New federal bill would make our streets safer—plus, see the 100 most dangerous House districts


A handful of leaders in the House and Senate just introduced a bill that would finally require states and metro areas to design and build safer streets for everyone. Plus, our new report shows which U.S. House representatives have the highest rate of people struck and killed while walking in their districts.

Advocacy Complete Streets Transportation

Passenger rail a lynchpin of smart, walkable development


Passenger rail along the Gulf Coast has been absent since 2005 when Hurricane Katrina wiped out much of the infrastructure. But Smart Growth America, through our Transportation for America (T4America) program, has been coordinating a monumental effort to restore service along the Gulf Coast and that work is paying off.

Advocacy Technical assistance

Our take on Infrastructure Week in the Washington Post


A new opinion piece in the Washington Post from Transportation for America takes a contrarian view of all the talk about money during Infrastructure Week. In short, let’s skip a special infrastructure plan and focus on policy; without good policy more spending could actually do more harm than good.

Advocacy Transportation

Repair Priorities 2019: more money won’t fix our infrastructure problems


It’s Infrastructure Week again and politicians are back at it, bemoaning our “crumbling roads and bridges” and insisting we must spend more to fix the problem. But we’ve got some cold water to throw on this pity party: Despite more transportation spending over the last decade, the percentage of the roads nationwide in “poor condition” increased from 14 to 20 percent.

Advocacy Transportation

Sprawl or smart growth: the future of Opportunity Zones

The newly created Opportunity Zones program will likely go down as the largest and most significant federal community development initiative in U.S. history, with trillions of dollars in new private investment about to start flowing into pre-designated low-income communities around the country.

Advocacy Economic development LOCUS

Local officials took the First & Main message to their representatives during Rebuild America’s Communities Week


During a special week in September we called Rebuild America’s Communities Week, elected local leaders in the First & Main coalition from small and mid-sized towns and cities across the country carried a clear and unified message to their representatives who were at home for recess: “We need reliable federal partners to support our homegrown efforts to rebuild our downtowns, restore our economies, and improve opportunity for everyone.”

Advocacy Local Leaders Council

Webinar recap: “People are dying on our streets: Why is this happening and how can we talk about it responsibly?”


In our recent webinar, we were joined by three reporters for a discussion about pedestrian fatalities and how people can talk about the issue in a responsible and productive way. The recording of that webinar is now available along with answers to some of the questions we weren’t able to get to live.

Advocacy Complete Streets Transportation Uncategorized