, usually the parks and recreation departments.

The NRTF has faced minor threats from environmental groups, particularly the Western Ancient Forest Campaign, which worries about motorized users invading roadless areas. But that interest group had a difficult time being heard amongst the huge volume of lobbyists, local and state governments, and big time transportation companies all trying to influence an 800-page act which spends over $200 billion.

Much more threatened was the Enhancements program, which many pro-highway interests view as an illegitimate use of gasoline taxes, the funding source of the whole system. Truckers, highway construction companies and their education and trade associations in Washington had urged elimination of Enhancements. Their message came as a call for "flexibility" in the spending. They wanted to give states the right to divert spending from specified Enhancements projects to highways. Since most state transportation departments are strongly pro-highway, this probably would have gutted the program. The final act largely preserves the limitation on spending. It does allow 25% of the increase in Enhancements to go to highways, but this will amount to a small percentage of the spending.

Another key victory was the defeat of anti-railbanking provisions. Several bills had been introduced which would have degraded or eliminated the ability of state and local governments and non-profit trails groups to convert abandoned railroad grades to trails. Most of these anti-trails proposals died in committees, but Senator Sam Brownback's (R-KS) amendment to give local governments the power to veto railtrail conversions, did pass the U.S. Senate. The conference committee which reconciled the Senate and House versions of TEA-21 did not include the measure.

Three more programs merit attention here. The Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality Improvement Program -- CMAQ -- was enlarged to $1.5 billion per year. Some of that money can be spent on bicycling/pedestrian projects, but it takes diligent effort by bike advocates to translate that authorization into on-the-ground facilities. A new program called Transit Enhancements calls for transit agencies in urbanized areas with populations over 200,000 to spend one percent of their federal transit dollars on activities such as bus shelters, public art and landscaping, bike storage at transit stations, and bike-on-bus racks. Again, cyclists need to work with local agencies to get the money programmed to bicycling. Finally, Congress authorized $500,000 per year for Bicycle and Pedestrian Safety Grants to fund education and dissemination of information by Bicycle Federation of America and others.

Much credit for these successes goes to the Bikes Belong! campaign. This effort was financed by major contributions from the bicycle industry, and it brought together IMBA, Rails To Trails Conservancy, League of American Bicyclists, Bicycle Federation of America and other groups. The 18-month grassroots campaign paid off.

Meanwhile, cycling activists remain aware of two considerations which temper enthusiasm: First, bicycling remains a tiny fraction of transportation spending, and public transit continues as a small percentage; most money goes to roads. Second, the policy and spending victories of TEA-21 now require major implementation efforts at state and local levels. So we all have our work cut out for us!