Transportation Plan

The Comprehensive Transportation Plan will provide both technical and policy direction for planning Gwinnett's transportation facilities. The plan will assess land use and map key information regarding the County's transportation network including roads, transit routes, bicycle amenities and pedestrian facilities. Issues of capacity, congestion, funding and maintenance will also be assessed. Evaluation of transportation alternatives will include both performance and costs. The project will use state-of-the-art modeling techniques and extensive public involvement to provide Gwinnett County with a plan to accommodate travel demand through the year 2030.

This planning effort will provide an analysis of current transportation systems in the County and review the inventories of transportation facilities maintained by the County. Documentation of the current County transportation systems will include:

• Bridge Inventory - location, number and width of lanes and conditions
• Major Bike and Pedestrian Facilities - location and type of facilities
• Major Parking Facilities - location, number of spaces, ownership, structured vs. at grade
• Public Transportation - current bus routes with headways, travel time, and current ridership
• Railroads and Airports - all facilities with location, ownership, frequencies of use, and conditions
• Current land use by category
• Current zoning
• Identification of Developments of Regional Impact using the GRTA process
• Projects recommended through Livable Center Initiative Studies
• Truck movements on major facilities and the identification of major trucking terminals

Travel Demand Forecasting Model

The travel demand forecasting model combines land use and demographic data with travel patterns to identify deficiencies in the transportation network. The primary output of a travel demand model is the assignment of traffic volumes to all roadway segments in the network. The model will be used to evaluate alternative transportation investments and land use policies.

Capital Cost Model

The capital cost model will be consistent with recent Gwinnett project development experience. The level of effort and amount of detail will be sufficient to produce conceptual level Present Day Cost estimates that show differences among alternatives within acceptable levels of confidence.

In addition to direct costs, indirect costs associated with the construction and implementation of the proposed alternatives will be included in the capital cost analysis to the greatest extent feasible. Capital costs in the model reflect recent construction trends and unit costs observed in the Atlanta area (heavily weighted by Gwinnett County experience) and actual experiences of other transportation agencies in the Atlanta Region construction and implementation.

Operating Cost Estimating

Consistent with recent Gwinnett County operating costs, an operating cost model to estimate the annual operating and maintenance costs associated with both highway and transit elements of the alternatives to be studied will be developed.

Scenarios

A series of model refinements to facilitate their integration and coordination and the use in the later stages of the project to test the scenarios and other plan policies will be developed. Such refinements and integration are crucial to the scenario building and testing process. The scenarios themselves can be designed to address the expected system deficiencies as well as address a full range of other County development objectives.