2012: Transportation Finance and Policy Related Solutions
For 2012, the competition theme focused on transportation finance and related policy solutions.
The U.S. transportation system is rapidly aging and in dire need of reconstruction and rehabilitation. The general public pays the price for this under-investment every day by sitting in traffic and paying more for goods. As car ownership, transit ridership, and goods movement increases, there is a need for greater capacity across all modes. Similarly, as the global economy continues to change, mobility and transportation efficiency become even more critical to staying competitive in world markets. With this immense need for transportation rehabilitation, recovery, and capacity improvement, federal monies are spread too thin, and state and local transportation agencies are seeking innovative financing strategies to fund transportation. Similarly, agencies are considering policy solutions, such as mileage-based user fees and managed lanes. These solutions may require public support in the form of a referendum or behavior change. How the solutions are communicated to the public becomes critical.
In response to the competition call, 18 entries were submitted. Of these, four winners and five honorable mentions were recognized for their efforts in communicating transportation finance and related policy solutions. These communication tools, featured in the 2012 competition brochure, epitomize the spirit of communicating complex information in an uncomplicated manner.
Transportation Priorities: How Would YOU Invest?
Metropolitan Transportation Commission, San Francisco Bay Area
Every four years, the Metropolitan Transportation Commission updates its Regional Transportation Plan. Public participation is critical to ensure an open, democratic process, in which all stakeholders have opportunity to offer input and share their vision for what a vibrant, livable Bay Area will look like decades from now. But how do transportation professionals help the public make sense of it all?
MTC’s answer in 2011 was to produce a clever and informative animated video focused on the transportation investment decisions – some $256 billion worth – at the core of the Plan Bay Area effort. The Transportation Priorities: How Would YOU Invest? video served to demystify the complexities of transportation planning and finance, and show interested Bay Area residents some of the trade-offs that will have to be made by MTC decision makers, all in five minutes.
How would you invest San Francisco’s transportation dollars: Be the City’s budget czar for a day!
San Francisco County Transportation Authority
The San Francisco County Transportation Authority is in the process of updating the San Francisco Transportation Plan, a 28‐year plan that establishes transportation investment priorities countywide. To educate the public about the difficult trade‐offs involved and especially to obtain input on spending priorities, the San Francisco County Transportation Authority has developed an interactive online budgeting tool. Titled “How would you invest San Francisco’s transportation dollars: be the City’s budget czar for a day!” it consists of a webpage that guides users through a series of transportation spending options under three expenditure categories: maintenance and operations; programs; and capital projects. The budgeting tool follows the trend of “gamification,” which uses game‐design techniques to make non‐game contexts more engaging and accessible.
Talking Trade-Offs: Using interactive public involvement techniques to prioritize investment on Minnesota’s state highways
Minnesota Department of Transportation
Traditionally, the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT) has used an open house format to communicate ideas and concepts in the State Highway Investment Plan update. Desiring a more robust public involvement element, the recent update uses a variety of communication techniques to better educate and engage the public in the difficult risk and investment trade-offs. In addition to using standard outreach techniques, such as maintaining a project website, using social media (Facebook and Twitter), and updates via a project email list, MnDOT implemented several innovative tools. Examples are a budgeting exercise, webinars, and an online tool to assess the values of the public and identify where citizens want greater investment along the state’s highways.
Regional Parking Initiative: Videos and Posters
Metropolitan Transportation Commission, San Francisco Bay Area The Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) Regional Parking Initiative is communicating with the public through alternative media and the use of humor and visual graphics. Staff presented a series of workshops on parking policies that included sessions with names such as “The Greedy Developer”, “How to Put Us to Work for You”. Cartoons with zombies poked fun at common parking policies, and Google Earth based-maps were used to demonstrate concepts. The financial implications of parking policies are largely overlooked. Central to this communications effort, MTC created four short provocative videos, a newscast, and visual posters to stimulate creative thinking, and invigorate and inform the purely policy discussions throughout the region, adding to more technical work. This effort begins to provide a foundation for conversations about the financial implications of the choices, so that we can develop public support for the transportation systems that serves the public interest.