Improving the Transportation Planning Process in Cambridge
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PAGE NOT AVAILABLE Originalfrom Oig�ized cy Google NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY HE 318 C178 3 5556 021 318 712 Improving the Transportation Planning Process in Small Cities prepared by THE CITY OF CAMBRIDGE for DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY and the Transportation Systems Center December 1972 The contents of this report reflect the views of the City of Cambridge, which is responsible for the facts and the accuracy of the data presented herein. The contents do not necessarily reflect the official views or policy of the Department of Transportation. This report does not constitute a standard specification or regulation. This document will be available to the public through the National Technical Information Service Springfield, Virginia 22151 IMPROVING THE TRANSPORTATION PLANNING PROCESS IN CAMBRIDGE AND OTHER SMALL CITIES VOLUME I — THE ORGANIZATIONAL FRAMEWORK Volume II The Planning Program Volume III — Recommendations for Small Cities A Municipal Level Planning Study Prepared by the City of Cambridge, Massachusetts For the U. S. Department of Transportation Under Contract No. DOT-TSC-296 Department of Planning & Development Department of Traffic & Parking City of Cambridge, Massachusetts December 1972 44ANSPORTA:0s CENIts libRARY //A 3/? Č/72 DEDICATION This report is dedicated to O. Hugo Schuck of the U.S. Department of Transportation, Transportation Systems Center in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Mr. Schuck passed away on December 21, 1972, just prior to the completion of this study. Mr. Schuck's able and sensitive counseling to the City of Cambridge in the conduct of the study is greatly appreciated, and his guidance in the further implementation of the study recommendations will be missed. PARTICIPANTS MUNICIPAL LEVEL PLANNING STUDY CITY OF CAMBRIDGE Barbara A. Ackermann Mayor Francis H. Duehay Chairman, City Council Transportation and Parking Committee John H. Corcoran City Manager Robert A. Bowyer Director, Department of Planning and Development George Teso Director, Department of Traffic and Parking James F. Regan Chief of Police Department Robert F. Rowland Executive Director, Cambridge Redevelopment Authority Edward A. Handy Cambridge Transportation Coordinator; and Assistant Director -- Transportation, Department of Planning and Development Lauren M. Preston Assistant Director, Department of Traffic and Parking Captain Nicholas Fratto Commanding Officer of Traffic Division, Police Department Richard A. Lockhart Chief Project Administrator, Department of Planning and Development Michael Appleby Former Director of Planning, Model Cities Peter R. Helwig Chief, Comprehensive Planning and Programming Division, Department of Planning and Development Stephen E. Zecher Principal Planner, Department of Planning and Development Eva H. Gemmill Chief, Graphic Design Section, Department of Planning and Development Jonathan B. Gilmore Assistant Planner, Department of Planning and Development Peter E. Hahn Junior Planner, Department of Planning and Development Andre W. Zienkiewicz Planning Draftsman, Department of Planning and Development Juanita B. Ward Principal Clerk, Department of Planning and Development Judith Strong Planning Aid, Department of Planning and Development Janet L. Schlicting Senior Clerk Typist, Department of Planning and Development Maria L. Schofield Junior Clerk Stenographer, Department of Planning and Development U. S. DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION John E. Hirten Assistant Secretary for Environment and Urban Systems, TEU Richard Bouchard Director, Office of Transportation Planning Assistance, TEU Gene Tyndall Acting Chief of Planning and Coordination Division, Office of Planning Assistance, TEU Gerald Cichy Office of Transportation Planning Assistance, TEU Garold Thomas Office of Transportation Planning Assistance, TEU John D. Hodge Director, Transportation Systems Concepts, Transportation Systems Center, TSC 0. Hugo Schuck Technical Assistant to Director, Transporta tion Systems Concepts, TSC David S. Glater Advanced Program Planning Division, Transportation Systems Concepts, TSC Howard L. Slavin Advanced Program Planning Division, Transportation Systems Concepts, TSC CONSULTANTS AND OTHERS Michael M. Bernard Justin Gray Tunney F. Lee James E. Morey Marvin E. Manheim Michael A. Powills Arlee Reno Robert K. Sloane PREFACE — VOLUME I The history of urban problems since World War II has demonstrated clearly the critical need for an improved transpor tation planning process at the municipal level. Cities have not been able to fathom the complexities of their transporation problems, let alone marshall the resources needed to effectively address them. Instead, they have looked to the state