The Georgia Department of Transportation has already shelved some projects expected to start this summer because it looks like there will be no federal money from the Highway Trust Fund available to support them.
“We have known for, I guess, about a year that they could see long-term that funds were not at the level to maintain roads and bridges and any transit projects,” said Natalie Dale, a GDOT spokesperson. “And so, we knew that the fund would reach insolvency by September, but it looks now as that it will dip below the critical funding level as soon as July.”
That critical level is where Highway Trust Fund dollars can no longer, by law, be used to start new projects.
Dale says U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx told state transportation heads not to expect Congress to make a move to alleviate the funding crunch anytime soon.
The major redesign of the I-285 / Flat Shoals Road interchange and part of the Atlanta BeltLine bicycle corridor are already on hold, in anticipation of the shortfall. In metro Atlanta alone, there are nearly 40 GDOT projects set to begin in the third fiscal quarter (July to September). All of those starts are in jeopardy, considering the state of the federal funding support.
(more on GDOT suspending construction for lack of federal support . . . )
