Conventional transportation planning strives to maximize traffic speeds, minimize
congestion and reduce crash rates (generally measured per vehicle-mile) using a well
developed set of engineering, modeling and financing tools. Many jurisdictions codify
these objectives in concurrency requirements and traffic impact fees, which require
developers to finance roadway capacity expansion to offset any increase in local traffic.
Alternatives to roadway expansion, such as transportation demand management and
multi-modal transport planning, are newer and so have fewer analysis tools. As a result,
conventional planning practices support automobile dependency, which refers to transport
and land use patterns favoring automobile travel over alternative modes (in this case,
automobile includes cars, vans, light trucks, SUVs and motorcycles).
In recent years transportation planning has expanded to include more emphasis on nonautomobile
modes and more consideration of factors such as environmental impacts and
mobility for non-drivers. In recent decades many highway agencies have been renamed
transportation agencies, and have added capacity related to environmental analysis,
community involvement and nonmotorized planning. Some are applying more
comprehensive and multi-modal evaluation (Litman 2012). Transport modeling
techniques are improving to account for a wider range of options (such as alternative
modes and pricing incentives) and impacts (such as pollution emissions and land use
effects). In addition, an increasing portion of transport funds are flexible, meaning that
they can be spent on a variety of types of programs and projects rather than just roadways.