Coordination of Transportation Planning and Land Use Control: A Challenge for Virginia in the 21st Century: Final Report

About the report:

The public power to control the use of land is primarily exercised by city and county officials in Virginia. Control over the location and characteristics of transportation facilities, including roads and mass transit, is exercised primarily by the Commonwealth through the Virginia Department of Transportation. Unlike most other states, Virginia retains control over and responsibility for almost all roads not within an incorporated city. Though it complicates coordination, this separation of the responsibility for land use control and transportation planning is not unworkable. This structure seems to have served the Commonwealth well for some 50 years; however, new pressures have begun to place great stress on it. This report explores the legal, institutional, and procedural environments within which the land use and transportation planning processes operate in Virginia. In particular, the study focuses on the problems that have emerged from the explosive population growth and development that Northern Virginia experienced in the 1980s. The report encompasses six general areas of inquiry: (1) intergovernmental relations; (2) the transportation planning process; (3) land use control; (4) tools for coordination; (5) impediments to effective coordination; and (6) the laws and practices of other selected regions.

Authors