Safety Research and Demonstration Program 2020 Notice of Funding Opportunity

Details:

Notice of Funding Opportunity for the Safety Research and Demonstration (SRD) Program. The Federal Transit Administration (FTA) announces the availability of $7.3 Million Public Transportation Innovation funds to demonstrate and evaluate innovative technologies, safer designs and/or practices to improve rail transit safety. FTA is seeking to fund cooperative agreements to engage in demonstrations that will improve the operational safety of rail transit services in the U.S. FTA is particularly interested in proposals to prevent and mitigate suicide and trespassing hazards on rail transit systems, and proposals to improve the operational safety of shared corridor fixed guideway systems, including highway-rail grade crossing safety. FTA intends to award multiple SRD demonstration projects under this announcement. Synopses and full announcement are posted on Grants.gov site as opportunity FTA-2020-004-TRI-SRD. Proposals must be submitted electronically through the Grants.gov website by midnight Eastern Time on March, 24, 2020.

Summary:

The Federal Transit Administration (FTA) announces the availability of $7,300,000 in Fiscal Year (FY) 2018 and 2019 research funds. FTA’s Public Transportation Innovation program is authorized by federal public transportation law (49 U.S.C § 5312). FTA is seeking to fund cooperative agreements to engage in demonstrations that will improve the operational safety of rail transit services in the U.S.

The primary objectives of the FY 2018 SRD Program are to assist rail transit agencies to:

• Explore advanced technologies, designs and/or practices to mitigate and prevent safety hazards on rail transit systems; and
• Evaluate cost-effectiveness and practicability of potential solutions.

Eligible Applicants:

An eligible lead applicant under this notice must be an existing FTA grant recipient and eligible project partners and sub-recipients under this program may include, but are not limited to, providers of public transportation; State and local governmental entities; departments, agencies, and instrumentalities of the Government, including Federal laboratories; private or non-profit organizations; institutions of higher education; and technical and community colleges.

For the purpose of this solicitation, rail transit systems are defined as transit modes whose vehicles travel along fixed rails forming a track. Rail transit systems that will be considered for this funding opportunity as a lead applicant or part of the team, should be public rail transit agencies that fall under the jurisdiction of FTA’s State Safety Oversight (SSO) Program.

Link and Instructions for attaching the supplemental form to the SF-424:

All applicants must complete the supplemental form for this Safety Research and Demonstration (SRD) Program NOFO and attach it to their submission in Grants.gov. Applicants should refer to section D of the NOFO for further information about required application contents. The supplemental form is available on Grants.gov and on the FTA website here.

Dates:

An applicant must submit a proposal electronically by midnight Eastern Time on March 24, 2020. Any applicant intending to apply should initiate the process of registering on the Grants.gov site immediately to ensure completion of registration before the submission deadline.

For Further Information Contact: 

Roy Chen, Safety Research Program Manager, Office of Research, Demonstration, and Innovation (TRI), (202) 366-0462.

FTA plans to hold a webinar on this funding opportunity in early March. The webinar will provide an overview of the program, describe eligible applicants and projects, and provide an opportunity for attendees to obtain answers to questions. Details on the time and date of the webinar will be available on the SRD program page.