The FY 2023-FY 2024 CRISI grants were announced on October 29, 2024. The total funding available for awards under this NOFO is up to $2,478,391,050, made available by the 2023 Appropriation, 2024 Appropriation, 2023 and 2024 advance appropriations provided in IIJA, and remaining unawarded 2022 CRISI balances. Short line projects did exceptionally well, garnering $1.29B across 81 awards. A list of CRISI projects in this round is available here.
The next round of grant funding for FY 2025 is expected to open Q1 2026.
Did you know? If you have received an award, in some cases you may apply for reimbursement of costs incurred between the time the award was announced and when the grant agreement is executed and funding begins. This is called Pre-Award Authority. Click here for responses to frequently asked questions from the FRA on this topic.
If you have questions about a specific grant, please contact FRA-NOFO-Support@dot.gov.
FRA Announcement of FY 23-24 Grants
List of FY 23-24 Grant Recipients
Resubmitting after an Unsuccessful CRISI Application
Register Your Railroad - ASLRRA
Coordinate With Partners/Seek Advocates - ASLRRA
Prepare Foundational Documents - ASLRRA
Build and De-Risk the Project - ASLRRA
Make the Case with Transportation Analysis - ASLRRA
ASLRRA’s Member Discount Program Preferred Providers offer grant writing services.
Eligibility Determination
It is important to verify applicant eligibility early. Verify your plan against the eligibility criteria from previous cycle NOFO section C.1 and consult with the FRA early if there are eligibility questions.
System Registrations
Before pursuing funding through CRISI, the applying entity must be properly registered in two federal systems: The System for Award Management (SAM) and grants.gov. Grant applicants must first be set up in SAM to register in grants.gov and all recipients of federal funds must be registered in SAM. All application materials are submitted through grants.gov. SAM is where you will receive your Unique Entity Identifier (UEI) that identifies your entity to the federal government for the purposes of receiving funds. Setting up SAM for the first time for an entity can take a few weeks. Every entity in your application that will receive funds if you win should be registered in SAM. Your applicant entity needs to be registered in grants.gov Even if you are already registered in both systems, it is important to verify those registrations and that you have account access at the beginning of our grant writing process.
Begin Work with Vendors Early
CRISI is not the only DOT funding program opening with a short deadline and more funds available than expected. Demand is now hitting the railroad supplier market for goods and services in support of applications and project execution for funding for multiple major grant programs in the railroad space. All of this is competing for the limited pools of experienced talent that can provide professional services. Vendors of materials, contracting services and equipment do not have infinite capacity. You should reach out promptly to the vendors you’ll need to work with to scope your project and secure cost estimates and quotes.
Some short line projects seeking federal CRISI funds will involve getting the permission of outside parties, so identifying and working on these tasks early in the grant application writing process is important.
Public Partner Requirements
If you are planning to apply through an eligible public entity or seek matching funding from a public entity, learn their process steps and timelines for those processes. If, for some reason, you must work through a public partner’s engineering and project management process, that can be a complex and slow process. If you are seeking matching funds from a public entity, understand it can take time for them to consider and respond to such a request.
Other Railroad Requirements
A common scenario for short lines is when a Class I freight railroad must approve the proposed grant-funded project. Short lines should review their lease agreements closely, as leases can include clauses specific to pursuit and use of public grant funding. Short lines should also presume that Class I permission will be required if the proposed project could affect their property or operations. Projects that touch the property, right-of-way or infrastructure of another railroad, such as adding or modifying a connection to another railroad, will always require their permission, and typically formal review by their engineering department.
The fact that a Class I won’t contribute any monetary resources to the proposed CRISI grant-funded project does not eliminate the need to meet all their legal and operational coordination requirements. The FRA considers agreements with or permissions from Class I partners to be an area of potentially significant risk when they evaluate CRISI grant applications. They will look closely at applications for projects that could require such agreements or coordination.
