(a) Each transportation planning agency with a population that exceeds 200,000 persons may prepare at least one “alternative planning scenario” for presentation to local officials, agency board members, and the public during the development of the triennial regional transportation plan and the hearing required under subdivision (c) of Section 65080.
(b) The alternative planning scenario shall accommodate the same amount of population growth as projected in the plan but shall be based on an alternative that attempts to reduce the growth in traffic congestion, make more efficient use of existing transportation infrastructure, and reduce the need for costly future public infrastructure.
(c) The alternative planning scenario shall be developed in collaboration with a broad range of public and private stakeholders, including local elected officials, city and county employees, relevant interest groups, and the general public. In developing the scenario, the agency shall consider all of the following:
(1) Increasing housing and commercial development around transit facilities and in close proximity to jobs and commercial activity centers.
(2) Encouraging public transit usage, ridesharing, walking, bicycling, and transportation demand management practices.
(3) Promoting a more efficient mix of current and future job sites, commercial activity centers, and housing opportunities.
(4) Promoting use of urban vacant land and “brownfield” redevelopment.
(5) An economic incentive program that may include measures such as transit vouchers and variable pricing for transportation.
(d) The planning scenario shall be included in a report evaluating all of the following:
(1) The amounts and locations of traffic congestion.
(2) Vehicle miles traveled and the resulting reduction in vehicle emissions.
(3) Estimated percentage share of trips made by each means of travel specified in subparagraph (C) of paragraph (1) of subdivision (b) of Section 65080.
(4) The costs of transportation improvements required to accommodate the population growth in accordance with the alternative scenario.
(5) The economic, social, environmental, regulatory, and institutional barriers to the scenario being achieved.
(e) If the adopted regional transportation plan already achieves one or more of the objectives set forth in subdivision (c), those objectives need not be discussed or evaluated in the alternative planning scenario.
(f) The alternative planning scenario and accompanying report shall not be adopted as part of the regional transportation plan, but it shall be distributed to cities and counties within the region and to other interested parties, and may be a basis for revisions to the transportation projects that will be included in the regional transportation plan.
(g) Nothing in this section grants transportation planning agencies any direct or indirect authority over local land use decisions.
(h) This section does not apply to a transportation plan adopted on or before September 1, 2001, proposed by a transportation planning agency with a population of less than 1,000,000 persons.
(Added by Stats. 2000, Ch. 832, Sec. 3. Effective January 1, 2001.)