Today, President Joe Biden and U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg announced $10,269,074 for the state of South Carolina for projects through the Reconnecting Communities Pilot and Neighborhood Access and Equity discretionary grant programs as part of President Biden’s Investing in America Agenda.
The funding is aimed at reconnecting communities that were cut off by transportation infrastructure decades ago, leaving entire neighborhoods without direct access to opportunity, like schools, jobs, medical offices, and places of worship.
Thanks to additional funding from the Inflation Reduction Act, this investment is 18 times larger than the investments from the previous year’s standalone Reconnecting Communities Pilot Program. Both programs are part of the President’s Justice40 Initiative.
“While the purpose of transportation is to connect, in too many communities past infrastructure decisions have served instead to divide. Now the Biden-Harris administration is acting to fix that,” said U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg. “Today we are proud to announce an unprecedented $3.3 billion to help 132 communities deliver better infrastructure that reconnects residents to jobs, health care, and other essentials.”
In this round of funding for the Reconnecting Communities Pilot and Neighborhood Access and Equity program, South Carolina received two grants. Awarded projects include:
- $10,109,074 for Dave Lyle Boulevard Pedestrian Bridge in Rock Hill – Dave Lyle Boulevard is a five-lane, state-owned, arterial roadway constructed in the mid-1970s that runs from Rock Hill’s downtown, through Rock Hill’s largest economic hub, and underneath Interstate 77. Railroad tracks owned and operated by Norfolk Southern Corporation run parallel to Dave Lyle Boulevard. These two facilities bisect Rock Hill’s downtown, disconnecting the area at a crucial location. A previous connectivity study engaged local businesses, community partners, residents and individual leaders and identified barriers, outlined feedback from stakeholders, and recommended a course of action – construction of a pedestrian/cyclist bridge over Dave Lyle Boulevard and the parallel railroad tracks. This bridge will run perpendicularly across Dave Lyle and the railroad tracks, between White Street and Main Street, and will be fully ADA accessible and available for use by both pedestrians and cyclists.
- $160,000 for Downtown Fort Mill Mobility and Parking Plan in Fort Mill – The Downtown Fort Mill Mobility and Parking Plan proposes a comprehensive transportation plan to identify and address existing transportation barriers within the Town of Fort Mill’s Downtown District. Central to this plan is addressing the railroad tracks that bisect the town’s downtown area, and remedying other obstacles in accessing the area, such as increased traffic due to population growth rate, increase in crashes involving vulnerable road users, and assess parking conditions. The Town of Fort Mill’s proposed study will include a safety analysis of crashes, assessment of the pedestrian network (including ADA accessibility), parking assessment and inventory, parking utilization analysis, and review of current policies, ordinances, and adopted plans.
The full list of Reconnecting Communities Pilot and Neighborhood Access and Equity awards can be viewed here.
