funds for transit development, improved "intermodal" connections, and emphasized upgrades to existing facilities over building new capacity—particularly roadway capacity. To accomplish more serious metropolitan planning, ISTEA doubled federal funding for MPO operations and required the agencies to evaluate a variety of multimodal solutions to roadway congestion and other transportation problems. MPOs also were required to broaden public participation in the planning process and to see that investment decisions contributed to meeting the air quality standards of the Clean Air Act Amendments. In addition, ISTEA placed a new requirement on MPOs to conduct "fiscally constrained planning", and ensure that long-range transportation plans and short-term transportation improvement programs were fiscally constrained; in other words, adopted plans and programs can not include more projects than reasonably can be expected to be funded through existing or projected sources of revenues. This new requirement represented a major conceptual shift for many MPOs (and others in the planning community), since the imposition of fiscal discipline on plans now required, not only understanding how much money might be available, but how to prioritize investment needs and make difficult choices among competing needs. Adding to this complexity is the need to plan across transportation modes and develop approaches for multimodal investment prioritization and decision making. It is in this context of greater prominence, funding, and requirements that MPOs function today. An annual element is composed of transportation improvement projects contained in an area's transportation improvement program (TIP), which is proposed for implementation during the current year. The annual element is submitted to the U.S. Department of Transportation as part of the required planning process. The passage of Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users SAFETEA-LU in 2005 created new and revised requirements for transportation planning and programs. Although SAFETEA-LU increased standards, most MPOs already were in compliance with the regulations. Some of the planning topic areas include transportation systems security, emergency preparedness, public participation plans for metropolitan planning, and requiring the electronic publication of plans and TIP/STIP by the MPOs. SAFETEA-LU requires that the statewide transportation planning process and the metropolitan planning process provide for consideration of projects and strategies that will protect and enhance the environment, promote energy conservation, improve the quality of life, and promote consistency between transportation improvements and state and local planned growth and economic development patterns. List of metropolitan planning organizations in the United States There are a large