photo by: City of Lawrence

A Lawrence Transit electric bus is pictured in this contributed photo.

The Lawrence-Douglas County Planning Commission could take the penultimate step in enacting the new long-range plan guiding Douglas County’s transportation system this week.

At its Wednesday meeting, the Planning Commission will consider approving an amendment to the city and county’s joint comprehensive plan, Plan 2040, that would incorporate “Transportation 2050,” a new version of the metropolitan transportation plan that must be revised every five years per federal requirements. The draft plan was released for public input early this year, and later was adopted by the Lawrence-Douglas County Metropolitan Planning Organization Policy Board on March 16.

But that board’s approval wasn’t the last step in the process. The plan won’t be final until it gets a stamp of approval from both the Lawrence City Commission and the Douglas County Commission. If the Planning Commission opts to approve the amendment to Plan 2040 this week, the same motion will be forwarded to both commissions with a recommendation for approval at a later date.

The plan is the product of more than a year of public input, according to a staff report included with the agenda for Wednesday’s meeting. That process included a few dozen stakeholder interviews and mobile meetings throughout the county, three open houses and hundreds of survey responses. It includes elements like a Major Thoroughfares Map, which designates Lawrence’s and unincorporated areas of Douglas County’s street classifications for development purposes, and myriad objectives and suggestions grouped into five broad areas: access and choices, shared prosperity, safety and security, sustainability and operations, and maintenance.

Some examples of those objectives include, under the access and choices goal area, completing a connected network of pedestrian and bicycle facilities comfortable to all ages and abilities and, under the sustainability goal area, increasing the percentage of trips made using active, shared and low-carbon transportation modes to reduce vehicle miles traveled.

Ultimately, the plan accounts for only a few pages of the amended version of Plan 2040. But Transportation 2050 itself is hundreds of pages long and dives into more detail about not just the five broader goal areas but also specific projects like a bicycle wayfinding project, which would involve a network of signage to direct people to specific destinations, set to be implemented this year.

Other projects called for in the plan are likely familiar to those who have been attuned to recent developments concerning transit. The opening and integration of Lawrence’s new multimillion-dollar bus station, which recently was delayed until January, is one of them, as is Lawrence Transit’s yearlong fare-free bus service pilot program.

The full plan as adopted by the Metropolitan Planning Organization is available to view here.