By Erik Noonan | May 19, 2026
The 2026 Minnesota legislative session opened February 17 under circumstances no one planned for. Lawmakers took their seats weeks after the assassination of Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband, the attempted assassination of Sen. John Hoffman (DFL-33) and his family, and the mass shooting at Annunciation school in Minneapolis. Three weeks before the gavel dropped, Alex Pretti — a 37-year-old VA ICU nurse and beloved member of the bike community — was shot and killed by U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers on Nicollet Avenue in Minneapolis, after Renée Good was killed by federal agents during Operation Metro Surge just weeks earlier. For many of the people BikeMN works alongside, traveling to St. Paul to advocate for better mobility wasn’t just inconvenient — it was actively unsafe.
A split House, a one-seat DFL Senate majority, an election year, a lame-duck governor, and the bruises of a 2025 session that cut $86.3 million from Metro Transit over four years — the conditions didn’t favor big moves. Our Streets said it plainly: 2026 is a year for continuing conversations, holding ground, and building the record for 2027.
The session adjourned sine die just before midnight Sunday. Here’s how the things BikeMN cares about landed.
What passed
Bonding Bill — $1.24 billion
The legislature passed a $1.24 billion bonding bill in the final hours of session. The headline transportation number is $180 million toward MnDOT road and highway maintenance — the kind of fix-it-first spending the governor’s supplemental budget conspicuously avoided. What’s not in it: transit. Sen. Scott Dibble (DFL-62) was direct: “There is zero for transit in this bill, and that is a huge and glaring omission.” Two sessions after the 2023 omnibus was supposed to change course, transit funding has been cut, not restored. Every transit funding cut rolls down to being a cut to bike and pedestrian facilities. These continue to be treated as ‘nice to haves’ instead of what they are: ways to make the whole system safer and more functional.
Final Budget Deal — HCMC Saved and Road Funding Undercut
The end-of-session deal centered on a rescue of Hennepin County Medical Center ($205 million immediate, $500 million reserve) and a two-year rollback on vehicle registration fees. The HCMC deal matters — keeping a Level 1 trauma center open is a public health floor worth protecting, and it serves people who depend on transit and active transportation to get there.
The tab fee rollback is a frustrating and short-sighted trade. Returning $254 million in registration fee revenue — and pulling another $119 million from the Highway User Tax Distribution Fund in FY2027 alone — while bonding $180 million to patch the maintenance backlog is fiscal sleight of hand. Minnesota faces a $15 to $20 billion maintenance shortfall on the fourth-largest road network in the country by lane miles. Undercutting that revenue base, then borrowing to fill the gap, shifts real costs onto future budgets. A ‘car-sized-fits-all’ transportation system has a car-sized maintenance bill. The bridge inspection reports come due regardless.
Office of Inspector General
The Office of Inspector General passed 127-5 in the House and 66-0 in the Senate. Gov. Walz signed it into law May 15. It will become operational in September 2027 as an independent watchdog with authority to audit agencies, investigate fraud, and maintain an anonymous tip line.
The fraud conversation drove this bill. BikeMN’s interest is parallel: MnDOT district offices need real accountability for compliance with state-level design mandates. Safe Routes to School standards, pedestrian infrastructure requirements, protected bike facilities — these are on the books, but implementation varies dramatically by district with no enforcement mechanism. The OIG isn’t a transportation-specific body, but the precedent that agencies are subject to independent oversight is one we intend to build on. It should be easier to make this argument now.
Safe Routes to School Funding
The bonding bill included $1 million in GO bonding for the Safe Routes to School Infrastructure Program — a quiet line item, but an important one. The program has been on the books since 2012, and MnDOT has put nearly $40 million toward SRTS projects statewide since 2006: sidewalks to schools, improved crossings, trails along state highways where kids actually travel. No local match required.
A million dollars doesn’t go far in a state this size — the 2024 solicitation had $8.5 million available and still left projects unfunded. But it keeps the program alive and the next solicitation open, which MnDOT expects to announce this summer.
