This bill reauthorizes and renames the Reconnecting Communities pilot as the Restoring Essential Public Access and Improving Resilient Infrastructure (REPAIR) program and extends its statutory life. It converts the pilot into a sustained competitive grant program that directs planning and capital grant funding to projects that reconfigure or mitigate transportation infrastructure that has separated communities.
Beyond reauthorization, the bill reshapes selection and eligibility rules: it adds explicit community‑participation, anti‑displacement, and placemaking criteria for award decisions, creates paperwork and partnership expectations for applicants, and embeds REPAIR‑eligible projects into multiple Title 23 funding streams so states, tribes, and localities can pair formula and discretionary funding to advance reconnecting projects.
At a Glance
What It Does
The bill converts section 11509 of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act into an ongoing REPAIR program, authorizes multiple years of funding from the Highway Trust Fund, and tasks the Secretary with soliciting applications and evaluating them under expanded criteria that prioritize community engagement, anti‑displacement measures, and multimodal connectivity. It also adds an explicit prohibition on using REPAIR grant dollars to increase the number of travel lanes on an existing highway.
Who It Affects
Primary applicants will be state and local transportation agencies, Metropolitan Planning Organizations, Tribal governments, and eligible local sponsors that partner with community organizations and community development financial institutions (CDFIs). Community‑based organizations, affordable‑housing advocates, and small businesses in project areas will be direct partners and intended beneficiaries of grant conditions and selection weighting.
Why It Matters
The bill shifts the federal posture from a short‑term pilot to a program with predictable capital and planning dollars and creates statutory pathways to combine REPAIR awards with formula and program funds. That changes how projects that remove or mitigate 'divisive' highway infrastructure will be packaged, funded, and evaluated — making equity and anti‑displacement measures first‑order selection priorities rather than add‑ons.
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What This Bill Actually Does
The core of this bill is a statutory revision of the Reconnecting Communities pilot (section 11509 of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act) into a renamed REPAIR program with sustained authority to make planning and capital construction grants. The bill directs the Secretary of Transportation to solicit applications and evaluate them under a reorganized set of criteria that goes well beyond engineering feasibility: reviewers must consider mobility and connectivity for all users, community participation plans, formal partnerships with community‑based organizations and CDFIs (backed by signed commitment letters and budgets), and measures aimed at preserving affordability and limiting displacement.
Practically, the bill requires applicants for capital grants to document partner resources, other federal and non‑federal funding commitments, and how the project will catalyze public and private investment near transit, rural main streets, or walkable neighborhoods. Applications may include optional land‑use policy metrics that measure whether the project area permits duplexes, triplexes, quadruplexes, or has no minimum parking requirements — a signal that reviewers should reward projects aligned with denser, transit‑oriented development.The bill also inserts a clear operational prohibition: grant funds awarded under section 11509 may not be used for projects that increase the number of travel lanes on an existing highway.
To broaden financing options, it amends multiple provisions of Title 23 U.S.C. so that projects eligible under the REPAIR program are explicitly eligible under National Highway Performance Program, Surface Transportation Block Grant program, Highway Safety Improvement Program, Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality, Territorial Highway Program, National Highway Freight Program, Rural Surface Transportation grants, and related carbon‑reduction flexibility provisions. Those cross‑references are mechanical but consequential: they let sponsors assemble funding packages from both discretionary REPAIR awards and formula funds.On safety and planning oversight, the bill adds a working definition of “divisive roadway infrastructure” into the Highway Safety Improvement Program and directs agencies to evaluate the impacts of such infrastructure.
It also changes program administration mechanics for REPAIR dollars — treating appropriated amounts as if apportioned under chapter 1 of title 23 (with availability until expended) and allowing tribal allocations to be administered under chapter 2 — which affects cash‑flow timing and tribal eligibility. Altogether, the statute links technical project review to community governance, funding commitments, and land‑use outcomes in a way that will require applicants to assemble cross‑sector teams well before they apply.
The Five Things You Need to Know
Authorizes $3.0 billion per year from the Highway Trust Fund for FY2027–FY2031 for the REPAIR program, split annually into $750 million for planning grants and $2.25 billion for capital construction grants.
Grant funds awarded under section 11509 may not be used for projects that increase the number of travel lanes on an existing highway.
Applicants must demonstrate formal partnerships (signed commitment letters and a budget) with community‑based organizations and community development financial institutions, and provide a detailed description of all funding commitments and in‑kind support.
The bill adds a statutory definition of “divisive roadway infrastructure” to the Highway Safety Improvement Program and directs agencies to evaluate the impacts of that infrastructure as part of eligibility and planning.
States that certify transportation emissions reductions on a per‑capita and per‑unit‑of‑economic‑output basis may be required to prioritize REPAIR‑eligible projects when programming certain carbon‑reduction funds, effectively linking climate certification to project selection.
Section-by-Section Breakdown
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Short title
Establishes the Act’s popular and statutory short names — the Restoring Essential Public Access and Improving Resilient Infrastructure (REPAIR) Act — so subsequent amendments target section 11509 of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act under the new program name.
Multi‑year funding authority and administrative treatment
Authorizes appropriations from the Highway Trust Fund for a multi‑year period and prescribes how those amounts are to be treated administratively: they are to be made available for obligation in the same manner as apportioned chapter‑1 funds and remain available until expended, and they may be administered as apportioned or, for tribal recipients, as allocated under chapter 2. That treatment affects obligation deadlines, cash management, and tribal distribution mechanics.
