U.S. Department of Transportation
Federal Highway Administration
From:
April Marchese, Director
Office of Natural and Human Environment
To:
FHWA Division Administrators
Resource Center Directors
Federal Lands Highway Division Engineers
Date: November 17, 2008
Reply to: HEPN-10
The purpose of this memorandum is to transmit the final guidance for the CMAQ program as reauthorized under SAFETEA-LU. This document replaces the October 2006 interim guidance. The final guidance and response to comments were published in the Federal Register October 20, 2008 (please see the email from October 28, providing the web links for the notice).
There have been very few departures from the interim guidance. A number of language clarifications have been added, including a more detailed treatment of HOV/HOT lane projects; a brief discussion of the effects of the Energy Independence and Security Act on CMAQ matching shares, a shift in eligibility for operational costs of transit New Starts projects, and a number of changes to the support and background appendices. The areas most prominently targeted by the SAFETEA-LU and the interim guidance, e.g. diesel retrofits, overall cost-effectiveness, and congestion relief, have been highlighted in the final document as well.
Copies of this guidance are available here by clicking (here for the PDF - 315 KB version) or (here for the HTML version). There is also available by clicking here a one-page side-by-side comparison of the interim and final guidance for quick reference. Additionally, the FHWA has created a series of brochures on the CMAQ program that are also available to those interested in further information on the program. For copies of those brochures or for further information on the CMAQ program, please contact Michael Koontz at michael.koontz@dot.gov or (202) 366-2076.
