On February 12, the US President Donald Trump has released his legislative goals to rebuild country’s infrastructure which envisages USD 200 billion in federal funds to be invested in the next decade. This will spur at least USD 1.5 trillion in infrastructure investments with partners at the state, local and private level.
Of the USD 200 billion, USD 100 billion will create an Incentives Program to boost additional dedicated funds from states, localities, and the private sector. Applications for the Incentives Program will be evaluated on objective criteria, with creating additional infrastructure investment being the largest factor.
USD 20 billion will be dedicated to the Transformative Projects Program, which will provide federal aid for bold and innovative projects that have the potential to dramatically improve America’s infrastructure. The same sum (USD 20 billion) will be allocated to expand infrastructure financing programs.
President’s plan also calls for major reforms to the federal permitting process. Administration’s infrastructure proposal will shorten and simplify the approval process for infrastructure projects, proposing the establishment of a “one agency, one decision” structure for environmental reviews.
Commenting on the budget, the American Public Transportation Association said that the USD 200 billion investment for infrastructure would be paid for by cutting funding for critical public transport infrastructure programmes including the Capital Improvement Grants (CIG), Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery programme (TIGER), and Amtrak, in the Fiscal Year 2019 budget. “This would be a big mistake and counterproductive to fostering prosperous communities,” APTA said.
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