By Legislative Committee, WTS-DC 
July 2023 

Passing the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL) and Inflation Reduction Acts (IRA) were landmark policy accomplishments for the Biden-Harris Administration. However, now the United States Department of Transportation (USDOT) and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg are racing against political time constraints to realize successful outcomes from BIL and IRA within the term. 

We've certainly seen that push in the grants arena. In recent months, funding from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL) and the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) have begun flowing into the industry at a more rapid pace, with USDOT announcing ten highly visible Notices of Funding Opportunity since the start of 2023. USDOT is also pushing forward to achieve their rulemaking initiatives before rulemaking slows to a crawl due to the infamous "fall of an election year" deadline. As such, USDOT has sought public comment on many policies and will continue releasing Notices of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) and Requests for Comment (RFC) in the coming months. Key proposals that are currently open for comment are described below.

• New Car Assessment Program (NCAP), RFC: The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration requests feedback on proposed updates to NCAP by July 25, 2023. NCAP provides comparative information on vehicle safety performance. The proposed NCAP updates provide consumers with safety information about vehicles' ability to protect pedestrians, potentially incentivizing manufactures to produce vehicles that better protect vulnerable roadway users. The RFC does not propose a comparative rating system for crashworthiness pedestrian protection.
• Review of the Civil Aviation Noise Policy, RFC: The Federal Aviation Administration request feedback by July 31, 2023 on four considerations of its civil aviation noise policy, which is the policy that establishes how FAA analyzes, explains, and publicly presents changes in public exposure to civil aviation noise. To briefly summarize, the four considerations relate to the effects of noise exposure, FAA's standard noise metric, the threshold of significant noise exposure, and levels below which land uses are considered "normally compatible" with airport operations.

Key proposals that are recently closed for comment are described below.

• Public Transportation Agency Safety Plans (PTASP), NPRM: The Federal Transit Administration requests feedback on proposed updates to PTASP by June 26, 2023. PTASP requires certain transit operators to develop Agency Safety Plans that include processes to adopt a Safety Management System. The proposed PTASP updates include the establishment of a Safety Committee, a safety risk reduction program, safety performance targets for risk reduction programs, and de-escalation training for certain transit workers, among other proposals.
• Environmental Review Implementation Funds, Request for Information: The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) requests information by June 1, 2023 on how to best facilitate the Environmental Review Implementation Funds provision of IRA. The funds may be made available to eligible entities to support environmental reviews of surface transportation projects and may be used by FHWA to develop tools and assistance to facilitate efficient and effective environmental reviews. 
• Crash Preventability Determination Program (CPDP), RFC: The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration requests feedback on proposed updates to CPDP by June 12, 2023. CPDP reviews crash types to identify not preventable crashes and prioritize interventions for unsafe carrier and driver behavior. The proposed CPDP updates include modifying existing crash types to broaden eligibility, differentiating some types for improved reporting, and using the collected data to identify ways to reduce crashes involving non-motorists.