Planning on a Shoestring – Creating a Multimodal Transportation Plan for Small and Medium Size Communities on a Small Size Budget

As urban development continues outward, the trend is toward fast-growing, small and medium size communities more than it is toward new, major cities. As these communities grow, they find that they should, or must, develop a plan to accommodate that growth. In these days of constrained budgets, how to develop that plan is as much of a budget issue as it is a capital facilities plan issue. Many cities may be losing out as such plans are required in order to assess Transportation System Development Charges (SDC) or Traffic Impact Fees (TIF). Using existing processes and data as much as possible, and interviewing those who work with the transportation system on a daily basis, can result in a wealth of information for the cost of a few phone calls and computer time, leaving a good budget to analyze the data and prepare a sound plan. Parsons Brinckerhoff’s (PB) Portland office has developed several transportation plans recently for small and medium size jurisdictions, with budgets well-under $100,000, which also included calculations for TIFs. These are multimodal plans that identify current and future deficiencies in the transportation system, capital project needs and costs, changes in codes and ordinances, as well as identifying financing strategies including traffic impact fees. Some recent planning work that we have completed include city Transportation Capital Facilities Plans for Ridgefield, La Center, and Washougal, Washington. This paper will fully elaborate on budget-saving and cost-cutting techniques we have successfully applied on the small- and medium-size area transportation plans.

• Corporate Authors:

  Transportation Research Board

  500 Fifth Street, NW
  Washington, DC  United States  20001
• Authors:
  • Green, Chuck
  • Noel, Scott
• Conference:
  • 11th National Conference on Transportation Planning for Small and Medium-Sized Communities
  • Location: Portland OR, United States
  • Date: 2008-9-17 to 2008-9-19
• Publication Date: 2008

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: CD-ROM
• Features: Figures; Maps; Tables;
• Pagination: 10p
• Monograph Title: Tools of the Trade: 11th National Conference on Transportation Planning for Small and Medium-Sized Communities

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Budgeting; Capital investments; Impact studies; Medium sized cities; Multimodal transportation; Planning and design; Small cities; Transportation planning
• Subject Areas: Data and Information Technology; Highways; Planning and Forecasting; I72: Traffic and Transport Planning;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01139200
• Record Type: Publication
• Files: TRIS, TRB
• Created Date: Aug 31 2009 9:25AM