We are at the approximate mid-point of the moveDC planning
effort. We’d like to extend a special thank you to everyone who has provided
input into the planning process to date. Your input has been valuable and
insightful. We hope that you’ll continue to participate in-person and online.
We’d also like to take a moment to encourage everyone who
has not attended one of our events, taken a survey, or followed us on social
media to take the plunge. Join the moveDC movement. Visit www.wemoveDC.org to learn more.
In September we’ll launch
two surveys and host another publicly-accessible plan advisory committee (TPAC)
meeting on September 30th at the Reeve's Center. In October we’ll host our third round of in-person and online
workshops (dates and locations coming soon). In October and through the end of
the year, we’ll also host monthly advisory committee meetings. In the coming
months, we hope you’ll lend your voice to the conversation on transportation in
the District.
In follow-up to our meeting of last week (August 22, 2013)
with the plan advisory committee (TPAC) and public, we wanted to share some
additional information on several things that were discussed. The following is
a brief summary of topics of conversation that were raised along with
additional planning team perspective and information on each.
1. TPAC Comment: Tools to help decide on
priorities with respect to mobility and access would be helpful.
Planning Team: Glad that you raised this. The question on
prioritization is timely. As a part of our effort, we will be developing a
decision framework for weighing potential transportation initiative priorities.
This is a topic we had planned to begin discussion on in September. As a part
of our effort, we will refer to successful examples of prioritization tools and
approaches from other places as well as from the experience of DDOT. In terms
of developing a tool, the goal outcome of the effort will be to have a defined
and documented approach through which to process, score, and rate
transportation initiatives. Bigger picture, our goal is to create reliability
in the way that projects and priorities are considered so that we focus our
limited resources where they can best help us achieve our long-term city goals.
You are welcome to come to the next TPAC meeting with thoughts/ieas on
prioritization.
2. TPAC Comment: Goals are an important
consideration in terms of the plan and measuring progress of the transportation
system over time. They should help inform decision-making and also communicate
how we are doing relevant to other things happening in the region and to how we
are serving people.
Planning Team: Understanding the wide reach of transportation,
early in the moveDC process the planning team did a lot of research. We looked
at what other places (nationally and internationally) are doing in terms of
transportation goals. We also identified goals in regional plans, District
agency plans not related to transportation, and District agency plans related
to transportation. From all of our research, we compiled a set of goals and
performance measures for moveDC. Some of the performance measures will be used
in helping to make decisions during the planning process, while others could
have use in monitoring the performance of our system over time. Hearing your
comments related to setting specific targets, we took a second look at the way
we had defined our goals in terms of themes and restructured and organized them
around more defined targets. Below is a
summary of how we’ve approached the bigger picture transportation goals and
targets for the plan:
- Sustainability and health: Achieve 75% of all District trips by non-auto modes – How well do we increase access to parks and green space? How does the plan relate to changing climatological conditions? How well does the plan offer opportunities for people to walk and bicycle?
- Citywide
accessibility and mobility: Maximize system reliability and capacity for moving
people and goods - How much do we increase our ability to move people? Will
the system be efficient and reliable? What will the coverage of different
transportation modes be to people? How well do we accommodate the movement of
goods and services?
- Neighborhood
accessibility and connectivity: Support neighborhood vitality and economic
development - How well do we do in terms of offering people more and better
transportation choices? Do we increase access to the places people want and
need to go? How well does transportation do in terms of supporting planned
growth?
- Safety
and security: Achieve zero fatalities and serious injuries on District
transportation network – Are we making our transportation system redundant
where it needs to be? How well are we doing in improving the safety of all
modal networks?
- Public
space: Reinforce Washington, D.C.’s historic landscapes and quality of
neighborhood public space – Are we protecting important corridors and urban
landscapes? How well are we doing in making our streets functional, beautiful,
and walkable? How much are we increasing the city’s tree canopy?
- Preservation
and implementation: Achieve a state of good repair for all District
infrastructure – How are we doing in achieving a full state of good repair
for roads, bridges, and sidewalks?
- Funding
and finance: Invest in transportation to achieve outcomes within the plan
horizon – How are we doing in establishing and securing sustainable
long-term transportation funding? Are we making our transportation system (from
an energy perspective) more efficient? Are we delivering projects on time and
budget?
3. TPAC Comment: Stable, secure long-term transportation
funding is important. Keeping options open to new ways to fund transportation
is important. It also will be important to create/identify secure sources of
funding.
Planning Team: We couldn’t agree more with your comment on the need
to have stable, secure, and sustainable long-term transportation funding.