and Federal governments for salvation — and after nearly three decades this hoped-for panacea has in many ways been found wanting. It was impractical to expect the higher levels of government to uni laterally develop regional and national transportation solutions that did not impact seriously on local quality of living. The contract under which this study has been carried out reflects a far-sighted view by the U.S. Department of Transportation, its Transportation Systems Center, and its Office of Environment and Urban Systems -- a view that the Federal Government can perform a vital function by fostering the development of an improved transportation planning process for small cities. The resulting three-volume report is believed by the study team to provide concepts and recommendations of value to small cities throughout the country. Volume I, contained herein, confronts the need for a basic organizational framework within which sound transportation plans and successful implementation can best be generated. Volume II develops an inventory of transportation studies needed by Cambridge, while Volume III recasts earlier material for specific use by other small cities. To the extent that the study may have been successful, the Federal Government will have helped build the foundations of a new Federal/state/local transportation planning partnership — one in which cities and towns can at last make strong, well- considered, grass-roots inputs without which Federal and state transportation planning efforts in urban areas cannot hope to succeed. TABLE OF CONTENTS VOLUME I — THE ORGANIZATIONAL FRAMEWORK PAGE INTRODUCTION 1 CHAPTER 1 — BASIC ORGANIZATIONAL ISSUES Introduction Local Consensus and Public Transportation Investment 9 "Top Down" Transportation Planning vs. the Reconcilia tion of Locally Generated Objectives 9 Section 1 -- Governmental Relationships Existing Governmental Relationships in Transportation Planning 11 — Relationship to Federal Revenue-Sharing Proposals 22 — Organizational Consequences of Federal Requirements for Local Community Participation 23 -- Regional Planning Problems 25 Section 2 — Local Governmental Considerations — Staging of Local Governmental Organizational Change 27 — Basic Structural Options for City Transportation Planning 27 Democratic Problems of "Executive Leadership" 29 Transportation Decision-Making Categories Their Relationship to Local Structure 30 — Budget Availability on Transportation Matters 30 ~ Funding Sources for Community Transportation Planning 31 — Under-Utilized Agency Resources for Transportation Planning Work in City Government 32 — Internal Cooperation Agreements 32 Problems of Department and Citizen Board Differences 32 Section 3 -- The Concept of a Transportation Forum -- Basic Transportation Forum Functions Affecting Working Structure 35 — Comparison of the Boston Transportation Planning Review (BTPR) and Transportation Forum Concepts 36 — Substitutability of Transportation 37 -- The Question of Referral Powers 37 Table of Contents: Volume I (Continued) PAGE -- The Transportation Forum Agenda 38 "Work in Progress" Reporting Government and Private 38 Options for Providing a Transportation Forum with Staff Capability 39 — City Agency Membership in the Transportation Forum 40 — Relationship of Cambridge's Area Planning Teams 40 CHAPTER 2 — PROPOSAL: A CITY MANAGER'S TRANSPORTATION FORUM Introduction — Background to Forum Concept 43 ~ Cambridge Involvement in Transportation Issues 45 — Current Status 46 Section 1 — The Forum: A Public Interaction Process — Why is the Public Interaction Process Needed: Its Purpose 47 — What the Public Interaction Process is (and isn't): Goals and Objectives 50 -- Structural Framework Considerations 50 — Organizational, Administrative and Operational Considerations 55 Section 2 -- Start Up and Operational Proposals — Current Status of CTF 65 — General Statement of CTF Functions 65 — Administration and Authority of CTF 66 — Procedures of the CTF 68 — The Working Committee and Other Committees 70 — The Coordinator and Staff Assistant 71 — Participation in the CTF 72 ~ Rights of the CTF 73 — Responsibilities of the CTF Member Groups 75 — Start-up Steps to be Taken 76 — How CTF Meetings Will Be Run 77 APPENDIX "A" — Governor's Executive Order No. 75 APPENDIX "B" — 1. City Manager's Report of April 3, 1972, to City Council Re Cambridge — U.S. Department of Transportation Study and Proposed City Manager's Cambridge Transportation Forum ■ Table of Contents: Volume I (Continued) 2. City Council's Resolution of April 10, 1972, En dorsing and Supporting Concept of City Manager's Cambridge Transportation Forum APPENDIX "C" — Prototype Meeting Format for City Mana ger's Cambridge Transportation Forum J INTRODUCTION The time was early December 1967. The speaker was John Kenneth Galbraith — Professor of Economics at Harvard, former U.S. Ambassador