For the week of March 26 - April 1, 2003

Cooperation needed on transportation

Public transit seen as key solution

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By GREGORY FOLEY
Express Staff Writer

Two transportation experts Thursday said the Wood River Valley could face a daunting set of transportation-related problems if regional governments do not begin to cooperate on a focused set of long-range solutions.

Roger Millar, a Carbondale, Colo.-based engineer and principal author of the 2001 Blaine County Public Transportation Feasibility Study, told a group of 40 elected officials and citizens that people and cars are crowding Western mountain valleys, but feasible traffic mitigation measures do exist.

"We’ve met the enemy, and they are us," he said.

Millar joined Walter Kieser, a Berkeley, Calif.-based economist who specializes in resort community transportation planning and financing, Thursday at the Liberty Theatre in Hailey for a special transportation forum hosted by Blaine County Commissioner Sarah Michael.

The two men—who both worked extensively on a public transit program for Colorado’s Roaring Fork Valley between Aspen and Glenwood Springs—said the communities of the Wood River Valley still have time to plan effectively for the future, but will need strong leadership.

"You gotta have a little bravery," Millar said, adding that he believes any major transit project should be developed "with the community."

Working from a long-range model being developed for the Roaring Fork Valley, Millar said the Wood River Valley could significantly benefit from several basic principles.

Millar said:

• Mountain valleys are ideal for public transit because they are typically "linear," with housing and work sites close to the corridor’s center.
  
   
• Paid parking in the region’s commercial and job centers will promote business in those areas and encourage commuters to use public transit.
  
   
• Revenues from paid-parking programs can be used to fund transit projects.
  
   
• Parking structures are more efficient than single-level "surface" parking lots, but more expensive.
  
   
• Communities should not plan projects that compete, such as those that would provide ample free parking to commuters in addition to a public bus or rail system.
  
   
• The Wood River Valley would benefit from an expanded highway that has two lanes for travel in each direction, with two individual lanes designated for "high-occupancy vehicles" during peak travel periods.
  
   
• Providing HOV lanes, promoting programs that encourage car pooling, and properly managing parking in destination cities are inexpensive ways to reduce traffic congestion on a region’s main highway.
  
   
• Ketchum and the Wood River Valley are in a similar position to Aspen and the Roaring Fork Valley in the mid-1980s, when Aspen began collaborating with other entities to build an integrated transit and parking plan. "My estimation is you guys are where we were in 1984," Millar said.
  
   
• Valley communities would be wise to maintain a corridor that is usable for rail service in the future.

Kieser told the audience that communities that invest in quality transit systems can ultimately own a valuable asset that creates economic, social, and environmental benefits.

He said valley communities are best served if government entities do not act autonomously, and cooperate on transit and economic issues.

Kieser noted that funding for transit programs could be available from numerous sources, including transit-service fares, state and federal grants and certain types of specialty taxes.

He concurred with Millar that paid parking in a region’s destination city—Ketchum, in the Wood River Valley’s case—works to help business and promote transit programs that are put in place.

"In all cases I’ve been working on, when paid parking is implemented, business has improved," he said.

In addressing questions from the audience, Millar said he believes the key to creating a successful public transit program is to provide "tangible benefits" of using the system to residents and commuters. Providing citizens with extra time or money are the key benefits, he noted.

Paid parking, inexpensive, fast and comfortable public transportation services, and HOV lanes that allow car-poolers and bus riders to get to work before those in single-occupancy vehicles are all relatively inexpensive tools to reduce congestion, he said.

He emphasized that planning only to move as many vehicles as possible can result in variety of conditions that limit an area’s quality of life. "If you build space for single-occupancy vehicles, they’re going to show up."

Millar acknowledged that even if the Idaho Transportation Department expands Highway 75 through the Wood River Valley to four or five lanes, congestion could occur at the end of the corridor if appropriate measures are not taken. "You have to move people, not cars," he said.

 

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