The Livable Communities Coalition
Working to improve Atlanta's quality of life through smart growth
Get a move on, or keep on keepin’ on?
Former Atlanta resident Curtis Mayfield once sang Keep On Keeping On.
Metro Atlanta now ponders whether it can afford to keep on keeping on when it comes to its transportation investments.
The Civic League for Regional Atlanta hosted a town hall Saturday focused on metro Atlanta’s transportation future.
The process mandated by the Transportation Investment Act calls for the Atlanta Regional Transportation Roundtable to deliver a draft “constrained list” by Aug. 15.
Earlier this summer, the roundtable voted to have the Atlanta Regional Commission winnow the $23 billion list into an $11.5 billion list.
If the transporation tax referendum passes next year, it is anticipated it will generate $6.1 billion to improve metro Atlanta’s transportation infrastructure during the lifetime of the tax.
The list the roundtable produces for the Aug. 15 deadline will be their first stab at a generating a list that meets that $6.1 billion revenue projection.
According to Atlanta Regional Commission external affairs manager Kathryn Lawler, the roundtable has spent the summer listening to residents through a series of telephone town halls.
The roundtable has also heard from other constituencies, such as the Livable Communities Coalition and its Fair Share for Transit stakeholders. Fair Share for Transit originally called for a significant transit investment of 40 to 60 percent at its March launch.
More recently Fair Share for Transit delivered a white paper to the roundtable that calls for 66 percent of the projects on their draft list to be transit projects.
The Civic League’s Get a Move On town hall provided another opportunity for metro residents to deliver their message to the roundtable; yet, it remains unclear whether a true transit vision will emerge from this process.
