City and County planning commissions recommend adoption of 2025 Klamath Falls Urban Area Transportation System Plan

The City of Klamath Falls Planning Commission and the Klamath County Planning Commission voted to recommend adoption of the 2025 Klamath Falls Urban Area Transportation System Plan, a 20-year transportation vision and implementation framework covering the city and the urban growth boundary.

The joint public hearing on the TSP included staff and consultant presentations, public outreach summaries and deliberations by both commissions. Jeremy Morris, Klamath County Planning Director, described the plan as an update to the city’s 2012 urban TSP and said it consolidates multiple background plans into a single reference for transportation needs, projects and policies. "This TSP certainly has a lot of lines on a map or dots on a map for existing issues that we know on the existing system and, what we project some of those future issues and constraints will be," Morris said.

Matt Kittleson of Kittleson and Associates, the consultant team lead, said the plan is intended as a long-range vision that unifies city and county priorities. "It's a long range vision, for the transportation system within the urban area, for the county and the city," Kittleson said, and described chapters that document existing conditions, multimodal needs, project lists and funding options.

Why it matters: The TSP sets priorities and creates an evidentiary basis for grant applications and code updates. Commissioners and staff emphasized that listing projects in a TSP is often a prerequisite for competing for state and federal grants and for coordinating construction standards across jurisdictions.

Key points from the hearing - Scope and content: The TSP updates the 2012 urban plan, consolidates related plans (trail master plan, transportation safety action plans, freight/bridge assessments) and proposes a summary to be incorporated into the urban area comprehensive plan with the full TSP included as a background volume. Joe Wall, a city planning staff member, said the document is largely organizational and will help city and county work toward more consistent construction standards within the urban growth boundary. - Project list and timeframe: Consultants and staff presented a prioritized list of short-, medium- and long-range projects, and a set of "vision" projects that could be needed beyond 20 years or that would be development-driven. Kittleson noted that some projects are development-triggered and may not be built unless development provides right-of-way and utility connections. - Multimodal and safety emphasis: The plan highlights sidewalks, active-transportation links to the OC&E Trail, crossing improvements, safe routes to school projects and intersection/corridor improvements. Staff and consultants stressed the overlap between congestion and safety needs and the advantage of using both safety and capacity grant programs. - Funding and implementation: Commissioners repeatedly returned to funding constraints. Staff estimated urban-area needs in the hundreds of millions of dollars and noted that available flexible revenue streams (gas tax, vehicle registration distributions) are small compared with capital needs. Morris and Kittleson discussed system development charges (SDCs) as one option; Kittleson cited examples from other Oregon cities where per-home SDCs range from a few thousand dollars to more than $15,000. Morris said the county and city do not currently levy transportation SDCs and recommended follow-up work sessions to develop a funding strategy. - Bridges, culverts and maintenance: Presenters noted bridge replacement or rehabilitation as especially costly, with example estimates discussed in the hearing (tens of millions for large bridges) and emphasized the importance of asset maintenance to avoid much higher replacement costs. - OC&E Trail connection: The plan includes projects (notably project M15) to improve connections between the OC&E Trail and downtown via existing crossings and the South 6th Street bridge; consultants said a dedicated new bridge across the rail yard has been pursued several times but interim route improvements are included so trail users have safer connections.

Formal actions and next steps - City Planning Commission motion: The City Planning Commission moved to accept staff findings and recommend adoption of the 2025 Klamath Falls Urban Area Transportation System Plan and amendments to the Community Development Ordinance to comply with the Oregon Transportation Planning Rule (file CPA-25). The motion passed on an aye vote called as "5 aye" by the chair; the transcript records the vote count as five in favor. - County Planning Commission motion: The County Planning Commission moved to accept staff findings and recommend adoption of the 2025 Klamath Falls Urban Area Transportation System Plan (file CLUP1-25) to the Board of County Commissioners. The commission voted in favor; recorded votes were announced as "aye" during the hearing and the commissioners stated they would forward the recommendation to the Board of County Commissioners for final action.

Commissioners on both bodies asked staff to return with additional work on funding options, including considering whether to pursue transportation system development charges, targeted grant strategies and potential local funding mechanisms. Both commissions noted that adoption of the TSP is a necessary step to make projects eligible for many competitive grants.

Public comment: No members of the public registered to speak during the designated public comment portion; staff noted a public sign-up process but reported no speakers for this hearing.

The planning commissions’ recommendations will be transmitted to their respective legislative bodies (City Council and Board of County Commissioners) for final decisions at future meetings. Staff indicated the formal adoption hearings will take place at subsequent City Council and Board of County Commissioners meetings, with additional public hearings required for adoption of the comprehensive plan amendment and related code changes.

Ending note: Commissioners and staff emphasized that the TSP is intended to be a living document that will be updated as focused studies (for example, ODOT work on Crater Lake Parkway and South 6 corridor studies) provide new information and as grant and funding opportunities evolve.