DOT-FRA Awards $60,000 from RCE Program to Florence, SC

Capitol Funding Solutions is pleased to announce that a proposal written for the City of Florence, South Carolina, was allocated $60,000 through the FY 22 Railroad Crossing Elimination (RCE) Program. 

The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) awarded more than $570 million in Railroad Crossing Elimination (RCE) Grant Program funding. Funded by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, this new competitive program will provide funding for highway-rail or pathway-rail grade crossing improvement projects. The purpose of the program is to assist communities in eliminating points where railroad tracks intersect with roads, which “have blocked vehicle and pedestrian traffic, led to deadly vehicle-rail collisions, and prevented first responders from reaching emergencies.”  

The City of Florence was awarded $60,000 to study 33 crossings within the city's limits that will produce a publicly available action plan identifying crossings requiring safety improvements to rail rights-of-way owned by CSX and South Carolina Central Railroad. The initiative will further identify specific crossings that are of high safety concern and are in relation to the City’s low-to-moderate income areas and will recommend specific improvements that can be made to the crossings to promote safety and provide access.  

Of the 63 awardees, this project was the only proposal selected in South Carolina. The project aims to support future initiatives to improve and install protective devices, signals, or signs for increased pedestrian and vehicular safety. The impact of this award significantly increases the City’s competitiveness for future federal funding to implement the action plan being produced from the RCE program funds.  

View the agency press release here.  

View the selected projects here.