Frequently Asked Questions

RCI is a USDOT technical assistance center that helps communities expand economic opportunity and mobility through transportation reconnection projects.

RCI technical assistance is provided through a contract administered by the Build America Bureau with the Cadmus Group in partnership with 12 organizations with expertise across transportation planning, engineering and design, communications, adult learning, and other areas. See our About RCI Page and the news release for more information.

RCI does not provide funding directly – it provides free technical assistance. However, this technical assistance can include helping communities identify and apply for funding opportunities for their transportation reconnection projects (see Section 5: Funding Identification Support).

There is no cost to participate in RCI. All RCI technical assistance is free of charge for communities with an approved Expression of Interest.

If you are interested in receiving RCI’s free technical assistance, please complete the short Expression of Interest form on the Request Support Page. The form should only take a few minutes to complete. The RCI team will review your expression of interest and determine if your community and project qualify for the program. We will contact you with the determination and if approved, discuss next steps to start receiving technical assistance from RCI.

Any state or local government, Tribe, metropolitan planning organization (MPO), or nonprofit community organization that has a qualifying transportation reconnection project at any stage of scoping, planning, or development is eligible to receive RCI support.

If you are not sure whether RCI can support your project, we encourage you to submit the Expression of Interest form so our team can assess whether your project qualifies.

Yes! If your organization received—or is part of a team that received—an RCP or RCN grant, you are eligible to receive free RCI technical assistance. Just make sure the person who submits the Expression of Interest form is from the state or local government, Tribe, metropolitan planning organization (MPO), or nonprofit that received the grant.

Yes, RCI can support Tribal nations that have an eligible transportation reconnection project (see Section 3 on Project Eligibility). If you are interested in receiving RCI technical assistance, please fill out the short Expression of Interest form.

Yes! RCI can help at any stage of your project planning or development process, from scoping to construction. As long as you or someone from your team is from an eligible entity (state or local government, Tribe, metropolitan planning organization, or nonprofit) and have a qualifying project in mind, you can submit the Expression of Interest form to request RCI support.

RCI’s technical assistance also includes helping you identify and apply for funding for your transportation reconnection project (See Section 5: Funding Identification Support).

If you have a transportation reconnection challenge, then yes!

RCI provides a range of technical assistance to address challenges like gaining stakeholder buy-in and working with state departments of transportation. We have experts on our team in community engagement and stakeholder analysis.

We encourage you to fill out the short Expression of Interest form so we can learn more about your project and the specific challenges you are facing.

There is no specific limit for the number of team members who participate in RCI or gain access to RCI resources and training materials. RCI will support the full team of partners who are working on your project. We ask that you designate a primary point of contact to coordinate with the RCI team.

RCI will engage your partner organizations, including your consultants, on a case-by-case basis and in coordination with the primary eligible organization. The individual who submits the Expression of Interest form for RCI support must be part of an eligible entity: state, local, Tribal, or territorial government, metropolitan planning organization, or nonprofit.

A transportation reconnection project is a planning or capital construction project that addresses a transportation barrier—defined as built infrastructure such as highways, transit lines, rail lines, or other surface transportation facilities that limit mobility, access, or economic development. Transportation reconnection projects aim to remove, retrofit, mitigate, or replace these transportation barriers in order to expand community connectivity and improve lives.

Examples of transportation reconnection projects include infrastructure removal, building a structure over a highway to connect both sides (often called a cap or lid), pedestrian walkways or overpasses, roadway redesigns, complete streets conversions, and main street revitalization.

If you are not sure your project qualifies as a transportation reconnection project, we encourage you to submit the Expression of Interest form so our team can assess whether your project qualifies.

No, projects that address natural dividing barriers, such as rivers, lakes, or mountains do not qualify for RCI support. To receive RCI support, your project must address barriers caused by transportation infrastructure (highways, transit lines, rail lines, or other surface transportation facilities that limit mobility, access, or economic development).

Most likely, but the RCI team will need more information on your specific project to determine if it is eligible for RCI technical assistance. If this applies to your project, we encourage you to submit the Expression of Interest form so our team can assess whether your project qualifies.

Your project could qualify as a transportation reconnection project as long as it addresses the transportation barrier (i.e., a one-way road) to improve mobility, access, economic development, and restore community connectivity. Addressing this infrastructure barrier with design changes fits within the USDOT definition of transportation reconnection projects. However, the RCI team will need more information on your specific project to determine if it is eligible for RCI technical assistance.

