Metropolitan planning organization
Encyclopedia
A metropolitan
Metropolitan area
The term metropolitan area refers to a region consisting of a densely populated urban core and its less-populated surrounding territories, sharing industry, infrastructure, and housing. A metropolitan area usually encompasses multiple jurisdictions and municipalities: neighborhoods, townships,...

 planning
Planning
Planning in organizations and public policy is both the organizational process of creating and maintaining a plan; and the psychological process of thinking about the activities required to create a desired goal on some scale. As such, it is a fundamental property of intelligent behavior...

 organization
(MPO) is a federally-mandated and federally-funded transportation policy-making organization in the United States that is made up of representatives from local government
Government
Government refers to the legislators, administrators, and arbitrators in the administrative bureaucracy who control a state at a given time, and to the system of government by which they are organized...

 and governmental transportation authorities. The United States Congress
United States Congress
The United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States, consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Congress meets in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C....

 passed the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1962, which required the formation of an MPO for any urbanized area
Urban area
An urban area is characterized by higher population density and vast human features in comparison to areas surrounding it. Urban areas may be cities, towns or conurbations, but the term is not commonly extended to rural settlements such as villages and hamlets.Urban areas are created and further...

 (UZA) with a population greater than 50,000. Federal funding for transportation projects and programs are channeled through this planning process. Congress created MPOs in order to ensure that existing and future expenditures of governmental funds for transportation projects and programs are based on a continuing, cooperative, and comprehensive (“3-C”) planning process. Statewide and metropolitan transportation planning processes are governed by federal law . Transparency through public access to participation in the planning process and electronic publication
Internet
The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...

 of plans now is required by federal law. As of 2005, there are 385 MPOs in the U.S.

Purpose

In creating the requirements for MPOs and a metropolitan planning process, Congress identified several key reasons MPOs are essential:
  • transportation investment means allocating scarce federal and other transportation funding resources appropriately;
  • planning needs to reflect the region’s shared vision for its future;
  • adequate transportation planning requires a comprehensive examination of the region’s future and investment alternatives; and
  • an MPO is needed to facilitate collaboration of governments, interested parties, and residents in the planning process.


In other words, the federal government wishes to see federal transportation funds spent in a manner that has a basis in metropolitan region-wide plans developed through inter-governmental collaboration, rational analysis, and consensus-based decision-making.

Governance

Typically, an MPO governance
Governance
Governance is the act of governing. It relates to decisions that define expectations, grant power, or verify performance. It consists of either a separate process or part of management or leadership processes...

 structure includes a variety of committees as well as a professional staff. The “policy committee” is the top-level decision-making body for the planning organization. In most MPOs, the policy committee comprises:
  • elected or appointed officials from local governmental jurisdictions such as municipalities or counties
    County
    A county is a jurisdiction of local government in certain modern nations. Historically in mainland Europe, the original French term, comté, and its equivalents in other languages denoted a jurisdiction under the sovereignty of a count A county is a jurisdiction of local government in certain...

    ;
  • representatives of different transportation modes, such as public transit, freight, bicycle
    Bicycle
    A bicycle, also known as a bike, pushbike or cycle, is a human-powered, pedal-driven, single-track vehicle, having two wheels attached to a frame, one behind the other. A person who rides a bicycle is called a cyclist, or bicyclist....

    /pedestrian
    Pedestrian
    A pedestrian is a person traveling on foot, whether walking or running. In some communities, those traveling using roller skates or skateboards are also considered to be pedestrians. In modern times, the term mostly refers to someone walking on a road or footpath, but this was not the case...

    ; and
  • state agency officials such as, state Department of Transportation
    Department of Transportation
    The Department of Transportation is the most common name for a government agency in North America devoted to transportation. The largest is the United States Department of Transportation, which oversees interstate travel. All U.S. states, Canadian provinces, and many local agencies also have...

