(a) Definitions.— In this title, the following definitions apply:
(1) Apportionment.—
The term apportionment includes unexpended apportionments made under prior authorization laws.
(2) Carpool project.—
The term carpool project means any project to encourage the use of carpools and vanpools, including provision of carpooling opportunities to the elderly and individuals with disabilities, systems for locating potential riders and informing them of carpool opportunities, acquiring vehicles for carpool use, designating existing highway lanes as preferential carpool highway lanes, providing related traffic control devices, and designating existing facilities for use for preferential parking for carpools.
(3) Construction.— The term construction means the supervising, inspecting, actual building, and incurrence of all costs incidental to the construction or reconstruction of a highway, including bond costs and other costs relating to the issuance in accordance with section 122 of bonds or other debt financing instruments and costs incurred by the State in performing Federal-aid project related audits that directly benefit the Federal-aid highway program. Such term includes
(A) locating, surveying, and mapping (including the establishment of temporary and permanent geodetic markers in accordance with specifications of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration of the Department of Commerce);
(B) resurfacing, restoration, and rehabilitation;
(C) acquisition of rights-of-way;
(D) relocation assistance, acquisition of replacement housing sites, and acquisition and rehabilitation, relocation, and construction of replacement housing;
(E) elimination of hazards of railway grade crossings;
(F) elimination of roadside obstacles;
(G) improvements that directly facilitate and control traffic flow, such as grade separation of intersections, widening of lanes, channelization of traffic, traffic control systems, and passenger loading and unloading areas; and
(H) capital improvements that directly facilitate an effective vehicle weight enforcement program, such as scales (fixed and portable), scale pits, scale installation, and scale houses.
(4) County.—
The term county includes corresponding units of government under any other name in States that do not have county organizations and, in those States in which the county government does not have jurisdiction over highways, any local government unit vested with jurisdiction over local highways.
(5) Federal-aid highway.—
The term Federal-aid highway means a highway eligible for assistance under this chapter other than a highway classified as a local road or rural minor collector.
(6) Federal-aid system.— The term Federal-aid system means any of the Federal-aid highway systems described in section
103.
(7) Federal lands highway.—
The term Federal lands highway means a forest highway, public lands highway, park road, parkway, refuge road, and Indian reservation road that is a public road.
(8) Forest development roads and trails.—
The term forest development roads and trails means forest roads and trails under the jurisdiction of the Forest Service.
(9) Forest highway.—
The term forest highway means a forest road under the jurisdiction of, and maintained by, a public authority and open to public travel.
(10) Forest road or trail.—
The term forest road or trail means a road or trail wholly or partly within, or adjacent to, and serving the National Forest System that is necessary for the protection, administration, and utilization of the National Forest System and the use and development of its resources.
(11) Highway.— The term highway includes
(A) a road, street, and parkway;
(B) a right-of-way, bridge, railroad-highway crossing, tunnel, drainage structure, sign, guardrail, and protective structure, in connection with a highway; and
(C) a portion of any interstate or international bridge or tunnel and the approaches thereto, the cost of which is assumed by a State transportation department, including such facilities as may be required by the United States Customs and Immigration Services in connection with the operation of an international bridge or tunnel.
(12) Indian reservation road.—
The term Indian reservation road means a public road that is located within or provides access to an Indian reservation or Indian trust land or restricted Indian land that is not subject to fee title alienation without the approval of the Federal Government, or Indian and Alaska Native villages, groups, or communities in which Indians and Alaskan Natives reside, whom the Secretary of the Interior has determined are eligible for services generally available to Indians under Federal laws specifically applicable to Indians.
(13) Interstate System.— The term Interstate System means the Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways described in section
103 (c).
(14) Maintenance.—
The term maintenance means the preservation of the entire highway, including surface, shoulders, roadsides, structures, and such traffic-control devices as are necessary for safe and efficient utilization of the highway.
(15) Maintenance area.— The term maintenance area means an area that was designated as a nonattainment area, but was later redesignated by the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency as an attainment area, under section 107(d) of the Clean Air Act (
42 U.S.C.
7407 (d)).
(16) National Highway System.— The term National Highway System means the Federal-aid highway system described in section
103 (b).
(17) Operating costs for traffic monitoring, management, and control.—
The term operating costs for traffic monitoring, management, and control includes labor costs, administrative costs, costs of utilities and rent, and other costs associated with the continuous operation of traffic control, such as integrated traffic control systems, incident management programs, and traffic control centers.
(18) Operational improvement.— The term operational improvement
(A) means
(i) a capital improvement for installation of traffic surveillance and control equipment, computerized signal systems, motorist information systems, integrated traffic control systems, incident management programs, and transportation demand management facilities, strategies, and programs, and
(ii) such other capital improvements to public roads as the Secretary may designate, by regulation; and
(B) does not include resurfacing, restoring, or rehabilitating improvements, construction of additional lanes, interchanges, and grade separations, and construction of a new facility on a new location.