Nationally and internationally, funding is at the forefront of most discussions
relating obstacles on meeting long-term transportation needs. In the coming
months, we will begin a discussion with you on transportation financing. We’ll
talk about where the opportunities and challenges lie and offer our best
forecast of what’s ahead. Later in the planning process, we’ll apply what we
can know (there is lots that we just can’t predict) and try to narrow the gap
between what we need and what we can reasonably expect to finance. We’ll
identify innovative approaches to finance as well as those we have relied on in
the past that have value for the future.
4. TPAC Comment: We need to be aware that
the District will continue to be a substantial employment destination for the
region. We can’t lose sight of the fact that even if we (within the District)
have lots of great, useful, and effective transportation choices, we will still
be significantly affected by the influx of the region’s commuters and visitors
each day.
Planning Team: This is an important issue. We are testing several
approaches to reducing the negative impacts of it through the scenarios we are
evaluating. We have considered a number of measures to incent and disincent
people to make choices that are more sustainable within what the District’s
transportation system can provide and better meet the District’s transportation
goals. For longer distance trips originating outside the District, we are
evaluating the effect of changes to commuter rail—more trains, more times of
the day, in more directions (not just peak), and some running from Maryland
into Virginia and some from Virginia into Maryland. We also are studying the
effect of congestion pricing and vehicle occupancy policies (HOV/HOT)—in a
defined geographic area of downtown and along major entry and through
corridors. For moderate distance trips, we are looking at where our transit and
bicycle investments can connect with neighboring jurisdictions’ services and
facilities.
5. TPAC Comment: We need to have a focus
on connecting neighborhoods and offering transportation choices for
neighborhoods throughout the city.
Planning Team: We have several performance measures that we’ll be
reporting information for that specifically address transportation coverage for
neighborhoods. In a nutshell, these are:
- Transportation choices between city neighborhoods
- Transportation availability to population centers, jobs, schools, amenities, and services
- Transportation availability to economically challenged areas
- Coverage of transportation networks to population
6. TPAC Comment: We need to discuss, do we
need to discuss, whether we should be establishing corridor, area, or
systemwide modal priorities (i.e. San Francisco’s “Transit First” policy)?
Planning Team: Good question. We’ve been discussing the
establishment of modal priorities from the beginning of the planning process.
We’ve been discussing this because of the natural tendency to try to put
everything in the same place (bike facility, transit facility, wide sidewalk,
lots of vehicle lanes, parking, etc.) in the network to very often, an
undesirable outcome. As we’ve approached the different plan approaches from a
geographic perspective, we have sought to create complementary separation and
coexistence among the modal networks. Our goal has been to not have everything
need to inhabit the same limited set of streets and to instead create complete
and complementary networks that overlap where needed and are separate, but
interconnected elsewhere. All of this stated and taking a step back, we also
are looking and starting a discussion on systemwide modal priority at a policy
level. We have talked about the value and potential pitfalls of making a
citywide statement on modal priority and have not yet come to resolution. This
could be a very helpful topic at an upcoming meeting and we’d welcome a lively
debate on it and its many potential approaches and outcomes.
7. TPAC Comment: We’d like to view meeting
materials ahead of time with some expectation from the planning team as to what
you’d like from us at upcoming meetings:
Planning Team: We will share all materials ahead of time and also
pose some framing type questions for discussion and consideration at upcoming
meetings. For anticipatory purposes, our goal at upcoming meetings is to start
talking about prioritization, performance of different aspects of the scenarios
we’re studying, finance, and an overall plan policy framework. The comment made
previously regarding modal priority would be a very timely and useful
discussion to have and come to a better understanding of at the next meeting. Tomorrow (Friday, August 30th), we will have uploaded several materials to the project website for you including the
local bus study update presentation, street typology discussion, and
performance measures document. (www.wemoveDC.org/resources.html)
8. TPAC Comment: Will the plan indicate
likely implementation horizons for important elements?
Planning Team: Yes. We will lay the plan out in its ultimate form
for the planning horizon year, 2040, and then back into short-, mid-, and
long-term horizons.
Please let us know if we’ve missed big follow-up topics from our last meeting and we’ll do our best to share other thoughts, provide
information, or respond. We hope that this has been helpful and informative and
that you’ll comment on the information above and start thinking about attending our
upcoming September advisory committee meeting. Advisory committee member or not, we hope that everyone will feel welcome to come attend an advisory committee meeting. We always provide time for
public comments and discussion and encourage dialogue.
