LEGISLATIVE PERSPECTIVES ON THE STATE TRANSPORTATION PLANNING PROCESS AND TRANSIT PLANNING IN CALIFORNIA

The state of California has created a multimodal Department of Transportation and has embarked on a major statewide transportation planning effort. Although the legislation gives much of the responsibility for planning to regional agencies in the major metropolitan area, both the California Department of Transportation and the California legislature have important roles in the first iteration of a plan to be developed by 1976. This paper points out several concerns that the legislature may pursue in reviewing and guiding the planning process. These concerns deal with the issues of goal setting, decision making, and conflict resolution rather than with the technical details of planning. Four concerns about multimodal planning are examined in this paper: (a) planning for operations versus planning for facilities; (b) corridor versus local travel needs; (c) planning bases in technical expertise and analytical technique versus public openness and broad participation; and (d) programming versus master planning. Because transit planning has been largely absent from past state-level transportation concerns, several conceptual transit planning issues are raised in this paper as well. Examples from the recent Los Angeles planning experience illustrate legislative interest in staged decision-making and multimode transit solutions.