REPORT TO PLANNING COMMISSION
SUBJECT
Title
Adoption of a Transportation Policy Establishing Vehicle Miles Traveled as the Methodology for Analyzing Transportation Environmental Impacts in Compliance with State Law
Report
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
In order to comply with State Senate Bill 743 (SB 743, Steinberg, 2013), the City has been working to update its policies regarding how transportation impacts are analyzed as a part of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) review process. SB 743 requires that starting on July 1, 2020, Level of Service (LOS) can no longer be used to analyze a project's transportation impacts for the purposes of completing a CEQA review. Per State guidelines, staff is recommending that the City Council adopt a policy where Vehicle Miles Traveled (VMT) is used as the City's updated transportation metric by which projects are analyzed under CEQA. Additionally, staff recommends that LOS be retained as a non-CEQA transportation operational measure that is studied for projects that require transportation analysis.
BACKGROUND
In September 2013, the State of California approved SB 743 (Attachment 1), which changes the way transportation impacts are analyzed under CEQA. SB 743 requires that starting on July 1, 2020, all California lead agencies (which includes cities, counties, etc.) can no longer use automobile LOS to analyze and disclose environmental transportation impacts per CEQA. SB 743 also requires that California lead agencies adopt a new transportation methodology to "promote the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, the development of multimodal transportation networks, and a diversity of land uses." The State has recommended VMT as the preferred methodology for conducting CEQA transportation analysis for projects. While LOS measures traffic delay (i.e. congestion) at signalized intersections or roadway segments, VMT generally measures the distance a vehicle will travel to a destination.
In December 2018, the State of Califor...
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