Advocacy and Letters of Support
Consider finding regional advocates, such as customers, businesses, or elected officials, who could help write letters of support touting your project’s importance to FRA. If you think you will seek a letter of support, or perhaps direct advocacy from a stakeholder, give them an early warning. While letters of support are the only thing that can be transmitted to FRA after the application submittal date, it is preferred that they be submitted as an attachment with the rest of your application.
Applicants are no longer required to provide the separate attachments of a project statement of work (SOW); a schedule; and a budget. Follow FRA’s new guidance for this cycle on integration of these elements into your project narrative. FRA has streamlined elements of the application process this cycle. Read the NOFO carefully for updated guidance on narrative contents, templates for budget and other tables, and overall organization of the project narrative and attachments.
Complete Advance Engineering and Design Tasks
Some projects require significant professional engineering and design work. Get these resources in place and their work started as early as possible. The farther you advance your engineering, the less risk associated with your project and higher readiness, which are important competitive factors in the eyes of the agency reviewers. Given the very short timeline of this cycle, you may not have enough time to carry out much significant engineering work for projects like bridge replacements or construction of brand new track. FRA has emphasized that in this cycle they will welcome traditional low-risk projects in existing operational right of way. These would include things like crosstie and rail replacement, turnout, switch and trackwork replacements, crossing surface rehabilitations, surfacing and tamping, bolt tightening, and like-for-like component replacements in structures. If you don’t think you have time to carry out meaningful preliminary engineering of a complex project, consider proposing a more basic project.
Understand Environmental Risks
Familiarize yourself early on with the FRA’s categorical exclusions (CEs) under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). Also try to determine early if you may require a federal permit for your project, such as from the US Army Corps of Engineers. The more potential environmental impacts of your project, the higher the risk, and also the longer it is likely to take to get to grant agreement if you are selected for an award.
Identify Any Land Rights Issues
Risk around land acquisition can be a major red flag for reviewers. It is important to determine early in the grant writing process if any land acquisition or rights to land will be required to carry out the project. Applicants should clearly explain the plan for land acquisition and try to take steps to reduce any risk associated with land acquisition needed to carry out the project. This includes initiating good faith discussions with landowners, doing title research and surveys if appropriate, and confirming zoning requirements. Past short line awardees have used legal agreements to protect their budgets against land acquisition cost risk while awaiting selection and then grant agreement.
Effective communication of the transportation analysis supporting a CRISI application is fundamental to making the case for the project. Most CRISI applications will have a forecast for traffic of some type, often in the form of revenue carloads transported over twenty years, sometimes more, from the expected completion of construction.
It is surprisingly easy to provide an excellent data-driven transportation and benefit-cost analysis in the application attachments but neglect to communicate that information in the grant application narrative. The narrative document must bring forward all important data and findings, including at least summary versions of traffic forecasts and scenarios that may be provided in attachments. Always assume that your evaluation could be heavily focused only on what is in your narrative, and strive to include the key points and figures you want to be sure are seen by all the reviewers.
FRA: Railroad Crossing Elimination (RCE) Grant program
The FRA held several webinars, focusing on a different aspect of the notice of funding opportunity (NOFO). While these webinars were focused on RCE grants, the information discussed could be insightful for railroads planning to apply for other grants, like the Consolidated Rail Infrastructure and Safety Improvements (CRISI) program. Click here to access the presentation materials and a recording of the event under “Grants and Loans”.
In FY 22, approximately $100 million in grants were made available to eligible entities to expand the sales and use of renewable fuels through the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Higher Blends Infrastructure Incentive Program (HBIIP).
The program includes grants of up to $5 million with cost-sharing of as much as half of all total project costs. Funding can be used to build and retrofit biofuel-related infrastructure such as pumps, dispensers and storage tanks. Eligible entities include rail fueling facilities.
Although Grant applications were due Nov. 21, 2022 for this round, helpful information to prepare for FY 23 applications can be found on the website including information about how to apply and a program fact sheet.
