MDOT’s plan for 2045: More of the same?

/ climate crisis, Governor Whitmer, Green Rides Blue Skies, highway funding, MDOT, MI Healthy Climate Plan, transit funding, Vision Zero

Michigan is facing a choice – a fork in the road:

  • Will Michigan continue to spend billions on wider highways, despite the climate crisis, increasing road deaths, persistent inequity, and lots of people who don’t want to drive?
  • Or will Michigan give more than just lip service to the virtues of transportation choices and finally shift policies and funding to make it easier, safer, and more convenient for Michiganders to walk, bike, and ride transit?

The Michigan Department of Transportation just proposed a plan for the next 25 years of transportation – Michigan Mobility 2045 – and despite nice platitudes about modal choice and equity – they’re largely proposing the same investments of the past sixty years!

We need to tell them NO! As Einstein said, to do more of the same and expect a different result is the definition of insanity!

Michigan transportation needs to be part of the climate solution and finally provide the big investments in public transit and safe walking and biking that Michiganders have been demanding.

YOU are essential in changing Michigan’s path!! Please attend one of these virtual meetings and speak out!

MDOT is hosting a pair of virtual public meetings to share their Michigan Mobility 2045 plan and ask for public feedback.

What’s wrong with the Michigan Mobility 2045 plan?

  • It ignores the Governor’s pledge to make Michigan carbon neutral economy wide by 2050 and says NOTHING about transportation’s role in the climate crisis. As our neighbors dig out from the third 100-year flood in 7 years, this is unacceptable!
  • It provides nice platitudes about modal choice, but makes no commitment to substantive policy or funding changes that would produce those changes.
  • Despite driving being the leading source of climate pollution, it makes no plans to decrease how much people drive. In fact their scenarios estimate between -5% and +15% change in how much people drive – as if their investments have nothing to do with that outcome.
  • It claims to be a performance based plan yet sets no performance goals for decreasing driving, increasing transit availability, or increasing non-car access to jobs and other necessities. (It’s got very detailed goals for pavement condition, though!)
  • It acknowledges that they don’t even know how many Michiganders have access to transit or safe walking or biking, yet fails to provide a concrete plan to measure and improve those.
  • It claims to prioritize safety but has no plan to change engineering standards or decrease speed limits to actually make roads safer. Nor does it fully embrace Vision Zero – that NO road deaths are acceptable.

Or if you can’t attend, email MichiganMobility@Michigan.gov with some of the below talking points!

Talking Points

Here are some suggested talking points to use during public comment (use these or ask your own!):

  • Governor Whitmer has pledged Michigan will be carbon neutral by 2050. Given that transportation produces more that 1/4 of climate pollution, how will MDOT lead the way in drastically cutting climate emissions?
  • For decades, Michiganders have been asking for more transit options, yet little has changed. How will this plan actual produce those statewide transit options, when past plans haven’t?
  • The plan claims to be performance-based. What are the performance metrics for decreasing climate pollution and for increasing public transit service?
  • The plan’s vision of safe, equitable, multimodal, and convenient for all sound great. How will implementation of this plan produce different results than the last few plans have?
  • Your scenario plans anticipate up to a 15% increase in daily vehicle travel. How can Michigan meet the Governor’s commitment to be carbon neutral by 2050 if people keep driving more?
  • It’s great to see multimodal in the vision and modal choice leading the principles. How much more money will go to public transit under this plan than is spent now?

More details about Michigan Mobility 2045 at http://www.michiganmobility.org/engage/events.aspx.

Green Rides, Blue Skies

This is part of TRU’s larger Green Rides, Blue Skies campaign, seeking to persuade Michigan leaders to make transit a central part of the Governor’s upcoming MI Healthy Climate Plan. Learn more and get involved!