MDOT released their Mobility 2050 plan – but it doesn’t work for all Michiganders
Once every five years, the Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT) decides the state’s transportation priorities for the next 25 years. While they claim the Mobility 2050 plan is an inclusive “all modes” transportation plan that emphasizes values of safety, accessibility, economic vitality, and preservation, there are no action plans or meaningful requirements that they do so! MM2050 (supposedly) guides MDOT’s priorities and project funding but includes no commitments to actually boost investment in safety or accessibility. You can read the full plan here.
The plan says many great things about the importance of safety, equity, and multimodality and acknowledges climate neutrality goals and where gaps exist in the plan. MDOT knows what’s important and what is needed to push transportation forward in Michigan… so why aren’t they doing it?
What are we doing?
We identified some recommendations such as incorporating meaningful multimodal metrics, clarifying the internal decision-making processes (who do we turn to when we have a problem after the comment period), and adopting true preservation and maintenance priorities that don’t include highway expansion.
TRU also organized 60 members of the public and multiple partner organizations to send comments to MDOT. Last time MDOT did this plan, they only received a couple of comments for more non-driving modes of transportation.
Read our full comments to MDOT below
We at Transportation Riders United appreciate the opportunity to contribute our comments and recommendations on the Michigan Mobility 2050 plan. We applaud this plan’s values, acknowledgment of climate goals, and focus on multimodal transportation and providing transportation options for all, which are meaningful and create a foundation for a future toward accessible and reliable transportation for all Michigan residents.
The plan, however, has inconsistencies that urgently need to be addressed.
- This plan presents an extremely compelling Vision and Guiding Principles. Yet it fails to explain how MDOT funding and project selection decisions are guided by these principles.
- Safety is listed as the top priority, yet road deaths have not improved over the past 5 years and this plan has no clear data-driven action plan to bring down road deaths.
- This is framed as a plan for all modes, yet there are huge gaps in data on non-road topics and this plan fails to explain how those gaps will be addressed.
While the following pages provide more details, we’d like to emphasize the following recommendations as priorities:
- Update project selection criteria: MDOT must explicitly show how the plan’s values and goals directly impact which projects receive funding. Project selection needs to be updated to transparently incorporate quantifiable criteria based on stated values like safety, equity, access, and climate.
- Detail the implementation plan: The plan should explain the implementation process in more depth, clearly defining who is responsible for achieving each goal, and what are top priorities for MDOT.
- Incorporate meaningful metrics for improving public transit, bicycle and pedestrian access, and reliability, especially around whether Michiganders have access to transit and trails.
- Articulate an action and funding plan to meet Michigan’s commitment to reach carbon neutrality by 2050. The MI Healthy Climate Plan is referenced several times; its time for MDOT to develop an action plan to achieve its commitments.
- Adopt a “fix-it-first” commitment to fund safety, mobility, and road maintenance before allocating any state or federal funds to widening any highways, including “flex lanes.”
We recognize the amount of complexity, time, and effort this work requires and look forward to seeing an updated version of MM2050 that is more transparent and details how MDOT is crafting a sustainable and equitable future of mobility. Thank you for your attention to our recommendations and detailed comments below.
An earlier version of this page had a link to take action and share comments. While the comment period for the Michigan Mobility 2050 plan has closed, if you have thoughts, send them to [email protected].