Funding Guide

Introduction

Do you have an idea for a transportation project, but don't know whether it would qualify for funding? Did you ever wonder what those state gas taxes collected every time you fill up at the pump actually pay for? What can you do to ensure that the project you support is fully funded?

Anyone who has been involved in the transportation arena knows how Byzantine the funding process can be. Besides the alphabet soup of funding programs and categories, there is the seemingly endless maze of approval stages for funding a project. Whether you support or oppose a transportation project, you need a crash course in "Transportation Funding 101" just to understand the many twists and turns of the process.

The Metropolitan Transportation Commission, or MTC, is the transportation planning and financing agency for the nine-county San Francisco Bay Area. Created by the California Legislature in 1970 to develop a long-range regional transportation plan, MTC also has considerable duties with respect to funding transportation projects. These include voting to allocate and keeping accurate financial records for more than $1 billion every year in funding for Bay Area mass transit, toll bridges, local streets and roads, highways, freight facilities, and bicycle and pedestrian routes.

MTC is providing this guide in an effort to answer basic questions about transportation finance, and provide information for citizens who want to be involved in transportation funding decisions (for general information on MTC and Bay Area transportation, refer to our ABCs of MTC. ). In these pages, you will find a comprehensive overview of the San Francisco Bay Area transportation funding process -- including where the money comes from, and what it can be used for -- as well as suggestions for effective public participation in the funding process.