Two sidewalk projects in Albemarle County and one in Charlottesville have been awarded funding through a program of the Virginia Department of Transportation that requires recipients to pay half of the total cost.
“The revenue sharing program is immensely popular, as you know, for localities in that they generally use the program to support projects that of course are local importance and as an alternative to the Smart Scale program,” said Terry Short of VDOT’s Local Assistance Division at the June 16 meeting of the Commonwealth Transportation Board.
At that meeting, the CTB voted to approve a $28.5 billion Six-Year Improvement Program which provides funding for a variety of categories. That amount includes $239 million for 143 local projects throughout Virginia over the next two years.
Localities can receive up to $10 million per project but must contribute an equal or greater amount. Projects have to meet a need in the state’s transportation plan (VTRANS) and preference is given first to projects that have already received revenue-sharing funds.
The City of Charlottesville asked for $2,285,951 for a new sidewalk on Cedar Hill Road in the Meadows neighborhood and received $2,077,247 with an equivalent local match. There is an additional commitment from the city of $624,212.
City Council signed off on the request last November.
Albemarle submitted two projects this year to make bicycle and pedestrian improvements.
One on Berkmar Drive has a total estimate of $9,799,097 and the county requested $679,242. The recently adopted transportation priority list identifies this as N1003 and the list describes this as a “continuation of the shared use path that… is being constructed from Hilton Heights to Woodbrook Drive.”
This project was called for in the Rio Road Small Area Plan adopted by the Board of Supervisors in December 2018.
The second Albemarle project has the title “Hydraulic Road Bicycle and Pedestrian Improvements” and the total project cost is $5,846,148. Albemarle requested $2,923,074 and received $2,610,968 with an equivalent match from the county. There’s an additional local contribution of $624,212.
This project would appear to match is N1001 which would make several changes to the intersection of Hydraulic Road, Lambs Road, and Whitewood Road with an improved shared use path.
The CTB will discuss potential reforms to the revenue-sharing program at their meeting in July.
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