Transportation Planning
Travel Forecasting
Developing travel forecasts to make smart mobility and land use-planning decisions.
The City is committed to using the best available data and developing reliable information to support smart mobility and land use planning decisions. The City uses existing and forecasted data to assist in creating the City's General Plan, community plans, and mobility and land use policies. As part of this planning process, travel forecast data is used to guide future roadway and circulation system decisions. Travel forecasting projects the future locations and volume of automobile and transit, travel based on future land use assumptions.
As part of the General Plan and community plan processes, the City, in cooperation with SANDAG, uses the latest geographic information systems (GIS) software to perform travel forecasts to test different alternatives for future land use patterns. The City, in partnership with the community, develops these future (20 to 30 years) land use alternatives. The testing process helps to identify potential congestion areas. This information is used to test and identify and evaluate potential roadway and transit improvements in conjunction with the different land use alternatives to identify a circulation system that provides the community with mobility options. The selected roadway and transit improvements are included in the community's facilities financing plan and are implemented through development fees and the City's Capital Improvement Program. The estimated future traffic volumes and street classifications determined by this process are included in each of the City's community plans.
Street classifications define the design characteristics of streets and the character of service the streets have been forecasted to provide. Classifications form a hierarchy of streets ranging from those that are primarily for travel between communities to streets that are primarily for local access. The street classifications are used to describe the circulation system included in each of the City's community plans. The circulation systems form a network of streets that work together to help serve the mobility needs for each community, the City, and the region.
Status
The City is currently working to update community transportation plans for Mission Valley, Centre City and Otay Mesa.