Transportation planning too important to be left to those who prefer current system

Joel S. Hirschhorn, former Director of Environment, Energy and Natural Resources at the National Governors Association, has written an article detailing problems he sees with the current state DOT-centered transportation planning process:

Transportation has become far too important to be left in the minds, hands, and dollars of people who prefer the existing automobile-dominated system. The new reality is that transportation intersects many other policy areas, especially housing, health, economic development, schools, employment, trade, land use, and the environment. . . .

Considering the much larger sphere of influence of transportation on so much of American society, it is no longer smart to expect state departments of transportation (DOTs), and the transportation commissions that often govern or advise them, to have the resources and expertise to manage the much larger agenda for transportation. . . .

I recommend the creation of state planning organizations (SPOs), analogous to current metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs). SPOs can take a big picture, strategic view of all the state transportation needs policy can address, far more than vehicles and roads. Reporting to governors, SPOs will provide the venue for policy experts from many areas in both the public and private sectors to examine and steer state transportation planning. A key goal is to explicitly examine the impact of transportation policy and planning on other policy areas and vice-versa. Another goal is integration of MPO plans throughout a state and comparable treatment of rural areas and their transportation needs.

Hirschhorn's web site is SprawlKills.com. His comments are particularly apropos in Missouri, where MoDOT is currently searching for a new director and several legislators have put forward proposals to re-structure MoDOT.