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The Bay Area's Regional Transportation Plan

One Way We're Winning World-Class Public Transportation and Walkable Communities

Program Spending in Bay Area Regional Transportation Plans Since TransForm's Founding in 1997

Since TransForm's founding, we have worked tenaciously with our regional coalition to shape the Bay Area's Regional Transportation Plan (RTP), which is updated about every four years. Why? Because the RTP is a $200+ billion, 25-year transportation plan - making it a huge opportunity to determine the future of the nine-country region and our quality of life.

TransForm has had a dramatic impact on the Regional Transportation Plan since our founding (RTP's are updated every three to four years). We have shifted hundreds of millions of dollars towards transit routes that connect low-income communities with jobs and healthcare; bicycle/pedestrian safety programs and projects; and rewards for cities that build additional housing near transit.

The 2009 RTP represents an important step in fighting climate change and creating a better Bay Area, though it still falls short of what it needs to be.

Read on for:

Contact Carli Paine, TransForm's Transportation Program Director, with any questions about our RTP advocacy.

 

Results of the 2009 Regional Transportation Plan Campaign

After more than two years of advocacy by TransForm, and the work of a wide range of organizations and activists, the 2009 Regional Transportation Plan (RTP) that was adopted by the Metropolitan Transportation Commission on April 22 took a number of important steps towards creating a region of walkable communities and world-class public transportation. Yet in many ways it also came up short.

On the bright side, the Metropolitan Transportation Commission adopted specific goals for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, increasing transportation affordability, and improving public health.

The 2009 RTP also included unprecedented levels of funding from uncommitted sources for: maintaining public transit; creating better transit connections between low-income communities and key destinations; walking and bicycling safety and infrastructure; promoting smart growth; and fighting climate change.

Excellent investments that TransForm advocated for include:

  • Doubling funding for MTC's smart growth program: the Transportation for Livable Communities program will grow from $27 million/year to $60 million/year.
  • Doubling funding for Lifeline, MTC's program that provides improved transit for low-income communities from $300 million to $700 million.
  • Dramatically more funding for the Safe Routes to Transit program, which funds projects improving the safety and convenience of walking and bicycling to transit. MTC committed an additional $10 million/year (over and above the current $2 million/year).
  • $10 million/year for a new Safe Routes to Schools grant program. See TransForm's Bringing Safe Routes to Scale report, which was key in building support for these funds.
  • A new climate protection grant program, which includes funding for transit efficiency and public education.
  • Full funding - $1 billion - to complete the Regional Bicycle Network (with the exception of the bridges)!

We applaud MTC for designating a significant part of their limited uncommitted funding for these excellent projects and programs. We urge MTC to allocate full funding for these excellent investments immediately.

But the RTP is still not what it needs to be: an outcomes-based plan.

Even MTC recognizes that these investments, once you consider the long list of "committed" projects, are not enough to meet their adopted goals.

That is why TransForm advocated for MTC to reconsider a host of highway expansions that will make achieving MTC's new goals impossible. Read our July 21, 2008 letter to MTC asking them to rethink key projects. While we didn't win this time around, MTC did agree to analyzing the "committed" projects early in the next RTP process to see how they support the new goals.

We deeply thank our activists and regional coalition member organizations, especially Greenbelt Alliance, the Sierra Club, Urban Habitat and the Bay Area Bicycle Coalition for their efforts. More than 100 activists and organizations helped develop the RTP platform, Fighting Climate Change and Winning a Better Bay Area, that guided our campaign. Read a comparison of what we asked for in the platform versus what we won.

Contact Carli Paine, TransForm's Transportation Program Director, with any questions about our 2009 RTP campaign.

 

How TransForm Will Work to Make the Next Regional Transportation Plan a Model

The 2009 Regional Transportation Plan (RTP) represents an important step towards creating a region of walkable communities and world-class public transportation.

The final 2009 RTP included unprecedented levels of funding for:

  • Maintaining public transit
  • Creating better transit connections between low-income communities and key destinations
  • Walking and bicycling safety and infrastructure
  • Promoting smart growth
  • Fighting climate change.

But the RTP is still not what it needs to be: an outcomes-based plan. For the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) to actually achieve its new environmental, equity, health, and safety goals, every project and program in future RTP's - no matter the funding source - must be shown to make significant contributions toward these goals.

This is especially true in terms of fighting climate change. The biggest lesson from the 2009 RTP campaign was that we need much better land use and smart transportation pricing if we have any hope of meeting climate change goals.

California's new smart growth law, SB 375, calls for the creation of regional "Sustainable Community Strategies".

This would require the Bay Area's next RTP to attempt to create an "alternative" that achieves a regional greenhouse gas target. That target will be assigned by September 30, 2010. Read TransForm's 2-page summary of SB 375.

We believe the next RTP can be a model in fighting climate change and improving our quality of life. That's why we're calling on MTC to start preparing now to successfully adopt a Sustainable Community Strategy in 2013 by:

  • Asking County Congestion Management Agencies to adopt MTC's goals, and then reevaluating their proposed county investments in light of these plans. Without this crucial step MTC may just end up stapling together a long list of "committed" projects again - including projects that are not close to construction and could be reconsidered.
  • Prioritizing funding for the places in the Bay Area that are focusing growth around transit.
  • Advocating for new state and federal funds to help local governments engage communities in planning, update zoning codes, and implement projects that will support walkable mixed-use, mixed income neighborhoods around transit.
  • Advocating for statutory authority to pursue transportation pricing that helps reduce driving and increases transportation choices.
  • Advocating for increased and stable funding for public transit operations.

TransForm and partners are developing a strategy to ensure that the Bay Area will be ready for the next RTP and make it a model.

Contact Carli Paine, TransForm's Transportation Program Director, with questions about our RTP advocacy.