San Francisco County Transportation Authority
Moving the City

ANNOUNCEMENT:  A workshop for prospective applicants will be held at 1:00 p.m. on Thursday, June 25, 2009, at the Fishbowl Conference Room on the 3rd floor of MTC's office at 101 Eighth Street in Oakland. Attendance is not required but encouraged.

Please see the MTC's New Freedom Program Web page for additional information, including Program Guidelines and downloadable application forms.

The due date for the New Freedom Program for Large Urban Areas is 5:00pm on August 7, 2009. 

The Federal Transit Administration (FTA) New Freedom Program provides grants for new capital and operational projects aimed at reducing, beyond the requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA), transportation barriers faced by individuals with disabilities.

Specifically, the eligibility requirements are:

• Projects must be intended to assist individuals with disabilities with accessing transportaiton services; and
• Projects must expand the transportation mobility options of disabled individuals beyond the requirements of ADA; and
  
• Projects must be "new," that is, they must not have been implemented or operational or have an identified funding source on August 10, 2005; and
• Projects must be derived from the Bay Area's Coordinated Public Transit - Human Services Transportation Plan.

Eligible applicants include private non-profit organizations, state or local government authorities, and operator of public transportation services (including private operators of public transportaiton services).

Funds are apportioned by formula to large urbanized areas (UAs), small UAs, and rural areas based on the population of persons with disabilities. Funds are required to be spent on projects that provide transportation services within those areas. A map of the Bay Area UAs is provided in the link below.  San Francisco is located within the designated San Francisco-Oakland large UA, which has a funding target this cycle of $2,209,639. MTC is the designated programming authority for the Bay Area's large UA funds. Caltrans is the designated recipient of the state's small UA funds and rural area funds.

Bay Area Urbanized Area Map

Details about the statewide competition for small UAs and rural areas can be found on Caltrans' New Freedom Web page.  (NOTE: the 2009 application is not yet available, but Caltrans says it will be posted on their Web site soon.)

MTC has released the Third Cycle Call for Projects for the Bay Area's large UA New Freedom funds.  Applications are due on August 7, 2009.  Please see http://www.mtc.ca.gov/funding/new_freedom.htm for additional information, including MTC's Program Guidelines and to download application forms.

MTC staff is available to provide information and assistance to potential applicants. If you would like assistance, please contact Kristen Mazur via or at 510-817-5789.

Please direct other questions about the the FTA New Freedom Program to:

 Amber Crabbe, Senion Transportation Planner with the SFCTA, at 415-522-4801 or via email.