Feds award $85 million Mega Grant to Tulsa corridor
The U.S. Department of Transportation on Tuesday announced it is awarding Oklahoma an $85 million transportation grant, the largest in state history, for reconstruction of the Interstate 44/ U.S. 75 corridor in Tulsa.
The project, currently in the first phase of construction is among nine chosen for $1.2 billion in Mega Grants being awarded under the 2021 infrastructure law.
“This is exciting and welcome news for the Tulsa area and the state of Oklahoma,” said Tim Gatz, Oklahoma transportation secretary. “I-44 and U.S. 75 are vital travel, freight and commuter corridors across the state, and this Mega Grant will help us complete much needed safety and operational improvements at this highly traveled interchange.”
The application for the Tulsa grant by the Oklahoma Department of Transportation described recurrent congestion and poor safety along the I-44/U.S. 75 corridor that makes travel through the state-designated “critical urban freight” corridor difficult.
Travel delays and unreliable travel times also affect supply chains and reduce access to job opportunities. By reducing crashes and travel delays and improving travel time reliability, this project will eliminate a freight bottleneck and expand access to jobs.
The Mega Grant will help fund three phases of already scheduled construction projects around the interchange. The three projects total $205 million in improvements, including:
h Completing the flyover ramps.
h New bridges at the Arkansas River, W 51st Street and W 61st Street.
h A new U.S. 75 frontage road.
h Improvements to Skelly Drive. The Mega Grant award does not include a $10 million federal Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity grant that U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg announced during a visit to Tulsa in August 2022. The RAISE Grant will fund related work to reconnect W 51st Street under U.S. 75, including sidewalks.
The improvements support replacing and upgrading the most outdated, unsafe, and congested elements of Tulsa’s I-44 corridor that carries almost 150,000 vehicles, including about 21,000 trucks, on a typical day. Safer modes of travel for cyclists and pedestrians also will be included with new sidewalks along W 51st and 61st streets, 49th W Avenue, and Skelly Drive; a new pedestrian bridge over railroad tracks connecting with Tulsa’s River Parks Trail; and bike lanes on W 61st Street.
The Mega Grant program, created by the infrastructure law, funds projects that are too large or complex for traditional funding programs. Oklahoma transportation officials say the $85 million won’t accelerate completion of the Tulsa corridor, but it will allow previously allocated funding to go toward other projects.
President showcases New York’s Hudson Tunnel project
President Joe Biden showcased the grants Tuesday with a trip to New York City, where a $292 million Mega Grant
will be used to help build a new rail tunnel beneath the Hudson River between New York and New Jersey.
The stop was part of a broader effort to draw a contrast between his economic vision and that of Republicans. He pledged that government spending on infrastructure will boost economic growth and create bluecollar jobs.
The New York stop also gave Biden a chance to highlight his administration jumpstarting a project that languished during President Donald Trump’s time in office. The years-long modernization of the Hudson project started in 2013 but stalled as Trump battled with Democratic Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer over funding for the project.
“This is one of the biggest the most consequential projects in the country,” Biden said. “But we finally have the money, and we’re going to get it done. I promise we’re going to get it done.”
The New York and Baltimore trips amount to a form of counterprogramming to the new House Republican majority. GOP lawmakers are seeking deep spending cuts in exchange for lifting the government’s legal borrowing limit, saying that federal expenditures are hurting growth and that the budget should be balanced.
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., and Biden are scheduled to meet on Wednesday, with the Republican lawmaker intending to press his case for spending cuts even though White House officials say Biden won’t negotiate over the need to increase the federal debt limit.
“I don’t think there’s anyone in America who doesn’t agree that there’s some wasteful Washington spending that we can eliminate,” McCarthy told CBS News on Sunday.
Mitch Landrieu, the White House senior adviser responsible for coordinating implementation of the infrastructure law, told reporters on Tuesday that if Republicans are looking to “take away money from projects, they ought to, I think, identify which projects they don’t want.”
“And then you can have that discussion with the American people,” Landrieu added.
Other projects to receive mega grants include the Brent Spence Bridge, which connects Kentucky and Ohio; the Calcasieu River Bridge replacement in Louisiana; a commuter rail in Illinois; the Alligator River Bridge in North Carolina; a transit and highway plan in California; and roadways in Pennsylvania and Mississippi.