Members of Western Pennsylvania’s congressional delegation just announced $142 million in federal grant money secured for a series of projects to improve both the Parkway East and the Martin Luther King Jr. East Busway.

“This is a tough commute coming in or out of town,” Congressman Chris Deluzio said. “I think this could have a big impact and improve our quality of life.”

From businessman to county council president to county executive. After 12 years, Rich Fitzgerald is vacating his office. For over a decade, the Democrat has overseen the commonwealth’s second-most populous county. Next month, he leaves public office. Shannon Perrine sits down with Fitzgerald as he looks back on the past, present and future of the region.

Residents probably have heard of the greenhouse effect, but there’s a better analogy to explain climate change, Lindsay Byron said Thursday.

“Think of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gasses as a heat-trapping blanket,” said Byron, environmental group manager for the state Department of Environmental Protection.

“As greenhouse gasses build up, they act like a blanket, trapping heat that would otherwise escape into space.

Allegheny County and the area around Cranberry can begin planning road safety improvements through study grants announced Wednesday by the U.S. Department of Transportation.

The grants, $520,000 for the county and $244,000 for the Cranberry area, were among 385 implementation and planning grants worth $817 million. The funds were awarded under the Safe Streets and Roads for All program, part of the Biden administration’s economic stimulus plan that earmarked $14 billion over five years to improve road conditions and reduce the sharp spike in traffic deaths that occurred during the first two years of the pandemic.

On Monday, several lawmakers announced that Allegheny County is getting a federal grant to make streets safer.

Rep. Summer Lee, Rep. Chris Deluzio, Senator Bob Casey and Senator John Fetterman together announced the $520,000 in funding allocated from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Safe Streets and Roads for All grant. The funds go to the Southwestern Pennsylvania Commission.

The Southwestern Pennsylvania Commission has received $520,000 in federal funding to develop a plan to make streets safer in Allegheny County, which is coming off its deadliest traffic year in nearly two decades.

Last year, Allegheny County saw 84 traffic fatalities, the most since 2005, according to PennDOT. After a dip in road fatalities in 2020 when the region was in lockdown for months due to the pandemic, traffic fatalities have been increasing.

More than $1.3 million in additional funding has been made available to complete the section of the Sheepskin Trail through the city of Uniontown.

“We’re continuing to add to the trail as quickly as we can and get this thing built,” said Fayette County Commissioner Vince Vicites.

Vicites said $1,300,832 came through his involvement with the Southwestern Pennsylvania Commission (SPC) as the secretary/treasurer, his fellow commissioners, Uniontown Mayor Bill Gerke and the state Department of Transportation to obtain funds to finish the Uniontown leg.

To say last week was good for the passenger train industry would be a massive understatement.

At the national level, President Joe Biden released $8.2 billion to fund 10 major projects, including the first high-speed rail line in the U.S. and $34 million to study 69 corridors across the country for new or expanded service.

Outgoing Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald has a new role for the organization leading growth in this region.

Fitzgerald was named recently as the Southwestern Pennsylvania Commission’s new executive director by its board.

Fitzgerald will assume this role on Jan. 2 when his tenure as Allegheny County Executive concludes.

The SPC is the federally certified metropolitan planning organization and local development district serving 10 counties in southwestern Pennsylvania, including Lawrence County.

Every two years, the Southwest Pennsylvania Commission, the metropolitan planning organization for the area that includes Butler County, updates its Transportation Improvement Plan, which is in effect for a three-year period. While the plan for 2023-26 is still in effect, the commission is working on putting together the plan for 2025-28, which comes into effect October 2024.

The commission held a public meeting at the Middlesex Township municipal building on Wednesday evening, Dec. 6, to gather feedback from Butler County residents.