Every five years, Congress rewrites the rules and the funding for how America funds and regulates transportation. The current law, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), expires on September 30, 2026, and the work to replace it is now underway. On May 22, the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee approved the BUILD America 250 Act (H.R. 8870) by a bipartisan vote of 62 to 2, following a marathon markup. It is the first major piece of the reauthorization to advance, and it gives us our first real look at how this Congress imagines federal support for the country’s roads, transit, trails, and streets over the next five years. The bill authorizes roughly $580 billion from fiscal year 2027 through fiscal year 2031. 

This is not a finished law. The Senate committees with jurisdiction have not yet released their own text, a House floor vote could come as early as this summer, and if negotiations run long, a short-term extension of current law is the likely fallback.

Positives of the Bill

CMAQ is retained. The Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality Improvement program has long been one of the most flexible federal sources available for the kinds of projects our industry supports, and its survival, funded at roughly $15 billion, is a meaningful win. The bill also broadens CMAQ eligibility to cover advanced congestion management technologies and digital infrastructure.

The Transportation Alternatives set-aside is preserved. The Surface Transportation Block Grant program continues, and protects the 10 percent Transportation Alternatives set-aside, the largest dedicated formula source for bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure. Transportation Alternatives is reauthorized at an average of about $1.6 billion a year, a modest increase over current levels.

Federal attention to micromobility safety. The reauthorization package incorporates parts of the MOVE Act, the Micromobility Oversight and Vulnerability Evaluation Act, which directs the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to study the safety of shared and personal micromobility and high-speed personal transportation devices, including the role that crash speeds and street design play, and to develop best practices and a public education program for riders and other road users. 

Concerns with the Bill

The Carbon Reduction Program is eliminated. This flexible formula source, which a number of communities have used for projects that reduce emissions, including shared micromobility, is repealed.

The one dedicated active transportation network program is repealed. The bill eliminates the Active Transportation Infrastructure Investment Program (ATIIP), the only federal program built specifically to close gaps in walking and biking networks. Its first grant round was oversubscribed by roughly 40 to 1, a clear signal of how much demand exists.

BUILD grants are restructured. The multimodal BUILD discretionary grant program is reshaped into a new Surface Transportation Accelerator Grant program, funded at roughly $12 billion and split across local and regional, rural, and urban communities. BUILD has funded multimodal and micromobility-supportive projects in the past, so while this is not necessarily a negative, how this new program treats those uses will be important to watch.

What’s Next

This is still the beginning of the process. The Senate has yet to release its bill, and the House and Senate versions will eventually have to be reconciled. That is precisely the window where advocacy moves outcomes.

As the reauthorization advances, NABSA’s approach is focused on expanding shared micromobility’s access to the resources that already exist, protecting the core programs that support it, and supporting the Shared Micromobility Investment Act (H.R. 8719).

Specifically, we are urging Congress to make the following inclusions in a final bill:

• Codify eligibility across the core programs though the Shared Micromobility Investment Act. Write shared micromobility into statute as an eligible project type in the BUILD, Surface Transportation Block Grant, and Carbon Reduction programs, matching the eligibility it already holds in CMAQ. Shared micromobility is already funded through these programs in practice, and codifying it increases efficiency, expands choice, and gives state and local decision-makers clarity.
• Recognize shared micromobility as transit. Designate shared micromobility as an “associated transit improvement” by amending Section 5302 of Title 49. Shared micromobility already helps complete transit networks and connect people to the jobs that power the economy, and federal law should reflect that established use case.
• Strengthen CMAQ eligibility. Incorporating shared micromobility into CMAQ was a breakthrough that made this eligibility clear. The next step is to expand it to cover operational investment, which would let systems scale more quickly to meet demand.

Later this month, our members will be bringing these priorities directly to Capitol Hill because the voices of operators, cities, and equipment manufacturers are what make the case real to lawmakers.

A five-year reauthorization is an opportunity to lock in the conditions for safe and well-funded shared micromobility systems. NABSA will keep tracking the bill closely, keep members informed at every step, and work to make the final law one that moves our industry, and the communities we serve, forward.