$13.5M in federal funding awarded for road safety improvements

The Massachusetts Department of Transportation announced on Feb. 11 that the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Safe Streets and Roads for All grant program has awarded $13.5 million to Massachusetts to improve roadway safety.

The federal grant program was established by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (also known as the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law), with approximately $5 billion in appropriated funds to be awarded over the next five years.

Grant funding can be used to improve roadway safety by supporting communities in developing comprehensive safety action plans, conducting data analyses, and implementing projects and strategies that seek to significantly reduce or eliminate transportation-related fatalities and serious injuries. Funding can also be used to support stakeholder engagement to ensure that all community members have a voice in developing plans, projects and strategies.

Massachusetts recipients of this round of SS4A funding are:
• Barnstable County: $476,800 for planning and demonstration activities
• Braintree: $192,000 for development of a comprehensive safety action plan
• Brookline: $540,000 for local planning and demonstration activities
• Dedham: $300,000 for local planning and demonstration activities
• Freetown: $96,000 for roadway safety improvements on Chase, Gurney and Braley roads
• Franklin Regional Council of Governments: $487,200 for demonstrations of safe crossing treatments in town centers in Greenfield and Deerfield
• Leicester: $280,000 for the town’s safety action plan and a high-injury network intersection demonstration
• Leominster: $328,000 for the city’s Vision Zero and Safe Streets For All action plan
• MBTA: $2.2 million for phase two of the Mobileye Shield + Collision Avoidance demonstration
• Merrimack Valley Planning Commission: $896,640 for community safety planning and advancing Vision Zero around Route 28
• Metropolitan Area Planning Council: $5 million to accelerate road safety innovation in the Boston area
• Newton: $144,000 for a multimodal improvements demonstration in Waban Village Center
• Southeastern Regional Planning and Economic Development District: $2.4 million for municipal planning and demonstration subgrant partnership
• Ware: $160,000 for local planning and demonstration activities