Wasatch Front TAC backs CMAQ, CRP, TAP and STP project recommendations and forwards them to Transcom

The Wasatch Front Transportation Technical Advisory Committee voted to recommend staff’s project lists for the Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality (CMAQ), Carbon Reduction Program (CRP), Transportation Alternatives Program (TAP) and Surface Transportation Program (STP), and to forward the draft recommendations to Transcom for the regional council’s April review.

Committee members and staff emphasized the scale mismatch between requests and available funds: staff reported 87 project submissions (54 unique) requesting more than $566 million in total project costs and about $209 million in federal funds while roughly $31.5 million was available for CMAQ-type allocations. For the CRP list, staff said 20 projects requested more than $51 million while roughly $2.4 million was available; TAP had 16 projects requesting about $25 million with $2.1 million available; STP showed 32 projects requesting more than $174 million with roughly $22.5 million to program.

Why it matters: the committee’s recommendations shape which local projects are eligible for scarce federal and state funding and determine what Transcom will consider for the draft 2026–2031 Transportation Improvement Program.

Staff presentations outlined project-by-project recommendations and partial awards where staff found limited funding. For example, the staff recommended partial operating subsidies to UTA requests (including recommended amounts such as $1,000,000 for certain operating requests) and recommended partial or full amounts for roadway, multimodal and transit projects across the four programs. Staff noted some projects were more appropriately programmed under a different fund (for instance, certain CMAQ-eligible projects were recommended for CRP or STP where the benefit-cost calculations and eligibility better aligned).

The meeting also included substantive procedural and data checks. Committee members flagged that a few projects submitted by West Valley City and Sandy were missing from one or more recommendation lists; staff acknowledged the omission and said those projects had been considered under other funding programs (or were under review) and that they would re-check the tally. Staff member Kip acknowledged a labeling error in the CMAQ recommendation table where two rows had an incorrect funding-program notation (“that’s an error on number 4 and number 7,” he said). Kip also explained the evaluation approach: ranked benefit-cost ratios (kilograms of emissions reduced per $1,000) for CMAQ and CO2 benefit-cost for CRP, with scoring and professional considerations used to form staff recommendations.

Formal actions: the committee took four separate motions to recommend the staff lists to the next step in the process. Motions and seconds were recorded for each program; the chair called the vote and members responded in the affirmative. The chair instructed staff to forward the recommended, draft programming to Transcom (the transportation coordinating committee) for the April meeting. The motions carried with no opposed votes recorded in the meeting transcript.

Quotes pulled from the meeting: "You have a critical role or responsibility as to where you will be making a recommendation from today's presentation," said Mr. Worthrich, introducing theTIP review. Kip summarized program intent: "The CMAQ, sorry, congestion mitigation and air quality and the CRP or carbon reduction program, they're kind of, twins." Ben (Wasatch Front staff) explained next steps: "They'll go to Transcom. So Transcom has a meeting in April, which all these draft projects will be recommended to them."

The committee set the next TAC meeting for May 28 and directed staff to circulate final recommendation materials and to follow up on the missing-project checks and table annotation errors.

Ending: The recommendations will appear on Transcom’s draft TIP agenda in April; staff said they will continue to reconcile project lists and funding-program assignments before that meeting.