FROM BUILDING TO MANAGING: COPING WITH THE "4TH C" OF TRANSPORTATION PLANNING

In the early days of transportation planning in the United States, the goal was increasing capacity for economic development and national security through the 3C approach for comprehensive, cooperative and continuous planning as defined by the 1962 Highway Act. Since that time, transportation planners have characterized the transportation problem primarily in terms of providing capacity to accommodate increasing numbers of cars and trucks. Transportation system performance has been measured almost exclusively in terms of vehicles rather than in terms of people, goods and the broad quality of the travel experience. The planning process may have been comprehensive, cooperative and continuous, but only in terms of planning highway facilities for motor vehicles. The traditional transportation planning approach is limited in its ability to respond to change and consider the sustainability of transportation facilities and services. This approach seeks to accomodate existing and future needs based on current trends and does not accommodate planning with a vision of how conditions could be. Projecting trends will always be an important part of the planning process, but the inability to accurately predict the future requires increased consideration of broad impacts, regional needs, emerging trends, and opportunities to affect change.