• Improved Bike/Ped bridge for the Ohio River!

• Freight Rail Improvents in Appalachia!

Everyone's favorite stimulus program, the TIGER grants, have been released today. The grant process was very competitive, with $60 billion of requests for a scant $1.5 billion of funding. The great thing about TIGER is that the money is not pidgeon holed for a single mode of travel (e.g. roads), but rather competitive based on benefit/cost analysis across all modes. So you see freight rail projects competing with highway projects competing with sidewalk improvement projects.

Update: No, its not the Big 4 ... added fresh info on the Big 4 below the fold...

The bridge from Kentucky to Madison, IN will be renovated, and new bike/ped facilities will be added. Having biked that narrow, long two-lane bridge this summer, I can testify that many will welcome dedicated accomodation across the Ohio River. According to David Karem's C-J editorial, the Big 4 project put in a similar request, but sadly it didn't make the cut.

And in Appalachia there will be a number of improvements to RJ Corman short-line railroads. According to TIGER, these railroads deliver "aluminum, sand, and chemicals". I wonder if "coal" is a chemical? Anyway, its nice to see investment in our freight rail system. Its the most energy efficient overland transportation system. This will keep trucks from tearing up our highways, and save the taxpayer money quite quickly.

Sadly, the Paducah and Louisville Railroad was not as lucky, and did not recieve the funding it was seeking to rebuild the Muldraugh trestles. These are essential to hopes of running commuter rail from Louisville to Ft Knox and Elizabethtown. We hope congress considers a robust second round of TIGER funding in the jobs bill now under consideration.