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| Cates Landing’s loss is other recipient’s gain |
By: John Brannon, Staff Reporter
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Posted: Wednesday, February 24, 2010 8:47 pm
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By JOHN BRANNON
Staff Reporter
The City of Indianapolis, Ind., won approval of a $20 million federal grant to help build a downtown walking track.
But an application from Tennessee for a $35 million grant to help build the Cates Landing riverport project near Tiptonville was rejected.
The Messenger asked Jake Falk, an official in the U.S. Department of Transportation, to explain the seeming disparity.
“Well, the department felt the City of Indianapolis’ plans to provide greater mobility for their downtown area was a worthwhile investment creating jobs and providing for long-term economic growth for the City of Indianapolis,” he said.
Falk, acting director of the Office of Infrastructure Finance and Innovation, headed a team that decided who got what in a total of $1.5 billion TIGER discretionary grants.
Falk characterizes the team as “an evaluation task force that includes technical and professional representatives from within the department.”
TIGER, an acronym for “Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery,” was created by Congress in 2009 as a discretionary program in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.
Last year, the federal transportation department solicited applications for the TIGER funds. The Northwest Tennessee Port Authority submitted an application for $35 million on behalf of its Cates Landing project.
Jobs
How many jobs will a walking track project in Indianapolis generate?
“Probably none,” said Jimmy Williamson, chairman of Northwest Tennessee Port Authority, the nonprofit agency that is building the riverport.
And how many will the Cates Landing project generate?
“Between 300 and 400 during construction, over an 18-month period. After that, our study shows 2,000-plus jobs will be created,” Williamson said.
Walking track?
Falk said the Indianapolis walking track is not a walking track at all, but a plethora of improvements to downtown streets, sidewalks, road repairs and crossings.
“I don’t know the exact details,” he said. “But I think it would create a lot of local jobs in terms of the street repairs that are required. I am not able to come up with on-the-spot answer to that, but myunderstanding is that these types of downtown urban repairs, including all the pedestrian facilities, would create jobs.”
Frustration
“We have spoken to a lot of people who are frustrated (over these grants),” Falk said. “There are a number of states that did not receive any funding at all (for their proposed projects). We had to make a lot of difficult decisions. There were a lot of good projects. There were any number of projects that didn’t have letters opposing them. We got letters of support for almost all of them.
“We would have loved to have provided funding. But at the end of the day, $1.5 billion was just not enough.”
Round 2
Alas, all is not lost, Falk assured The Messenger. A second round of grants is waiting in the wings — $600 million this time — and Williamson and company can apply. “It’s included in the 2010 appropriations bill. We’re getting ready to put out solicitations on it. The funds will be awarded sometime this year,” he said.
Big winners
According to the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Web site, here are some of the awardees of the TIGER grants:
• California. Four grants totaling $129 million.
• Tucson, Ariz., $63 million for its “Modern Streetcar” program.
• Illinois.
Chicago. $100 million.
Granite City. $6 million. The project involved construction of a public harbor on the Mississippi River that will be used for barge loading and unloading.
• Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Maryland collectively. $98 million for a national gateway freight rail corridor.
• Louisiana. Full funding, $45 million for the Union Passenger terminal/Loyola Loop.
A share
According to Nicole Lawrence of the Tennessee Department of Transportation public information office, Tennessee was included in two TIGER grants.
The total grant is $105 million, of which Tennessee gets $52.5 million.
“It’s for construction of a new intermodal transfer facility in Memphis that is part of Norfolk Southern’s Crescent Corridor,” she said. “Also, Tennessee shares a $17.5 million grant with Kentucky and West Virginia for the Appalachian Regional Short Line Rail Project. Our share is $2.8 million.”
Published in The Messenger 2.24.10
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