Section 5316 Job Access and Reverse Commute Program (JARC)

JARC is a program under the Federal Transit Administration of the US Department of Transportation. The purpose of the JARC grant program is to assist states and localities in developing new or expanded transportation services that connect welfare recipients and other low income persons to jobs and other employment related services. Job Access projects are targeted at developing new or expanded transportation services such as shuttles, vanpools, new bus routes, connector services to mass transit, and guaranteed ride home programs for welfare recipients and low income persons. Reverse Commute projects provide transportation services to suburban employment centers from urban, rural and other suburban locations for all populations. Eligible applicants include private nonprofit organizations, State or local governmental authority, and operators of public transportation services including private operators of public transportation services.

Eligible activities for Job Access grants include capital, operating and planning expenses of services, equipment, facilities, and associated capital maintenance items related to providing access to jobs. Eligible projects include, but are not limited to:

Late night and weekend service

Guaranteed ride home services

Shuttle Service

Expanding fixed route mass transit routes

Demand-responsive van service

Ridesharing and carpooling activities

Transit related aspects of bicycling

Also included are the costs of promoting the use of transit by workers with nontraditional work schedules, promoting the use of transit vouchers, and promoting the use of employer-provided transportation including the transit benefits. In addition, mobility management activities are an eligible capital expense. These eligible expenses are defined as short range planning and management activities and projects for improving coordination among public transportation and other transportation services providers. For Reverse Commute grants, the following activities are eligible—operating costs, capital costs and other costs associated with reverse commute by bus, train, carpool, vans or other transit service.

As designated by the Governor of the State of Arizona, the ADOT Multimodal Planning Division administers JARC funds for all rural (less than 50,000 population) and small urbanized areas (50,000 to 199,999 population) regions of the state. Available FY2008 statewide funding for the rural areas is $561,451. Available FY 2008 statewide funding for the small urbanized areas is $314,702. All projects funded under this program must be derived from a locally developed, coordinated public transit-human services transportation planning process.

Section 5316 Application

The Section 5316 Program manager is Mr. Gregg Kiely.