Traffic Congestion

Activities to Reduce Travel Demand and Air Pollution Are Not Widely Implemented Gao ID: PEMD-93-2 November 6, 1992

GAO's nationwide survey of metropolitan planning organizations revealed only limited evidence of integration of air quality and local transportation planning processes, even in areas with poor air quality; many respondents said that local officials are unwilling to reduce congestion by discouraging single-occupancy ridership. The 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments encourage the use of transportation systems management techniques--a variety of low-cost approaches to maximize the efficiency of existing roads or to lower demand on them--to meet air quality goals. The Environmental Protection Agency is authorized to mandate these techniques in locales that fail to meet federal air quality regulations. This report discusses in detail the role of federally required urban transportation planning agencies in managing transportation systems and the extent to which air quality concerns affect the inclusion of these activities in the local transportation planning process.

GAO found that: (1) 96 percent of all metropolitan planning organizations planned TSM activities for their regions; (2) organizations placed more emphasis on supply than demand; (3) when organizations planned demand management activities, the greatest emphasis came from areas with a population of 1 million or more; (4) planning alone failed to ensure implementation of demand management activities because of the lack of consensus among implementors, and the absence of a link between planning and funding; (5) only 26 percent of all metropolitan planning organizations indicated that their short-term plans included some demand management or related activities for air pollution reduction; and (6) the planning and implementation of demand management or related activities for air quality improvement required the involvement of many agencies.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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