If you live, work, or visit Northern Virginia, please take a moment to speak up for better transit, walking and biking, and more homes near transit and destinations. The Northern Virginia Transportation Authority (NVTA) wants your input by August 9 for its next regional plan.
What NVTA does — NVTA helps fund some of the transportation projects in our region. Despite changing priorities in Northern VA, the agency still focuses too much on car congestion and mostly ignores the role of more housing in walkable, compact, transit-oriented places in reducing the need to drive for long distances for most trips. On the positive side, the agency is promoting Bus Rapid Transit and has identified potential new corridors.
The survey will inform NVTA’s long-range “TransAction” transportation plan. Previous plans have included transit projects but also called for over 1,000 new lane miles of expanded highways and arterials – a $75 Billion dollar list of projects the region could never afford and that would lead to the average NoVA resident driving even more than they do today. The plans made no recommendations for more housing near jobs or better land use. See links below for more background.
How your survey answers can help — The survey asks about how you travel, and what you’d like to see prioritized. Where the survey asks about “your biggest priorities for transportation in the future”, CSG recommends:
- Select “Other” and specify things like:
- more housing opportunities in close-in communities and near transit
- more compact mixed-use places
- narrower roads for safer and nicer places for new homes and businesses
- converting existing road lanes for Bus Rapid Transit
- retrofit suburban strip arterials for more housing, walking, biking and bus service
- Enhance public transit
- Improve roadway safety
- Make it easier to walk and bike places
Background
NVTA TransAction update page — details the plan components, process, and how public feedback is used
CSG article on the previous TransAction plan — has lessons for how the current process can be improved
CSG “On the Wrong Road” report — analysis of 1,200 miles of new highway/arterial lane miles in 2017 TransAction Plan
Featured image: Hugh Kenny