ACCESS 33, Fall 2008

Introduction

Elizabeth Deakin

Transportation planners and engineers often focus on specific areas of expertise, such as particular modes of transport, or air quality effects of transportation. Increasingly, however, Californians are reminded that such focused specializations, while valuable, are insufficient by themselves. Current efforts to meet stringent greenhouse gas reduction targets while accommodating growth and counteracting economic downturn show just how complex and interconnected urban development issues are. The emerging paradigm is one that integrates transportation planning into a broader metropolitan development strategy.

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Multimodal Transportation in California: Connecting Planes, Trains, and Automobiles

Adib Kanafani

The continued population growth expected for California will bring increasing demand for mobility and pressure to expand the capacity of the transportation system, including intercity transportation. If historic trends are any indication, we know that no single mode—rail, air, or highway—by itself can meet this increasing demand. Making the best use of each mode and creating interconnections among them are key to coping with rising demand for transportation.

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2018-02-07T23:32:04+00:00Categories: ACCESS 33, Fall 2008|Tags: , |

Planning Water Use In California

William Eisenstein and G. Mathias Kondolf

As California's population grows, so will its demand for a full range of infrastructure and services. An efficient transportation system, for example, is crucial for the state’s economy and people. So is a system for storing water and moving it to where it’s needed. Water is a perennial problem in California, but it is not the problem most people think it is. Viewed strictly as a matter of quantity, California does not have a water shortage, nor will it anytime soon. The state’s water is plentiful, but it is inconvenient for human use; distributed unevenly across time and space, it is rarely where we want it when we want it. About three quarters of the potential water supply in the state of California originates north of the city of Sacramento, while about three quarters of the demand is south of the city. During flood times, the state’s most pressing water problem is getting rid of it, while in dry times the problem lies in storing and moving it.

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2018-02-07T23:33:43+00:00Categories: ACCESS 33, Fall 2008|Tags: |

Integrating Infrastructure Planning: The Role Of Schools

Deborah L. McKoy, Jeffrey M. Vincent, and Carrie Makarewicz

California sits at an historic moment. The state’s policymakers and voters have aggressively ramped up their investment in public school buildings, providing more than $35 billion in state funds in the form of general obligation bonds to modernize existing schools and build new ones since 1998. Additionally, the California Strategic Growth Plan won voter approval and in 2006 state leaders began the first phase of a comprehensive twenty-year plan to upgrade critical infrastructure. The plan calls for spending $211 billion through 2016—with $42 billion in bonds already approved—on transportation, water systems, public safety, housing, the judiciary, and education facilities. By including public schools as one of six key pieces of critical infrastructure, state officials and voters recognized the importance of school facilities in shaping California’s growth and prosperity. Ongoing school construction investment, coupled with the new, broader infrastructure investment, creates a strategic opportunity for California to improve the way it plans, funds, constructs, modernizes, and operates its schools, and to make school planning an integral part of community and regional development, rather than an isolated endeavor.

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Transportation Infrastructure And Sustainable Development: New Planning Approaches For Urban Growth

Marlon G. Boarnet

As California's population expands to fifty million people over the next two decades, urban infrastructure will be under immense pressure. Partly in anticipation of growth, and partly to catch up after years of neglected investment, in 2006 California voters approved bond measures for transportation, affordable housing, education, disaster preparedness, flood prevention, and water projects. Most experts expect that even more funding will be needed to meet future needs. How can these funds best be spent to accommodate growth and avoid stressing California’s environmental, fiscal, and social resources? In particular, how can we use the next round of transportation investment to help us plan for a more sustainable future?

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