Community Planning Workshop Program:
NYMTC and its members sponsor community planning workshops on various topics
Since 2001, NYMTC has held more than 100 workshops throughout its planning area to generate local planning on pedestrian safety and walkability. These contribute to local plans that incorporate goals from NYMTC's Regional Transportation Plans. As part of these workshops, NYMTC assists project sponsors with ways to tap into available federal funds. The workshops have helped groups of elected officials, local government staff, and citizens analyze current conditions and identify needed improvements. In addition to being popular with a broad cross-section of communities in NYMTC's planning area, the workshops generate awareness about pedestrian safety, walkability, and bicycle access.
After a five-year hiatus, NYMTC has recently relaunched its Community Planning Workshop Program based on goals identified in its Regional Transportation Plan, Moving Forward. Moving Forward seeks to ensure a transportation system that safely and efficiently serves today's population and plans for our region's growing number of residents, workers, and goods.
NYMTC, in collaboration with its consultant, the Public Outreach Engagement Team (POET) at Rutgers University, is holding meetings in locations identified by NYMTC's members in Coordinated Development Emphasis Areas (CDEA). CDEAs are locations where NYMTC anticipates an increase in population and seeks to promote transportation improvements and land use development that accommodate future growth within a sustainable framework. By using these areas as a targeting mechanism, NYMTC can work with local governments for a continuing program of community planning activities that:
- Encourage development in centers and downtowns to reinforce walkable, aesthetically pleasing, and transit-accessible environments
- Encourage consideration of local transportation issues in comprehensive/master planning and community visioning processes
- Make walking safer and more convenient through safety and streetscape improvements
- Support downtown development/redevelopment
- Encourage walkability, Complete Streets, and remote parking in targeted centers
- Complete and distribute the MTA First Mile/Last Mile Station Access Toolkit
- Provide planning assistance
- Facilitate discussions with the public enabling participants to develop, evaluate, and implement improvements for their communities
See Figures A-24 through A-33 within Appendix A of Moving Forward for maps showing the CDEAs identified within NYMTC's planning area.
The Community Planning Workshop Program is federally funded through the Unified Planning Work Program (UPWP), an annual or biennial statement of work identifying the planning priorities and activities carried out within a metropolitan planning area.