SACOG Conformity Determination

easiest and best option? How is the 70 percent share of transit's operating costs now coming
from public funds to be provided?
• Is encouraging people to use transit or carpools instead of driving alone important
enough to warrant increasing the cost of driving, via road tolls, gasoline tax surcharges,
or parking fees, and using the money to increase available transit service dramatically?
• Should main-road capacity in major travel corridors be increased to prevent the
increasingly common and much-disparaged practice of drivers cutting through
neighborhood streets to avoid traffic jams?
• To what extent should the region try to satisfy region-wide travel demand -- by
building onto the system to reduce congestion, so that the opportunity to live where you
want to, work anywhere in the region, and do business region wide is preserved?
• How should the region balance protection of the American River Parkway as a
recreational and open space asset against the growing need for greater transportation access
across the river?
On these issues SACOG could find no consensus. The MTP 2025 aimed to engage debate on these
larger issues, and the 2006 MTP, by its nature a plan that bridges the gap until the region prepares a
“next generation” MTP in 2007, is not able to resolve them. We expect that this MTP 2030, to be
completed in 2007, will make progress in finding answers and thus become more effective in using
the region’s limited resources.
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