DC's Transportation "Plan"

While it's not a full-fledged master transportation plan along the lines of what I believe that the city needs to produce, DC's Department of Transportation has just released a two-year Action Agenda and Annual Report for 2009 and it looks to be quite good, covering much of the ground that I think ought to be in a robust and forward-thinking (full-fledged) plan, even if they don't address everything, or in the manner in which I might want them to cover certain elements.

The Agenda refocuses the transportation agenda on what we might call complete places and sustainable and optimal transportation and linking land use and transportation planning and objectives. It appears to extend the thinking of the Transportation element from the DC Comprehensive Plan in a more integrated fashion.

It's definitely a huge step forward, complemented by how Director Klein (see yesterday's Washington Post article, "Transportation chief says bikes, buses are way to go in D.C.") is reorganizing the agency's operations, structure, and management around the achievement of quality of place goals, rather than organizing operations in a mode-based fashion, mostly focused on the maintenance and construction of streets, highways, and bridges.

DDOT has also launched a new website, although I haven't had a chance to dig through it, and I don't know if any fanfare for it is justified. For me, thus far the changes make it harder to use the site, not easier, because I have learned how to find stuff according to how they had previously organized the site.