TCSP Accomplishments: Demonstrating Results

The TCSP program is intended to generate results from which other communities can learn. As the first round of TCSP projects is implemented, results - including observed benefits, successful strategies, and lessons learned - will be disseminated to help other communities identify policies and actions that most effectively balance the need for mobility, economic development, fiscal wisdom, and environmental protection. Communities across the nation will be able to use the tools and methods developed under TCSP to evaluate the potential impacts of various strategies within their own unique setting. Furthermore, experiences from TCSP pilot projects will help communities develop strategies to successfully implement various policies and actions, as well as avoiding strategies that have proven unsuccessful in other areas.

Envision Utah:
Developing a Quality Growth Strategy
to Guide a Region's Future

Pressures from rapid growth are threatening the very features that make the Greater Wasatch area of Utah an attractive place to live and work. Responding to these pressures, citizens have formed a broad-based public/private partnership, known as Envision Utah, to examine alternative regional growth scenarios. TCSP funds will support the development of outreach efforts and analytical tools to evaluate the transportation, infrastructure, and environmental impacts of these scenarios. These efforts in turn will help citizens, businesses, and community leaders in Utah to develop a "Quality Growth Strategy" for the region.

In order to make TCSP results available as quickly as possible, the FY 1999 selection process focused on projects that were ready to begin and had plans to collect and document results that could be shared with others. As experiences from the first year of program implementation are collected, they will be shared and used to evaluate both the success of the overall program, and of specific projects and strategies undertaken through the TCSP program.

The results of the May 1999 Denver TCSP workshop indicate that even at this early stage, a number of TCSP success stories already are evident. The process of developing TCSP grant applications, by itself, led to the generation of new design approaches and the formation of new transportation planning partnerships. These local innovations are likely to have important impacts even in cases where a TCSP grant could not be awarded.