Driving Emissions Reduction through Project Prioritization: Insights for State Departments of Transportation

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State departments of transportation (DOTs) shape the nation’s transportation infrastructure by allocating billions of dollars of federal funding each year, and they act with broad discretion for investing these funds. To guide decision-making, states use project prioritization frameworks that aim to connect investments with transportation-sector goals.

This paper examines the complex federal-state transportation funding relationship and offers guidance for state DOTs seeking to improve their approach to project prioritization to better support climate goals. By highlighting five noteworthy approaches to project prioritization in California, Colorado, Massachusetts, Minnesota, and Virginia, this paper showcases diverse strategies for integrating greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction into transportation investment decisions. Additionally, an included resource guide highlights key technical tools to further support practitioners.

The status quo for state DOTs is to overinvest in highway-widening projects, which are proven to contribute to greater vehicle miles traveled and thus negatively impact goals for emissions reduction, while underinvesting in projects that support public transit and non-motorized modes, such as walking or biking. This is the result of decades of prioritizing projects based on their perceived merits for congestion mitigation over other benefits to the transportation system.

This paper recommends that state DOTs rethink how they approach project prioritization and place more scrutiny on proposed investments in highway widening while simultaneously increasing the emphasis on public transit, non-motorized modes, and electric vehicle projects in their prioritization frameworks. Doing so will help states produce transportation project lists that redirect funds from costly, emissions-increasing projects to a broader set of investments that will reduce emissions, increase transportation options, and deliver more affordable and connected transportation networks for communities.

Key takeaways

To meet clean transportation goals, the focus must be on how state departments of transportation (DOTs) allocate dollars from traditional formula funding streams. Effective investments from large funding programs like the Surface Transportation Block Grant program and the National Highway Performance Program can meaningfully move the needle on emissions reduction goals.
State DOTs should capture the true scale of costs for projects expected to increase vehicle miles traveled, such as major highway-widening projects, by applying more scrutiny to these investments in the project prioritization process—the Minnesota DOT’s cost/benefit analysis tool offers a good framework for this.
Across both state DOTs and metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs), there is an abundance of knowledge about creative and innovative approaches to the project prioritization process required by federal transportation law. Agencies should look to learn from their peer network instead of reinventing the wheel. Moreover, MPOs more familiar with on-the-ground challenges and priorities from their communities can be valuable partners in identifying cleaner transportation investments, as seen in Massachusetts and Colorado.

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