First Look at the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill

Published: August 03, 2021

Federal Market AnalysisArchitecture, Engineering, and Construction (AEC)InfrastructurePolicy and LegislationTransportation

On Sunday, Senators introduced a bipartisan infrastructure bill that would invest over $1 trillion in the nation’s roads, bridges, power grid, waterways, broadband, and airports.

The legislation includes $550 billion in new federal investment over the next five years, beyond the U.S.’s traditional surface transportation acts. Surface transportation reauthorization acts fund federal highway and public transportation programs, along with transportation research, intercity passenger rail, and other programs. The last surface transportation act, entitled Fixing America’s Surface Transportation Act (FAST Act), authorized federal spending from FY 2016 – FY 2020, with a one-year extension that continues funding through September 30, 2021.

The new surface transportation reauthorization bill, entitled the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, comes in at 2,700 pages which Deltek’s Federal Market Analysis team is hard at work reading and analyzing.

Below is a summary of the major investment areas:

Roads, Bridges, and Major Projects: $402B 8-year baseline + $110B new spending

  • Invests $110B of new funds for roads, bridges, and major projects, and reauthorizes the surface transportation program for the next five years.
  • Repairs and rebuilds U.S. roads and bridges with a focus on climate change mitigation, resilience, equity, and safety for all users, including cyclists and pedestrians.
  • Includes $40B of new funding for bridge repair, replacement, and rehabilitation.
  • Includes $16B for large, complex, major projects planned to deliver significant economic benefits to communities.

Safety: $16B 8-year baseline + $11B new spending

  • Invests in transportation safety programs, including a new Safe Streets for All program to help states and localities reduce crashes and fatalities, especially for cyclists and pedestrians.
  • More than doubles funding directed to programs that improve the safety of people and vehicles, including highway safety, truck safety, and pipeline and hazardous materials safety.

Public Transit: $106B 8-year baseline + $39B new spending

  • Modernizes transit and improves accessibility for the elderly and people with disabilities.
  • Continues existing transit programs for five years as part of surface transportation reauthorization.
  • Repairs and upgrades aging infrastructure, modernizes bus and rail fleets, makes stations accessible to all users, and brings transit service to new communities.
  • Replaces thousands of transit vehicles, including buses, with clean, zero emission vehicles.

Passenger and Freight Rail: $24B 8-year baseline + $66B new spending

  • Makes the largest investment in passenger rail since the creation of Amtrak 50 years ago.
  • Eliminates the Amtrak maintenance backlog.
  • Modernizes the Northeast Corridor. 
  • Brings rail service to areas outside the northeast and mid-Atlantic.
  • Provides funding in the form of
    • $22B as grants to Amtrak
    • $24B as federal-state partnership grants for Northeast Corridor modernization
    • $12B for partnership grants for intercity rail service, including high-speed rail.
    • $5B for rail improvement and safety grants
    • $3B for grade crossing safety improvements

Electric Vehicle (EV) Infrastructure: $7.5B new spending

  • Builds out a national network of EV chargers.
  • Provides funding for deployment of EV chargers along highway corridors.
  • Focuses funding on rural, disadvantaged, and hard-to-reach communities.

Low and No Carbon Buses/Ferries: $7.5B new spending

  • Delivers thousands of electric school buses nationwide, including in rural communities.
  • Invests $2.5B in zero emission buses, $2.5B in low emission buses, and $2.5B for ferries.

Reconnecting Communities: $1B new spending

  • Creates a program to reconnect communities divided by transportation infrastructure.
  • Funds the planning, design, demolition, and reconstruction of street grids, parks, or other infrastructure.

Airports, Ports, and Waterways: $44B 8-year baseline + $42 new spending

  • Invests $17B in port infrastructure and $25B in airports to address repair and maintenance backlogs, reduce congestion and emissions near ports and airports, and drive electrification and other low-carbon technologies.

Resilience and Western Water Infrastructure: $14B 8-year baseline + $50B new spending

  • Invests $50B to keep communities safer and U.S. infrastructure more resilient to the impacts of climate change and cyberattacks.
  • Includes funds to protect against droughts, floods, and weatherization.

Clean Drinking Water: $24B 8-year baseline + $55B new spending

  • Includes dedicated funding to replace lead service lines and the dangerous chemical PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl).
  • Replaces all of the nation’s lead pipes and service lines.
  • Invests in water infrastructure across the U.S. including rural towns, cities, Tribal Nations and disadvantaged communities.

High-Speed Internet: $65B new spending

  • Makes investments to ensure all Americans have access to reliable high-speed internet.
  • Helps lower prices for internet service by requiring funding recipients to offer a low-cost affordable plan and provide price transparency.
  • Boosts competition in areas where existing providers aren’t providing adequate service.
  • Includes passage of the Digital Equity Act, which will end digital redlining, and create a permanent program to help more low-income households access the internet.

Environmental Remediation: $21B new spending

  • Addresses legacy pollution that harms the public health of communities and neighborhoods.
  • Creates well-paying union jobs in hard-hit energy communities.
  • Advances economic and environmental justice.
  • Includes funds to clean up superfund and brownfield sites, reclaim abandoned mine land and cap orphaned gas wells.

Power Infrastructure: $73B new spending

  • Invests in clean energy transmission.
  • Upgrades U.S. power infrastructure, including the building of thousands of miles of new, resilient transmission lines to facilitate the expansion of renewable energy.
  • Creates a new Grid Deployment Authority.
  • Invests in research and development for advanced transmission and electricity distribution technologies.
  • Promotes smart grid technologies.
  • Invests in demonstration projects and research hubs for next generation technologies like advanced nuclear reactors, carbon capture, and clean hydrogen.

Senators could begin amending the bipartisan bill this week. The legislation could face opposition in the House where some progressive lawmakers want a more expansive infrastructure package. The House won’t take up this bill until after it returns to D.C. on September 20th.