If this applies to your project, we encourage you to submit the Expression of Interest form so our team can assess whether your project qualifies.

RCI supports a wide range of needs including developing and complying with federal grant agreements, creating effective community engagement processes, using software and tools for decision-making and modeling, designing safe streets, and identifying options for funding or financing future project needs. RCI is building its TA offering based on what we are hearing from applicants and participants. RCI is flexible so that we can adapt our assistance services to best meet your needs.

A community can get the most out of RCI by participating in each type of TA offering, recognizing that communities are often limited by time and resources. RCI offers three main types of TA: Group TA, One-on-One TA, and Community of Practice. In One-on-One TA, communities receive support from experts on the issues they are facing with their transportation reconnection project. With Group TA, RCI will educate communities about topics that are relevant and helpful for their transportation reconnection project but not project specific. The Community of Practice is a forum for you to both help and learn from your peers. These different avenues for TA offer communities different ways to be involved and get the most out of their participation with RCI.

Participation in RCI is completely voluntary. If you request RCI support, we will work with you to tailor technical assistance based on your project or community needs, but your participation is not mandatory.

We encourage active engagement in RCI, including the RCI Community of Practice, to realize the most benefits for your community and transportation reconnection project.

No, you will not have specific performance metrics related to your participation in RCI. We do offer technical assistance related to performance metrics for your transportation reconnection project. It is not a requirement of RCI that you come in with specific performance metrics for your project, but it is something that we are interested in helping communities develop.

Yes! RCI can provide technical assistance at any stage of your transportation reconnection project, including project scoping.

Yes, RCI offers technical assistance resources and training on contractor procurement to help you implement your transportation reconnection project. This technical assistance covers federal requirements for hiring contractors or consultants, the types of eligible services and activities that can be performed by a consultant or contractor, the process, and typical steps for procuring a contractor or consultant, how to develop an RFP, considerations in selecting a successful bidder, and how to negotiate a contract.

Not directly, but we can help you with them.

RCI provides technical assistance and is not a direct consultation service. We cannot complete any part of your grant application or project execution, but we can provide guidance, resources, tools, templates, and approaches to help you complete these analyses.

RCI has a team of subject matter experts with decades of experience in the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) process, and we are ready to help. RCI offers resources to support the environmental review and permitting processes. Our experts can review where you are in the process, clarify and help assess federal requirement compliance, and guide you through the process to approval.

The RCI team includes subject matter experts in public finance who can provide guidance on conducting fiscal impact analyses and other economic analyses.

RCI cannot conduct your engineering or environmental evaluations. However, RCI subject matter experts in environmental permitting and engineering can provide advice and guidance at these stages of your project. RCI can also connect you with other communities working through similar challenges and facilitate peer learning and knowledge sharing.

RCI may offer a limited number of in-person site visits. RCI will develop virtual resources such as success stories and case studies that examine best practices from other transportation reconnection projects.

Yes, RCI can help you identify grants and other funding opportunities for your reconnection project. RCI will also provide a number of technical assistance offerings on finding appropriate funding and writing grant applications. The RCI Team cannot write your grant applications for you, but we can provide best practices and examples of past successful grant applications.

There is currently no more funding allocated for these programs.  RCP funding was distributed through three funding cycles (RCP FY2022, RCN FY 2023, and RCP FY 2024). The application period for the RCP FY2024 Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) closed in September 2024. All grant funding for the Reconnecting Communities and Neighborhoods (RCN) Program was distributed in FY 2023.

However, there are several other ways to access federal funding for your transportation reconnection project. RCI will work with you to identify those sources and help you prepare strong grant applications.

RCI can help identify funding opportunities for projects in smaller and rural communities, in addition to those in larger metropolitan areas. In fact, while RCI technical assistance is available to communities of all sizes, we prioritize providing technical assistance to communities with fewer resources or more limited capacity.

RCI does not provide funding for projects, nor can we guarantee any future funding from other programs. However, one goal of our technical assistance is to help communities develop plans, identify funding sources, and prepare strong grant applications to make transportation reconnection projects possible.

Yes, in addition to helping you identify funding opportunities, we can work with you to understand when it makes sense to apply for funding for different phases of your project. For example, if you have received a project planning grant, we can advise on the best timing to pursue capital construction grant funding.