Safe Routes to School is core to BikeMN’s mission. Walk! Bike! Fun!, our K–8 pedestrian and bicycle safety education program, is built to work alongside the infrastructure side — curriculum and encouragement don’t mean much if kids don’t have a safe route to use. We’ll keep pushing for this line item to grow.
What didn’t pass — and what that means for 2027
Defining E-Motos — HF 3785 / SF 4186
HF 3785 was, all session, the bill most likely to cross the finish line. The “e-bike crisis” in local news is, in most cases, an e-moto crisis — devices exceeding federal power and speed thresholds, illegally marketed and sold as e-bikes. Minnesota’s 2026 Electric-Assisted Bicycle Youth Operation Study confirmed it. The bill clarified which existing motor vehicle classifications apply to devices exceeding 1 HP/750W or 20 mph under their own power. Carried by Rep. Tom Dippel (R-41B), Rep. Lucy Rehm (DFL-48B), Sen. Julia Coleman (R-49), and Sen. Jim Abeler (R-35), it cleared the House Ways and Means Committee in late April with bipartisan support.
Then, well after all committee deadlines had passed, Senate Transportation Committee members attached amendments imposing speed restrictions in business districts applying only to e-bikes, and a helmet mandate covering only e-bike riders ages 15 to 18. Both targeted the legal, regulated devices that weren’t the problem — and neither aligned with the state’s own research. The House couldn’t support the bill as amended, and it died. Elected leaders should engage Minnesota’s nation-leading bicycle safety expertise before pursuing bicycle legislation. We’re here, we know this space, and we want to help get it right. This comes back in 2027.
Intelligent Speed Assistance — HF 3429 / SF 3691
Rep. Larry Kraft (DFL-46A) authored this bill to require repeat speeders to have an Intelligent Speed Assistance device installed in their vehicle — technology that physically prevents a car from exceeding the posted speed limit, using location tracking. It follows the same logic as Minnesota’s ignition interlock law, which Kraft also authored. The bill cleared the House Transportation Finance and Policy Committee in February, co-authored by Rep. Brad Tabke (DFL-54B), Rep. Katie Jones (DFL-61A), and Rep. Liz Olson Sencer-Mura. Without Republican support in the tied House, it didn’t reach the floor. Roughly 30% of deaths on Minnesota roads are primarily caused by speed. The resistance wasn’t about the technology or the evidence. BikeMN wants to see this pass in 2027.
Highway Purposes — HF 186 / SF 817 and HF 1630 / SF 1972
Two years of work, and the problem remains: highway funding can’t be used for transit or active transportation unless a project qualifies as “highway purposes” — a constraint that cost the Central Avenue F Line BRT project nearly $18 million and years of delay. Both the Our Streets version (HF 186) and BikeMN’s version (HF 1630) passed the Senate Transportation Committee; neither made the final deal. The record is there for 2027.
MSA Design Standards — SF 2162 / HF 4434
A significant share of Minnesota’s neighborhood streets are Municipal/County State Aid roads built to design standards written in 1957 — forcing roads to be overbuilt for car speeds and making protected bike infrastructure nearly impossible without a variance process that rarely works. SF 2162, carried by Sen. Scott Dibble (DFL-62) and Sen. Melissa Wiklund (DFL-52), would let cities use any FHWA-approved standard. As I wrote at Streets.mn in March, this may be the most consequential long-term bill in BikeMN’s package. It didn’t pass. The conversation is better grounded than a year ago.
Fix It First — HF 3728 / SF 4055
MnDOT faces a $15 to $20 billion maintenance shortfall over 20 years. Rep. Erin Koegel (DFL-39A) and Sen. Doron Clark (DFL-60) carried a bill requiring MnDOT to meet maintenance standards before adding new highway capacity. It was laid over after a fiscal note inflated its costs — revealing that MnDOT has no clear accounting of how project spending aligns with maintenance needs. That’s the problem the bill is trying to solve. Rep. Tom Murphy (R-9B) co-authored; that bipartisan foothold matters for 2027.
