The term “apportionment” includes unexpended apportionments made under prior authorization laws.

The term “asset management” means a strategic and systematic process of operating, maintaining, and improving physical assets, with a focus on both engineering and economic analysis based upon quality information, to identify a structured sequence of maintenance, preservation, repair, rehabilitation, and replacement actions that will achieve and sustain a desired state of good repair over the lifecycle of the assets at minimum practicable cost.

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, designating existing facilities for use for preferential parking for carpools, and real-time ridesharing projects, such as projects where drivers, using an electronic transfer of funds, recover costs directly associated with the trip provided through the use of location technology to quantify those direct costs, subject to the condition that the cost recovered does not exceed the cost of the trip provided.

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.

The term “Federal-aid highway” means a public highway eligible for assistance under this chapter other than a highway functionally classified as a local road or rural minor collector.

The term “Federal Lands access transportation facility” means a public highway, road, bridge, trail, or transit system that is located on, is adjacent to, or provides access to Federal lands for which title or maintenance responsibility is vested in a State, county, town, township, tribal, municipal, or local government.

The term “Federal lands transportation facility” means a public highway, road, bridge, trail, or transit system that is located on, is adjacent to, or provides access to Federal lands for which title and maintenance responsibility is vested in the Federal Government, and that appears on the national Federal lands transportation facility inventory described in section 203(c).

The term “forest development roads and trails” means forest roads and trails under the jurisdiction of the Forest Service.

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.

The term “Interstate System” means the Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways described in section 103(c).

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.

The term “maintenance area” means an area that was designated as an air quality nonattainment area, but was later redesignated by the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency as an air quality attainment area, under section 107(d) of the Clean Air Act (42 U.S.C. 7407(d)).

The term “National Highway Freight Network” means the National Highway Freight Network established under section 167.

The term “National Highway System” means the Federal-aid highway system described in section 103(b).

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.

The term “project” means any undertaking eligible for assistance under this title.

The term “project agreement” means the formal instrument to be executed by the Secretary and the recipient as required by section 106.

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.

The term “public road” means any road or street under the jurisdiction of and maintained by a public authority and open to public travel.

The term “rural areas” means all areas of a State not included in urban areas.

The term “safety improvement project” means a strategy, activity, or project on a public road that is consistent with the State strategic highway safety plan and corrects or improves a roadway feature that constitutes a hazard to road users or addresses a highway safety problem.

The term “Secretary” means Secretary of Transportation.

The term “State” means any of the 50 States, the District of Columbia, or Puerto Rico.

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.

The term “State strategic highway safety plan” has the same meaning given such term in section 148(a).

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.

The term “tribal transportation facility” means a public highway, road, bridge, trail, or transit system that is located on or provides access to tribal land and appears on the national tribal transportation facility inventory described in section 202(b)(1).

The term “truck stop electrification system” means a system that delivers heat, air conditioning, electricity, or communications to a heavy-duty vehicle.

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.

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.

Congress declares that it is in the national interest to accelerate the construction of Federal-aid highway systems, including the Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways, because many of the highways (or portions of the highways) are inadequate to meet the needs of local and interstate commerce for the national and civil defense.

Congress declares that the prompt and early completion of the Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways (referred to in this section as the “Interstate System”), so named because of its primary importance to the national defense, is essential to the national interest. It is the intent of Congress that the Interstate System be completed as nearly as practicable over the period of availability of the forty years’ appropriations authorized for the purpose of expediting its construction, reconstruction, or improvement, inclusive of necessary tunnels and bridges, through the fiscal year ending September 30, 1996, under section 108(b) of the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956 (70 Stat. 374), and that the entire system in all States be brought to simultaneous completion. Insofar as possible in consonance with this objective, existing highways located on an interstate route shall be used to the extent that such use is practicable, suitable, and feasible, it being the intent that local needs, to the extent practicable, suitable, and feasible, shall be given equal consideration with the needs of interstate commerce.