President Obama signed the FY'10 DOT Appropriations bill on December 16, 2009. The DOT funding is included in a consolidated "minibus" bill which also includes funding for HUD, Military Construction/VA, Financial Services, Labor/HHS, Commerce/Justice/State, and State/Foreign Ops appropriations bills. The bill passed the House by a close vote of 221 to 202, with no Republican support. Major program funding includes:

• Federal-aid Highway Program funded at $41.8B (the same level as in both the House and Senate bills versus $40.7B in FY'09).
• FAA Airport Improvement Program (AIP) funded at $3.5B (same as in House and Senate bills).
• FTA New Start/Small Starts program funded at $2B (a split between the House and Senate levels) while the FTA Formula and Bus program is funded at $8.3B (the same in both bills).
• Amtrak funded at $1.56B (of which $1B is for capital projects).

In other programs of note, $2.5B is appropriated for additional funding for high speed rail projects (compared with the $1B Administration request, $4B in the House bill and $1.2B in the Senate bill). Up to $50M can be used for planning grants. This amount is in addition to the $8B provided in the ARRA stimulus bill. DOT plans to announce the HSR grant recipients in early 2010.

No funding is provided for a National Infrastructure Bank. The appropriators recommended waiting until such a bank is actually created in authorizing legislation.

An additional $600M is made available for a new merit-based, multi-modal National Infrastructure Investments program which is similar to the ARRA stimulus TIGER program. Applications for the new program will be due in mid-2010. Under this new program, up to $35M may be awarded for planning or design uses, funds must be obligated by 9/30/12, and the maximum size of any grant is $200M, with no more than $150M going to any one state. In addition, up to $150M may be used for the TIFIA financing program.