Rockdale County Comprehensive Transportation Plan Update - Rockdale County, GA

Pond is leading the team to complete an update to Rockdale County’s Comprehensive Transportation Plan (CTP). This plan update builds off of the previous CTP, completed in 2009, to consider the appropriate transportation decisions given the recovery of the economy since the previous plan and helping to align with ongoing regional planning to ARC’s 2040 horizon year. The overall process includes an initial existing conditions and data collection phase, followed by a needs assessment, the drafting of initial recommendations, and the finalization of the plan.

Planning Accomplishments 

• Pond managed the project and expectations successfully
• Well received and easy-to-understand evaluation framework incorporated technical results, broader long term goals, and community input to develop normalized and objective analysis across multiple modes of transportation (capacity projects, safety projects, bicycle and pedestrian projects, bridges, transit, freight, etc.)
• Staff, stakeholders, and elected leaders agreed – with minimal comment – on the results of the first application of project prioritization

Technical Accomplishments 

• Among the first CTPs to utilize ARC’s new Activity Based Model.
• Use and integration of ARC provided INRIX real time conditions data into planning process and project evaluation.
• Application of active mode transportation suitability analysis to better prioritize investment in bicycle and pedestrian facilities. This suitability analysis also incorporated future land use and development components of Comprehensive Planning in the County.
• Use of fiscal constraint analysis to anticipate short and long-term funding strategy.

Community Engagement Accomplishments 

• Dedicated freight panel and focus group to discuss freight specific issues such as truck parking, challenging intersections, and numerous railroad at-grade crossings in the community.
• While not a statistically valid survey, the study’s online survey responses were validated through questions relating to commute patterns. These results were compared to actual Census Longitudinal Employer Household Dynamics data which showed commute patterns thematically similar to the online survey respondents.
• Open house interactive exercises and online survey questions were designed to solicit input that were considered directly into the project evaluation and prioritization process.