    , environmental agency, etc.; and
  • non-voting members such as FHWA
    Federal Highway Administration
    The Federal Highway Administration is a division of the United States Department of Transportation that specializes in highway transportation. The agency's major activities are grouped into two "programs," the Federal-aid Highway Program and the Federal Lands Highway Program...

    , FTA
    FTA
    FTA may stand for:* The Faery Tale Adventure, a computer game* Freight Transport Association* Failure to appear, a legal term* Fault tree analysis, a systems engineering term* Federación de Trabajadores Arubanos, the Aruban Workers' Federation...

    , FAA, FRA
    FRA
    Fra is a variant of Friar.FRA may refer to:* Forward Rate Agreement , a financial instrument* Federal Railroad Administration, a division of the United States Department of Transportation...

    , staff advisers from state departments of transportation, Chambers of Commerce, etc.


With only a few unique exceptions nationwide (such as the MPO in Portland
Metro (Oregon regional government)
Metro, formerly known as Metropolitan Service District, is the regional governmental agency for the Oregon portion of the Portland metropolitan area...

, Oregon), MPO policy committee members are not elected directly by citizens. Rather, a policy committee member typically is an elected or appointed official of one of the MPO’s constituent local jurisdictions. The policy committee member thus has legal authority to speak and act on behalf of that jurisdiction in the MPO setting. However, Federal law does not require that MPO policy committee members are representative of the metropolitan areas' populations. Systematic studies have found that MPO policy committees' representations of urban municipalities and disadvantaged minority populations in their areas are less than proportional to population.
The policy committee’s responsibilities include debating and making decisions on key MPO actions and issues, including adoption of the metropolitan long-range transportation plans, transportation improvement programs, annual planning work programs, budgets, and other policy documents. The policy committee also may play an active role in key decision points or milestones associated with MPO plans and studies, as well as conducting public hearings and meetings. An appointed advisory committee (CAC) develops the recommendations for consideration by the policy committee and establishes a ranked proposal for work plans.

Most MPOs also establish a technical committee to act as an advisory body to the policy committee for transportation issues that primarily are technical in nature. The technical committee interacts with the MPO’s professional staff on technical matters related to planning, analysis tasks, and projects. Through this work, the technical committee develops recommendations on projects and programs for policy committee consideration. Metropolitan travel forecasting is one of the key roles that the technical committee supports. The technical committee typically comprises staff-level officials of local, state, and federal agencies. In addition, a technical committee may include representatives of interest groups, various transportation modes, and in some cases, local citizens. A 2005 survey of MPOs nationally commissioned in preparation of Special Report 288 of the U.S. Transportation Research Board found that "forecast by negotiation" was a common method of projecting future population and employment growth for use in travel forecasting, suggesting rent-seeking behavior on the part of MPO committees influencing the technical staff.

Usually MPOs retain a core professional staff in order to ensure the ability to carry out the required metropolitan planning process in an effective and expeditious manner. The size and qualifications of this staff may vary by MPO, since no two metropolitan areas are the same nor have the same planning needs. Most MPOs, however, require at least some staff dedicated solely to MPO process oversight and management because of the complexity of the process and need to ensure that requirements are properly addressed.

Core functions

There are five core functions of an MPO:
  1. establish a setting: establish and manage a fair and impartial setting for effective regional decision-making in the metropolitan area (UZA)
  2. evaluate alternatives: evaluate transportation alternatives, scaled to the size and complexity of the region, to the nature of its transportation issues, and to the realistically available options
  3. maintain a long-range transportation plan (LRTP): develop and update a fiscally-constrained long-range transportation plan for the UZA covering a planning horizon of at least twenty years that fosters
    • mobility and access for people and goods,
    • efficient system performance and preservation, and
    • quality of life
  4. develop a transportation improvement program (TIP): develop a fiscally-constrained program based on the long-range transportation plan and designed to serve the UZA’s goals while using spending, regulating, operating, management, and financial tools
  5. involve the public: involve the general public and all the significantly affected sub-groups in the four essential functions listed above.


