Safe and Equitable Transportation for All

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

• Apply the concepts of complete streets and context-sensitive design to multimodal street environments with competing user needs.
• Learn why planning a transportation network around the needs of all users, rather than primarily (or only) automobiles, is so important.
• Understand how roadway design and planning around safety can affect traveler behavior and reduce fatalities and serious injuries.

MORE SESSION DETAILS

Planning for safe and equitable multimodal transportation has become increasingly important for modern transportation engineering and planning practitioners. In particular, shifting patterns in land use and urban/rural demographics have given rise to greater numbers of active transportation users – those who utilize modes of travel other than automobiles. At the same time, this growth in non-motorized travel has been associated with a rise in fatalities and serious injuries due to crashes, and internationally driven efforts such as Vision Zero have underscored the need to better utilize roadway design as a means to effect a safer and more secure travel experience. The Institute of Transportation Engineers (ITE) has recently released several publications and digital resources aimed at making sure planning professionals and transportation engineers have the latest standards and data to inform their efforts around these safety and equity needs. This session will include presentations on the "Context Sensitive Design Handbook" (an implementation guide associated with ITE’s 2010 recommended practice on context-sensitive design), and the "Self-Enforcing Roadways Guide." It will also include information on the recently launched website, developed jointly by ITE and the American Public Health Association (APHA), which accompanies the League of American Bicyclists’ biannual report on biking and walking benchmarks.