Description

CD+A worked with a transportation engineering firm to prepare a framework document for multimodal investment in Berkeley’s transportation systems—the Berkeley Strategic Transportation (BeST) Plan.

CD+A prepared a policy review of all the city’s planning documents and other transportation related documents. The team then summarized and developed framework goals and policies for the BeST Plan, including increasing mobility choices, access, safety, equity, and sustainability. The team collected information on all identified transportation improvements, provided a summary cost estimate for each improvement, organized them into project categories, and mapped the project information and locations in GIS. Working closely with city staff and the Alameda County Transportation Commission, the team analyzed and prioritized each project based on the framework policies, evaluating them against additional screening criteria such as cost-effectiveness, agency coordination, community support, and project readiness. Together, the framework policies and prioritized projects form the backbone of the BeST Plan.

To fine-tune the framework policies and project prioritization, community outreach was done that included a city-wide survey and focus group meetings, made refinements based on feedback, and added guidelines for project implementation and new project adoption. The BeST Plan was then taken through a public review process and was unanimously adopted by City Council.

While the BeST Plan organized all the individual transportation improvements into non-discrete projects and programs, the team concurrently organized the projects into discrete bundles for submission to the Alameda Countywide Transportation Plan and Countywide open grant request process. Ultimately, over thirty grant applications with a sum of nearly $500 million in capital improvements were submitted.