(19) Park road.—
The term park road means a public road, including a bridge built primarily for pedestrian use, but with capacity for use by emergency vehicles, that is located within, or provides access to, an area in the National Park System with title and maintenance responsibilities vested in the United States.
(20) Parkway.— The term parkway, as used in chapter
2 of this title, means a parkway authorized by Act of Congress on lands to which title is vested in the United States.
(21) Project.—
The term project means an undertaking to construct a particular portion of a highway, or if the context so implies, the particular portion of a highway so constructed or any other undertaking eligible for assistance under this title.
(22) Project agreement.— The term project agreement means the formal instrument to be executed by the State transportation department and the Secretary as required by section
106.
(23) Public authority.—
The term public authority means a Federal, State, county, town, or township, Indian tribe, municipal or other local government or instrumentality with authority to finance, build, operate, or maintain toll or toll-free facilities.
(24) Public lands development roads and trails.—
The term public lands development roads and trails means those roads and trails that the Secretary of the Interior determines are of primary importance for the development, protection, administration, and utilization of public lands and resources under the control of the Secretary of the Interior.
(25) Public lands highway.—
The term public lands highway means a forest road under the jurisdiction of and maintained by a public authority and open to public travel or any highway through unappropriated or unreserved public lands, nontaxable Indian lands, or other Federal reservations under the jurisdiction of and maintained by a public authority and open to public travel.
(26) Public lands highways.—
The term public lands highways means those main highways through unappropriated or unreserved public lands, nontaxable Indian lands, or other Federal reservations, which are on the Federal-aid systems.
(27) Public road.—
The term public road means any road or street under the jurisdiction of and maintained by a public authority and open to public travel.
(28) Refuge road.—
The term refuge road means a public road that provides access to or within a unit of the National Wildlife Refuge System and for which title and maintenance responsibility is vested in the United States Government.
(29) Rural areas.—
The term rural areas means all areas of a State not included in urban areas.
(30) Safety improvement project.—
The term safety improvement project means a project that corrects or improves high hazard locations, eliminates roadside obstacles, improves highway signing and pavement marking, installs priority control systems for emergency vehicles at signalized intersections, installs or replaces emergency motorist aid call boxes, or installs traffic control or warning devices at locations with high accident potential.
(31) Secretary.—
The term Secretary means Secretary of Transportation.
(32) State.—
The term State means any of the 50 States, the District of Columbia, or Puerto Rico.
(33) State funds.—
The term State funds includes funds raised under the authority of the State or any political or other subdivision thereof, and made available for expenditure under the direct control of the State transportation department.
(34) State transportation department.—
The term State transportation department means that department, commission, board, or official of any State charged by its laws with the responsibility for highway construction.
(35) Transportation enhancement activity.— The term transportation enhancement activity means, with respect to any project or the area to be served by the project, any of the following activities as the activities relate to surface transportation:
(A) Provision of facilities for pedestrians and bicycles.
(B) Provision of safety and educational activities for pedestrians and bicyclists.
(C) Acquisition of scenic easements and scenic or historic sites (including historic battlefields).
(D) Scenic or historic highway programs (including the provision of tourist and welcome center facilities).
(E) Landscaping and other scenic beautification.
(F) Historic preservation.
(G) Rehabilitation and operation of historic transportation buildings, structures, or facilities (including historic railroad facilities and canals).
(H) Preservation of abandoned railway corridors (including the conversion and use of the corridors for pedestrian or bicycle trails).
(I) Inventory, control, and removal of outdoor advertising.
(J) Archaeological planning and research.
(K) Environmental mitigation
(i) to address water pollution due to highway runoff; or
(ii) reduce vehicle-caused wildlife mortality while maintaining habitat connectivity.
(L) Establishment of transportation museums.
(36) Urban area.—
The term urban area means an urbanized area or, in the case of an urbanized area encompassing more than one State, that part of the urbanized area in each such State, or urban place as designated by the Bureau of the Census having a population of 5,000 or more and not within any urbanized area, within boundaries to be fixed by responsible State and local officials in cooperation with each other, subject to approval by the Secretary. Such boundaries shall encompass, at a minimum, the entire urban place designated by the Bureau of the Census, except in the case of cities in the State of Maine and in the State of New Hampshire.
(37) Urbanized area.—
The term urbanized area means an area with a population of 50,000 or more designated by the Bureau of the Census, within boundaries to be fixed by responsible State and local officials in cooperation with each other, subject to approval by the Secretary. Such boundaries shall encompass, at a minimum, the entire urbanized area within a State as designated by the Bureau of the Census.
(38) Advanced truck stop electrification system.—
The term advanced truck stop electrification system means a system that delivers heat, air conditioning, electricity, or communications to a heavy duty vehicle.