I-66 Multimodal Study Final Report - Virginia Department of ...

RecommendationsIn developing the mobility options, multimodal packages, and recommendations, findingsfrom the market research were used to examine the level of support for the components of eachpackage. A full report on the market research is provided in Appendix B. The market researchincluded over 3,500 survey responses, and represented users of all modes in the corridor,residing both inside and outside the Beltway. Overall, there was much support for improvingthe transit services and bicycle opportunities in the corridor, but mixed support for implementationof HOT lanes and adding lanes to I-66. About 25 percent of all respondents supportedconverting the roadway to a HOT facility. The survey also indicated that, although commutersmay have heard about HOT lanes, they do not have a high level of familiarity or understandingof the benefits of HOT lanes, which could contribute to the low level of support. Support foradding new HOV/bus lanes varied as well. Overall, about 44 percent of the survey respondentssupported adding a lane for HOV/bus usage.The stakeholder interviews conducted throughout the study also indicated strong support fortransit and bicycle improvements in the corridor, but similar to the market research, about athird of the stakeholders interviewed were in favor of adding capacity to I-66 and a thirdopposed. When asked about converting I-66 to HOT lanes, about 43 percent of stakeholderssupported the idea and 21 percent were opposed.Citizen comments received at the public meetings and through the webpage and telephone linegenerally supported transit and bicycle improvements in the corridor, but were mostly not infavor of widening the roadway or converting to HOT lanes. There were more than 100 commentsreceived in total from the four public meetings, through the webpage and telephone line.The study considered all of the inputs from the public and the directive from the TPB resolutionin developing and evaluating the multimodal packages. The substantial support for transitand for bicycle and pedestrian improvements was evident, and is reflected by the inclusion ofthese elements in each package. As such, the overall performance of each package is not attributableto any one element, but rather to the collection of multimodal elements that make upthe package.Recommended Package ElementsAs the results show in Table 4.1, Multimodal Package 2, Multimodal Package 4, and the sensitivitytest on Multimodal Package 3 are the only tested scenarios that serve both of the studygoals – improve mobility (increase daily PMT and person throughput) and reduce congestion(decrease congested VMT). The sensitivity test on Multimodal Package 1, however, has thehighest PMT and person throughput of the packages (0.8 percent better than MultimodalPackage 2). However, for reasons noted in Section 3.0, the difference between MultimodalPackage 1 and the associated Sensitivity Test 1 may be somewhat overstated. As discussed inSection 3.0, Multimodal Package 3 has design and operational challenges that would affectservice-level predictions, but are not fully captured in the planning-level travel demand modelingconducted for this study. As such, Multimodal Package 3 is not considered a goodcandidate for recommendation. The sensitivity test on Multimodal Package 1, with its potentialI-66 Multimodal Study 4-9