If the metropolitan area is designated as an air quality non-attainment
Non-Attainment Area
In United States environmental law, a nonattainment area is an area considered to have air quality worse than the National Ambient Air Quality Standards as defined in the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1970 . Nonattainment areas must have and implement a plan to meet the standard, or risk losing some...

 or maintenance area, then
  1. protect air quality: transportation plans, programs, and projects must conform with the air quality plan, known as the “state implementation plan
    State Implementation Plan
    A State Implementation Plan is a United States state plan for complying with the federal Clean Air Act, administered by the Environmental Protection Agency...

    ” (SIP), for the state within which the UZA lies.


Presently, most MPOs have no authority to raise revenues such as to levy taxes on their own, rather, they are designed to allow local officials to decide collaboratively how to spend available federal and other governmental transportation funds in their urbanized areas. The funding for the operations of an MPO comes from a combination of federal transportation funds and required matching funds from state and local governments.

Structure of MPO organizations

MPOs differ greatly in various parts of the country and even within states. Some have large staffs, while others may include only a director and a transportation planner. Sometimes the professional staff of an MPO is provided by a county or a council of governments. In many urban areas, existing organizations such as county governments or councils of government also function as MPOs. The MPO role also may be played by an independent governmental organization or a regional government. In the Portland, Oregon
Portland, Oregon
Portland is a city located in the Pacific Northwest, near the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers in the U.S. state of Oregon. As of the 2010 Census, it had a population of 583,776, making it the 29th most populous city in the United States...

 metropolitan area, for example, the Metro
Metro (Oregon regional government)
Metro, formerly known as Metropolitan Service District, is the regional governmental agency for the Oregon portion of the Portland metropolitan area...

 is the MPO. In the Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota metropolitan area, the Metropolitan Council
Metropolitan Council
The Metropolitan Council or Met Council is the regional governmental agency and metropolitan planning organization in Minnesota serving the Twin Cities seven-county metropolitan area. The Met Council is granted regional authority powers in state statutes by the Minnesota Legislature. These powers...

 is the MPO.

An example of a medium-sized MPO is the Lexington Area MPO
Lexington Area MPO
The Lexington Area Metropolitan Planning Organization has been involved with transportation planning in Lexington, Kentucky and its immediate area since being established in 1974...

 in the Lexington, Kentucky
Lexington, Kentucky
Lexington is the second-largest city in Kentucky and the 63rd largest in the US. Known as the "Thoroughbred City" and the "Horse Capital of the World", it is located in the heart of Kentucky's Bluegrass region...

 region. An example of a small MPO is the Kittery Area MPO
Kittery, Maine
Kittery is a town in York County, Maine, United States. The population was 9,543 at the 2000 census. Home to the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard on Seavey's Island, Kittery includes Badger's Island, the seaside district of Kittery Point, and part of the Isles of Shoals...

 in Maine
Maine
Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost...

.

Another MPO planning organization has developed in the area of western central Florida
Florida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...

. Several MPOs there, with governance over eight counties, have developed a greater regional planning committee, the Chairs Coordinating Committee (CCC), composed of the chairs of seven MPOs and the chairs of their appointed advisory committee (or their representatives) in order to co-ordinate transportation planning for the region, that is compatible with all, as well as addressing the challenges of long range planning for a large and growing region that has overlapping issues among the MPOs or transportation plans that extend throughout the entire area. Often the members of the executive committee of an MPO act interchangeably as the representative to this seven-MPO regional committee. This committee meets less frequently than the participating MPOs.

Evolving role

The enactment of the 1991 Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act
Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act
The Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act of 1991 is a United States federal law that posed a major change to transportation planning and policy, as the first U.S. federal legislation on the subject in the post-Interstate Highway System era...

