Project Summary
Public engagement in transportation planning processes can sometimes be hard to conduct in a meaningful way, particularly when engaging with disadvantaged communities. The reasons for this are numerous: meeting times conflict with work or caretaking responsibilities, lack of advertisement, weak connection with local community, difficulties in transportation, lack of resources within planning agency, and other logistical and resource related challenges. Additional barriers to equitable transportation may include the structure of planning processes, as well as the historical structural inequalities in the distribution of transportation resources.This project will assess current practices for engaging disadvantaged communities in participatory planning processes for transportation projects in California. The goal will be to identify specific practices, projects, or processes that were particularly successful in engaging disadvantaged communities. Materials from transportation projects and agencies will be collected and analyzed in regard to the planning processes, the level of engagement achieved, and the resulting outcomes. Interviews will be conducted with transportation professionals who took part in these processes. The project will begin by connecting with professionals with a stated investment in disadvantaged communities through their participation in active conversations on transportation equity and mobility justice. Organizations such as Untokening Collective, a multiracial collective that centers the lived experiences of marginalized communities to address mobility justice, will participate in the analysis. Patterns and themes in the participatory planning processes will be analyzed, as will their efficacy through both qualitative and quantitative measures. A final report will share patterns and themes that highlight promising trends in engaging in meaningful participatory planning with disadvantaged communities.