Expanded application criteria emphasizing community participation and anti‑displacement
Rewrites the program’s selection criteria to require demonstrations by applicants that projects will increase affordable transportation options and connectivity, adopt robust community‑participation plans, establish formal partnerships with neighborhood organizations and CDFIs, and include community oversight mechanisms (for example, community land trusts or benefit agreements). The statute also instructs reviewers to weigh creative placemaking and explicit anti‑displacement measures (rent assistance, preservation/rehab of location‑efficient affordable housing, affordable commercial spaces, etc.). These are concrete evaluation levers that move selection beyond a pure engineering or traffic‑flow focus.
Bar on using grant funds to add travel lanes
Adds an express prohibition that REPAIR grant amounts may not be used for projects that increase the number of travel lanes on an existing highway. This is a bright‑line budgeting constraint that will rule out conventional 'widen‑and‑speed' solutions and requires applicants to propose multimodal or reconfiguration alternatives.
Integrating REPAIR projects into federal formula and program streams
Amends numerous provisions of Title 23 to list REPAIR‑eligible projects as permissible uses under the National Highway Performance Program, Surface Transportation Block Grant program, Highway Safety Improvement Program (including new language to evaluate divisive roadway infrastructure), Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality program, Territorial Highway Program, National Highway Freight Program, Rural Surface Transportation grants, and carbon‑reduction program flexibilities. Those cross‑references enable sponsors to blend REPAIR awards with formula funds and to use multiple programs in a single project package.
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Explore Transportation in Codify Search →Who Benefits and Who Bears the Cost
Every bill creates winners and losers. Here's who stands to gain and who bears the cost.
Who Benefits
- Residents of historically divided neighborhoods — the bill prioritizes projects that reconnect communities to jobs, schools, healthcare, parks, and transit while explicitly rewarding proposals that limit displacement and preserve affordability.
- Community-based organizations and community development financial institutions (CDFIs) — the statute elevates formal local partnerships (signed letters, budgets) in application scoring, channeling resources to trusted local intermediaries and increasing their role in project design and benefit sharing.
- Tribal governments — the statute treats REPAIR funds as also administrable under chapter 2 allocations for tribes, and explicitly lists REPAIR projects as eligible under programs that tribes access, expanding tribal financing options.
- Local governments and MPOs that pursue multimodal, placemaking projects — projects that emphasize walkability, mixed‑use development, and affordable housing preservation are prioritized, improving prospects for funding non‑automobile infrastructure.
- Federal and state planners focused on equity and climate goals — the bill ties emissions certification and community outcomes to funding decisions, giving planners a statutory lever to advance integrated land‑use and transportation outcomes.
Who Bears the Cost
- State departments of transportation and local sponsors — must assemble more complex applications with signed partnerships, budget commitments, and anti‑displacement elements, which raises pre‑award staffing and planning costs and may disadvantage less‑resourced jurisdictions.
- Federal agencies (FHWA and DOT) — gain new oversight responsibilities, including reviewing community participation plans, commitments for affordability protections, and emissions certification reviews, creating administrative workload and enforcement obligations without an explicit staffing appropriation in the bill text.
- Highway expansion contractors and business models built on lane‑adding projects — the explicit prohibition on using funds to add travel lanes shifts future work toward reconfiguration, multimodal retrofits, and demolition/replace projects, disrupting established procurement pipelines.
- Local property owners and developers in project areas — while the bill funds anti‑displacement measures, redevelopment and placemaking can still create market pressure; local governments may need to fund additional affordability protections beyond what grant awards cover.
Key Issues
The Core Tension
The central dilemma is reconciling restorative, community‑led repairs to divisive infrastructure with system‑level mobility and freight priorities: funding projects that reconnect neighborhoods and prevent displacement demands slower, participatory processes and affordability guarantees, but those same choices can complicate regional traffic flow, increase project complexity and cost, and strain agency capacity — there is no single policy lever that fixes both past harms and preserves all aspects of mobility without trade‑offs.
The bill combines two legitimate but sometimes competing policy aims: repairing past harms caused by large transportation projects and preserving regional mobility and freight function. Operationalizing that balance raises several implementation questions.
First, the statute tightens selection criteria around community participation and anti‑displacement but stops short of creating enforcement mechanisms or long‑term affordability covenants; it is unclear whether FHWA guidance or cooperative agreements will be used to make affordability protections legally binding, or whether those measures will be left to local land‑use law and conditional grant agreements.
Second, the bill’s cross‑referencing into Title 23 increases funding flexibility but complicates cash flow and compliance. Treating REPAIR appropriations as if apportioned and 'available until expended' helps recipients with multi‑phase projects, but coordinating discretionary REPAIR awards with formula funds and state asset management rules will require careful program guidance.
Finally, the insertion of a “divisive roadway infrastructure” definition into the Highway Safety Improvement Program creates a tension between safety‑oriented program goals and reconnection goals: projects that reduce speeds or remove grade separations may improve local access while potentially affecting throughput or freight reliability — outcomes that will require reconciled metrics and potentially contested trade‑offs between safety, equity, and mobility objectives.
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