 (ISTEA) ushered in a “renaissance” for MPOs. After a decade or more of being consigned to a minimal role in transportation planning, ISTEA directed additional federal funding to MPOs, expanded their authority to select projects, and mandated new metropolitan planning initiatives. For the first time, state transportation officials were required to consult seriously with local representatives on MPO governing boards regarding matters of project prioritization and decision-making. These changes had their roots in the need to address increasingly difficult transportation problems—in particular, the more complicated patterns of traffic congestion
Traffic congestion
Traffic congestion is a condition on road networks that occurs as use increases, and is characterized by slower speeds, longer trip times, and increased vehicular queueing. The most common example is the physical use of roads by vehicles. When traffic demand is great enough that the interaction...

 that arose with the suburban development boom in the previous decades. Many recognized that the problems could only be addressed effectively through a stronger federal commitment to regional planning.

The legislation that emerged, the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act (ISTEA), was signed into federal law by President Bush in December 1991. It focused on improving transportation, not as an end in itself, but as the means to achieve important national goals including economic progress, cleaner air, energy conservation, and social equity. ISTEA promoted a transportation system in which different modes and facilities—highway, transit, pedestrian, bicycle, aviation
Aviation
Aviation is the design, development, production, operation, and use of aircraft, especially heavier-than-air aircraft. Aviation is derived from avis, the Latin word for bird.-History:...

, and marine
Marine (ocean)
Marine is an umbrella term. As an adjective it is usually applicable to things relating to the sea or ocean, such as marine biology, marine ecology and marine geology...

—were integrated to allow a "seamless" movement of both goods and people. New funding programs provided greater flexibility in the use of funds, particularly regarding using previously restricted highway funds for transit development, improved "intermodal" connections, and emphasized upgrades to existing facilities over building new capacity—particularly roadway capacity.

To accomplish more serious metropolitan planning, ISTEA doubled federal funding for MPO operations and required the agencies to evaluate a variety of multimodal
Multimodal
Multimodal may refer to:* Multimodal distribution, a statistical distribution of values with multiple peaks* Multimodal interaction, a form of human-machine interaction using multiple modes of input/output....

 solutions to roadway congestion and other transportation problems. MPOs also were required to broaden public participation in the planning process and to see that investment decisions contributed to meeting the air quality standards of the Clean Air Act Amendments.

In addition, ISTEA placed a new requirement on MPOs to conduct “fiscally-constrained planning,” and ensure that long-range transportation plans and short-term transportation improvement programs were fiscally-constrained; in other words, adopted plans and programs can not include more projects than reasonably can be expected to be funded through existing or projected sources of revenues. This new requirement represented a major conceptual shift for many MPOs (and others in the planning community), since the imposition of fiscal discipline on plans now required, not only understanding how much money might be available, but how to prioritize investment needs and make difficult choices among competing needs. Adding to this complexity is the need to plan across transportation modes and develop approaches for multimodal investment prioritization and decision-making. It is in this context of greater prominence, funding, and requirements that MPOs function today.

An annual element is composed of transportation improvement projects contained in an area's transportation improvement program (TIP), which are proposed for implementation during the current year. The annual element is submitted to the U.S. Department of Transportation as part of the required planning process.

The passage of Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users SAFETEA-LU in 2005 created new and revised requirements for transportation planning and programs. Although SAFETEA-LU increased standards, most MPOs already were in compliance with the regulations. Some of the planning topic areas include transportation systems security, emergency preparedness, public participation plans for metropolitan planning, and requiring the electronic publication
Internet
The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...

of plans and TIP/STIP by the MPOs.

SAFETEA-LU requires that the statewide transportation planning process and the metropolitan planning process shall provide for consideration of projects and strategies that will protect and enhance the environment, promote energy conservation, improve the quality of life, and promote consistency between transportation improvements and state and local planned growth and economic development patterns [49 USC 5303(g)(3) and 23 USC 134(g)(3)].

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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