Jaywalking Decriminalization — SF 1836 / HF 1509
About 435 citations were issued statewide over five years. This bill removes crossing mid-block as a primary offense but preserves citations for actual hazards. The Senate version passed in 2025; the House stalled after the Police Chiefs Association opposed it. The reform matters most for people with disabilities and communities of color, who are cited disproportionately. This is back on the list for 2027.
What we held back
Yellow Light Stop Rule — HF 3774: Rep. Mary Frances Clardy (DFL-53A) introduced a bill requiring people biking in bike lanes to stop completely at yellow lights. BikeMN Executive Director Michael Wojcik testified against it: safe intersection design moves people biking through conflict zones quickly, it does not hold them stationary. The bill did not advance.
Mandatory Helmet Law and Local E-Bike Speed Limits — SF 3236 / SF 3280: Sen. Ann Johnson Stewart (DFL-45) carried two bills targeting youth e-bike riders. The 2026 Youth E-Bike Study warned that over-regulation risks biased enforcement and undue burden on families and public safety agencies. Our position is unchanged: we support helmets and oppose mandates. Neither passed — and similar language resurfaced as the amendments that killed HF 3785.
Ban on E-Bikes from Shared Facilities: Rep. Tom Dippel (R-41B) carried a bill banning e-bikes from bike lanes and shared-use facilities. The evidence points the other direction. It did not advance.
Connected and Autonomous Vehicles: Despite manufactured urgency around Waymo, Tesla Taxi, and other self-driving platforms, no CAV bills reached the governor’s desk. Sen. Dibble’s SF 4618 — requiring independent safety verification in Minnesota conditions and protecting local regulatory authority — reflected the right framework. The fight over CAV policy continues, and we’ll stay in it.
Still worth watching
HF 3966 / SF 4377 — Bus Lane Parking Enforcement: Automated enforcement of parking in bus lanes. Carried by Rep. Katie Jones (DFL-61A), Rep. Larry Kraft (DFL-46A), Rep. Erin Koegel (DFL-39A), and Rep. Julie Greene (DFL-50B); Sen. Dibble in the Senate. Bipartisan potential; should be reintroduced early.
HF 1309 / SF 1268 — Parking Minimums Prohibition: Statewide prohibition on parking minimums. Keeps advancing. It’ll pass eventually.
HF 3121 — Community Engagement / Project Portal: Rep. Koegel’s public-facing map portal for trunk highway projects. Needs a new champion in 2027.
H.R. 4924 — Federal Anti-Railbanking: Rep. Sam Graves (R-Mo.) bill to strip railbanking protections from converted trail corridors, undermining Rails to Trails. Watching at the federal level.
The accounting
The session ended with a divided government finding the floor, not the ceiling. The HCMC deal was necessary. The bonding bill’s maintenance dollars are real. The OIG is a genuine step toward the kind of state agency accountability BikeMN has been pushing for longer than the fraud scandal has been in the news. Everything else — e-moto, ISA, highway purposes, MSA standards, Fix It First, jaywalking — is unfinished work in a constrained session. The testimony happened. The arguments landed. The record for 2027 is better than the one we came in with, and November’s elections will determine what that record can do.
For the full picture, read BikeMN’s legislative priorities. The Our Streets mid-session update covers the broader coalition view. And the Streets.mn piece from March is still a useful frame for why any of this matters for the places where people actually live. Look for a forthcoming piece in Streets.mn breaking down the session with our friends from Neighbors for More Neighbors, Our Streets, Move MN, All Aboard MN, and Sierra Club. We are also planning to publish a more in-depth look at what happened with the e-moto bill that had an ‘all but sure’ path to passing… until it didn’t.
Minnesota is a national leader in forward-thinking transportation policy — and that didn’t happen by chance. For over 17 years, BikeMN has been at the table, fight after fight, shaping a future where biking, walking, and rolling is safe, accessible, and valued. That work is funded by members like you. Join as a sustaining supporter today at bikemn.org/join — $5 or $10 a month helps ensure Minnesota stays ahead. We all move forward together.