Wins and Disappointments from the ‘Reconnecting Communities’ Grants – America Walks
By Ben Crowther
The latest round of Reconnecting Communities and Neighborhoods Grant Program (RCN) awards announced last week underscores the need for a transformational infrastructure bill that puts communities before highways. There are several transformative projects among this year’s recipients, but the majority are smaller fixes and few deal directly with the root cause of disconnection: highways and big roads.
This year, the amount of funding available for the Reconnecting Communities and Neighborhoods Grant Program was bolstered by the Neighborhood Access and Equity Grants (a program of the Inflation Reduction Act), to a total amount of $3.3b.
USDOT made the decision to allocate all of the Neighborhood Access and Equity Grants in one go, so next year funding is back down to 2022 levels. This means the majority of federal funding dedicated to repairing the harms of previous transportation planning, particularly those done to Black and brown communities and lower-income communities, has now gone out the door.
So in what should be a banner year for reconnecting communities, do the selections address historic injustices and build new infrastructure that promotes walkability and multimodal access for underserved communities?
