Interstate Rail Compacts

a. Costs of Administration, which include staffing costs for administrative, professional, or technical staff, or contractors serving administrative functions or providing technical oversight. Costs of administration also include the cost of activities or work products that facilitate Interstate Rail Compacts carrying out their duties effectively and timely, such as information technology, accounting, human resources, and procurement. b. Systems Planning, a high-level planning study that considers new transportation services or enhancing existing transportation systems by examining broad needs, challenges, and opportunities, including studying the impacts of freight rail operations on system performance and ridership. Systems planning occurs prior to corridor or project planning and identifies potential solutions to transportation challenges that can be examined at a more detailed level of study. Examples of systems planning work products include development of new or updates to existing regional rail planning studies. Systems planning should include strong community and stakeholder engagement elements, advisory and participation mechanisms to obtain planning input in a thorough, inclusive, and equitable basis. This will also include community engagement efforts already taken or planned, the extent to which engagement efforts are designed to reach impacted communities, whether engagement is accessible for persons with disabilities or limited English proficient persons within the impacted communities, and how community feedback is taken into account in decision-making. c. Promotion of intercity passenger rail operation, including marketing and advertising intercity passenger rail services. Promotional activities include website development, social media management, print materials, direct advertising, collecting customer feedback, and stakeholder outreach. d. Preparation of applications for competitive federal grant programs, including technical staff or contractor support to prepare applications and documentation associated with preparing an application for financial assistance, such as preparing operating plans, funding plans, benefit-cost analysis, and any other documentation that is required to be provided as part of an application for a federal grant. e. Operations Coordination, including coordinating interstate passenger rail services among states and with shared freight operations. Examples include, syncing schedules to facilitate better connections between overlapping services, identifying opportunities for creating operational efficiencies through optimizing the use of shared Amtrak resources, coordinating corridor utilization by other stakeholders such as freight rail, right of way coordination, shared maintenance, and joint procurement of services or equipment. FRA is prohibited under 49 U.S.C. 22905(f) from providing Interstate Rail Compact grants for commuter rail passenger transportation (as defined in 49 U.S.C. 24102(3)). FRA’s interpretation of this restriction is informed by the language in 49 U.S.C. 22907. FRA’s primary intent in funding rail projects is to make reasonable investments in intercity passenger rail and freight rail transportation. Such projects may be located on shared corridors where commuter rail passenger transportation and/or freight rail also benefit from the project. Consistent with 2 CFR 200.458, as applicable, FRA will only approve pre-award costs if such costs are incurred pursuant to the negotiation and in anticipation of the grant agreement and if such costs are necessary for efficient and timely performance of the scope of work. Under 2 CFR 200.458, grantees must seek written approval from FRA for pre-award activities to be eligible for reimbursement under the grant. Activities initiated prior to the execution of a grant or without FRA’s written approval may be ineligible for reimbursement or matching contribution. Cost sharing or matching may be used only for authorized Federal award

Transportation, Planning