U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx announced $500 million will be made available for transportation projects under an eighth round of the Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery (TIGER) competitive grant program.
Like the first seven rounds, FY 2016 TIGER discretionary grants will fund capital investments in surface transportation infrastructure and will be awarded on a competitive basis.
The 2016 TIGER grant program will continue to make transformative surface transportation investments by providing improvements over existing conditions. The grant program will focus on capital projects that generate economic development and improve access to reliable, safe and affordable transportation for communities, both urban and rural.
Since 2009, TIGER has provided nearly $4.6 billion to 381 projects in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, including 134 projects to support rural and tribal communities. During the previous seven rounds, the U.S. DOT received more than 6,700 applications requesting more than $134 billion for transportation projects across the country.
The TIGER grant program supports transportation projects, including multi-modal and multi-jurisdictional projects, which are difficult to fund through traditional federal programs. These federal funds leverage money from private sector partners, states, local governments, metropolitan planning organizations and transit agencies. The 2015 TIGER round alone is leveraging $500 million in federal investment to support $1.4 billion in overall transportation investments.
