Transportation. People. Opportunity.
Those are the themes that the NJTPA’s draft
long range transportation plan (LRTP) focuses on. The plan, which has a horizon year of 2050, is one of three core documents that the NJTPA is seeking public comment on through
August 4.
The other documents are the
Fiscal Year 2022-2025 Transportation Improvement Program (TIP), which is a four-year fiscally constrained agenda of transportation improvement projects drawn from the LRTP, and the
Air Quality Conformity Determination, a federally required analysis of the LRTP and TIP used to demonstrate the funded projects, taken together, meet the standards set forth in New Jersey’s State Implementation Plan.
In order to be eligible for federal funds, proposed projects must be approved by the NJTPA Board for inclusion in the TIP, which is updated every two years. The FY 2022-2025 TIP contains 263 projects and programs totaling $11.5 billion.
A virtual public meeting is being held
July 27 from 4 to 7 p.m. to provide information about the products and to gather input. The public is invited to attend any time during the three-hour event. People interested in participating can review the drafts, provide feedback and register for the event at
https://njtpa.org/publiccomment.
Plan 2050: Transportation, People, Opportunity, is a vision for investing wisely to improve roads, rail and other infrastructure to meet the needs of transportation users and support the regional economy.
The plan incorporates input gathered through extensive public and stakeholder outreach. It was developed under the direction of the NJTPA Board of Trustees in close collaboration with partner agencies, including member city and county “subregions,” the New Jersey Department of Transportation (NJDOT), NJ TRANSIT, the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey (PANYNJ), the state’s eight Transportation Management Associations (TMAs), and the Together North Jersey (TNJ) consortium, among others.
The plan considers disruptors experienced in 2020 and 2021 — the need to provide transportation to essential workers during the pandemic, growth in e-commerce, shifts to telework, a widespread embrace of walking and biking and opening streets to outdoor dining and other creative uses. It also considers ways to better address the mobility needs of minority and low income communities and anticipated disruptors, particularly advances in transportation technology, like driverless cars and an increased use of electric and alternative fuel vehicles, and the need to mitigate climate change.
In addition to its planning products, the NJTPA also seeks comments on NJDOT’s draft
Fiscal Year 2022-2031 Statewide Transportation Improvement Program (STIP). The STIP is the federally required compilation of TIPs from the NJTPA and the state’s two other Metropolitan Planning Organizations (Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission and South Jersey Transportation Planning Organization).
All of the documents are on file at New Jersey Library Network libraries in the NJTPA region and available at
https://njtpa.org/publiccomment. Comments can be submitted via email to
[email protected] or by calling (862) 800-7457 (English) or (862) 800-7239 (Español) and leaving a voicemail.