1999 Grant Recipient Information
Alaska

AMATS Community Transportation Cooperative Program (CTCP)
Anchorage, Alaska

Abstract

The Anchorage Metropolitan Area Transportation Study (AMATS) Community Transportation Cooperative Program is envisioned to create a contemporary and effective avenue of communication between local policy-makers, regulators and planners, and the community population. The proposed program will be designed to empower the public, including non-traditional participants, to re-build public trust in the planning authority, and to utilize an often under-valued source of knowledge-the people of the community. The requested planning grant will enable the AMATS to accomplish two things. First, the AMATS will be able to re-design its public involvement program by determining the most effective processes and technology to empower the public, to facilitate communication, and to motivate the community to engage in meaningful dialogue in land use and transportation issues. The new program will be applied to the AMATS metropolitan planning organization jurisdictional area encompassing both urban and rural communities with a population of 255,000 persons. Secondly, AMATS will apply the new program to a significant transportation-planning project: Ship Creek Multimodal Transportation Plan. We believe that Ship Creek represents an excellent case study in controversial land use/transportation/community preservation issues. Ship Creek has both urban and statewide significance, as it is the most important multimodal hub in both the Municipality and the State. It also is located adjacent to the downtown Anchorage Central Business District. Populations affected by this project include the Alaska Railroad, the Port of Anchorage and Anchorage's major trucking warehouse and consolidation district. The basin is a favorite recreational fishing destination and popular running and bicycling corridor. The area also has significant existing and potential tourism-related commercial operations. Finally, the Ship Creek basin separates a major, long-established residential community from the rest of the Anchorage community. Access to the residential area is limited to thoroughfares that pass through the Ship Creek industrial area. The Ship Creek project will serve as one measure to evaluate the newly designed public involvement process. Additionally, a series of elements, including objective and subjective points, will be used to measure the level of public involvement in the decision-making cycle and whether that level of involvement is appropriate and acceptable to the neighborhood, and to the community at large. The product will be a stand-alone program that the AMATS and the Municipality Planning Department can apply to future planning efforts for both land use and transportation issues.

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