Skip to main content

Public Transportation: Opportunities Exist to Improve the Communication and Transparency of Changes Made to the New Starts Program

GAO-05-674 Published: Jun 28, 2005. Publicly Released: Jun 28, 2005.
Jump To:
Skip to Highlights

Highlights

The Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century (TEA-21) and subsequent legislation authorized about $13.5 billion in guaranteed funding for the Federal Transit Administration's (FTA) New Starts program, which is used to select fixed guideway transit projects, such as rail and trolley projects, and to award full funding grant agreements (FFGA). GAO assessed the New Starts process for the fiscal year 2006 cycle. GAO identified (1) the number of projects that were evaluated, rated, and proposed for new FFGAs and the proposed funding commitments in the administration's budget request; (2) changes FTA has made to the New Starts application, evaluation, rating, and oversight processes since the fiscal year 2001 evaluation cycle and how these changes have been communicated to project sponsors; and (3) how FTA developed the measures used to evaluate and rate projects from the criteria outlined in TEA-21 and how those measures are used in the rating process.

Recommendations

Recommendations for Executive Action

Agency Affected Recommendation Status
Department of Transportation To ensure that the New Starts regulations reflect FTA's current evaluation and rating process, and to ensure that FTA's New Starts evaluation process and policies are objective, transparent, and follow the intent of federal statute, the Secretary of Transportation should direct the Administrator, FTA, to ensure that the agency's regulations governing the New Starts evaluation and rating process reflect FTA's current weighting practices for the criteria when the regulations are revised.
Closed – Implemented
In its January 2006 guidance, FTA outlined its initial thinking on how to implement SAFETEA-LU changes to the New Starts program. FTA sought public input on a number of its proposals, including the proposed weighting practices for evaluation criteria. According to FTA officials, FTA will use the public input to develop a notice for proposed rule making for the New Starts program later this year.
Department of Transportation To ensure that the New Starts regulations reflect FTA's current evaluation and rating process, and to ensure that FTA's New Starts evaluation process and policies are objective, transparent, and follow the intent of federal statute, the Secretary of Transportation should direct the Administrator, FTA, to improve the measures for evaluating New Starts projects so that all five project justification criteria can be used in determining a project's overall rating, or provide a crosswalk in the agency's New Starts regulations showing clear linkages between the criteria outlined in statute and the criteria and measures used in the rating process.
Closed – Implemented
In its January 2006 guidance, FTA outlined its initial thinking on how to implement SAFETEA-LU changes to the New Starts program, including different evaluation criteria. FTA sought public input on a number of its proposals, including proposed measures for the different evaluation criteria. According to FTA officials, FTA will use the public input to develop a notice for proposed rule making for the New Starts program later this year that will clarify how all evaluation criteria will be used in reviewing proposed New Starts projects.
Department of Transportation To ensure that the New Starts regulations reflect FTA's current evaluation and rating process, and to ensure that FTA's New Starts evaluation process and policies are objective, transparent, and follow the intent of federal statute, the Secretary of Transportation should direct the Administrator, FTA, to publish future changes to the New Starts program in the Federal Register and subject future changes to the New Starts program to the rulemaking process or, at a minimum, a 30-day informal review and comment period, as appropriate. As part of this process, the agency should develop criteria for determining which changes should be subject to the rulemaking process, as outlined in federal statute, or to an informal review and comment period. At a minimum, these criteria could include changes that impose new reporting requirements or new analysis on project sponsors, changes to the principles used to recommend projects for funding, and changes to the weights assigned to the criteria used to evaluate and rate projects. The criteria should be communicated to Congress and to project sponsors and others in the transit community.
Closed – Implemented
The Safe, Accountable, Flexible, and Efficient Transportation Equity Act of 2005 (SAFETEA-LU), which was signed into law on August 10, 2005, requires the Secretary of Transportation to publish policy guidance regarding the new fixed guideway capital project review and evaluation process and criteria each time significant changes are made by the Secretary to the process and criteria, but not less frequently than once every 2 years. In addition, the Secretary must invite public comment on the changes and publish a response to the comments. On August 30, 2005, the Department of Transportation reported that it concurred with GAO's recommendation and that the Federal Transit Administration will identify changes to the New Starts program that will be subject to either rulemaking or informal review and comment as required by SAFETEA-LU.
Department of Transportation To ensure that the New Starts regulations reflect FTA's current evaluation and rating process, and to ensure that FTA's New Starts evaluation process and policies are objective, transparent, and follow the intent of federal statute, the Secretary of Transportation should direct the Administrator, FTA, to consolidate information and guidance related to the New Starts program in one location on the agency's Web site and regularly review this information to ensure it is up to date and easy to access.
Closed – Implemented
On August 30, 2005, the Department of Transportation (DOT) reported that the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) recently added a quick link to New Starts material on the homepage of its public web site in response to GAO's recommendation. Through this link, project sponsors can access the most current guidance, sample documents, reporting instructions, and other materials related to the New Starts program. DOT also reported that FTA will continue to strive to improve the user-friendliness and completeness of its web site.

Full Report

Office of Public Affairs

Topics

Evaluation criteriaEvaluation methodsFederal aid for transportationFederal aid programsFederal fundsFederal grantsMass transit fundingProgram evaluationProgram managementTransportationRail transit facilitiesPolicies and proceduresTransparency