Carbon Trace

We spent much of our time in vision exercises during the strategic plan transportation committee meeting yesterday. Our goal was to imagine what role transportation should play in creating the kind of community we want to live in by 2035 (when I’ll be 78 years old).

We did an overall visioning exercise and a series of exercises focused on 1) rail/air/transit, 2) bicycle/pedestrian, and 3) roads/freight.

The following is a list of themes/ideas that I found important:

Transportation in general:

• People should have real transportation choices rather than be resigned to a car-centric system.
• We must promote more urban density and encourage people to live closer to essential services.
• There needs to be more mixed-use development and a more even distribution of development.
• There should be multi-modal connections.
• There should be more regional connectivity, perhaps with light rail.

Rail/Air/Transit:

• Perhaps City Utilities should be encouraged to partner with communities outside Springfield to provide regional bus transit.
• Offer support services for plug-in vehicles.
• As gas-tax revenue dwindles, consider a mileabge assessment on cars.
• Land-use/planning changes necessary to increase urban density.
• Create a regional transportation authority
• Create a regional, multi-modal transportation center.

Bicycle/pedestrian:

• Establish state, county, city, and town complete streets programs.
• Sidewalks on major arteries.
• More bicycle parking.
• More Safe Routes to School programs.
• Connections between trails and street routes.
• Expand the greenways — a central north-south route needed.
• Develop a dedicated funding source for bike/ped improvements.

Roads/Freight:

• Create freight centers for consumer/wholesale pick-up.
• HOV lanes.
• Preserve state/federal power of eminent domain.
• Maintain a grid street system.
• Develop a new north-south route from Springfield to Ozark/Nixa.
• Orbital freeway to connect area cities.

The OTO will publish a more comprehensive list soon. I will link to it as an update to this post.

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