$25M in federal funding awarded for roadway safety improvements

Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll announces $25 million in grant awards from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Safe Streets and Roads for All grant program in Lynn on Sept. 9. (Photo courtesy Joshua Qualls/Governor’s Press Office)

State and local officials gathered in Lynn on Sept. 9 to celebrate the award of $25 million from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Safe Streets and Roads for All grant program to improve roadway safety.

The federal grant program was established through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, with approximately $5 billion in appropriated funds to be awarded over the next five years.

Grants were made to 10 municipalities, as well as the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Agency and the Metropolitan Area Planning Council. Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll joined U.S. Deputy Transportation Secretary Polly Trottenberg, Congressman Seth Moulton, and Lynn Mayor Jared Nicholson for the announcement.

Trottenberg said the USDOT is “proud to have found a formula that works for a large federal program that is helping solve a national safety problem by working at the local level, in partnership with local leaders and community members.”

The SS4A program funding awards 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.

The following are the Massachusetts recipients of this round of SS4A funding:
• Abington: $301,804 to conduct supplemental planning and demonstration activities, such as traffic calming and crossing treatments
• Boston: $3.5 million to update the city’s Vision Zero Plan and conduct demonstration projects to pilot ways to improve safety on streets in East Boston
• Clinton: $356,204 to develop a comprehensive safety action plan and conduct demonstration activities
• Fitchburg: $423,795 to develop a comprehensive safety action plan; develop an ADA transition plan; and deploy high-visibility crosswalks, curb extensions with flex posts, pedestrian scale lighting, and ADA curb ramps along priority roads lacking infrastructure for vulnerable road users
• Haverhill: $743,778 to implement temporary safety measures and analyze the most effective solution to meet the goal of zero deaths in the community
• Lynn: $9.6 million to implement low-cost street design changes on high-injury routes to address systemic crash risks
• MAPC: $7.5 million to update the council’s comprehensive safety action plan; conduct walkability and bike-ability audits; and implement quick-build traffic calming projects
• MBTA: $2.16 million to retrofit 175 MBTA buses with a collision avoidance system
• New Bedford: $237,267 to conduct two demonstration projects in areas with a high prevalence of pedestrian-involved crashes
• Peabody: $223,360 to test safety interventions by altering the geometry of Lynnfield Street and key intersections
• Quincy: $126,400 to conduct demonstration activities to inform the local MPO’s comprehensive action plan
• Watertown: $806,192 to conduct a Safe System Approach Educational Campaign and Citywide Speed Limit Study; and to deploy traffic calming, pedestrian safety, and bicycle safety treatments