County commissioners hear progress update on countywide transportation master plan; consultants promise data-driven "hard choices"

The Palm Beach County Board of County Commissioners on Tuesday received a progress update on the countywide transportation master plan from WSP project manager Claudia Bellato and consultant Victor Dover.

WSP said it has completed Phase 1 outreach, including 12 public meetings and more than 1,500 public survey responses, and launched a public portal at pbcmoves.com to share data and recommendations. "We received over 1,500 responses," Bellato said during the presentation, noting about 400 attendees across the outreach events.

The consultant team framed the plan around four pillars — safety, connectivity, technology and mobility choice — and stressed integration of land use, design and transportation. "The best transportation plan is a good land use plan," Victor Dover told commissioners, arguing that compact, mixed-use development can shorten trips and increase walk, bike and transit modes.

Commissioners questioned how interactive the online tool would be and whether the plan would include a "digital twin" capable of running new simulations. Bellato replied that the portal is intended as a public-facing repository of data and recommendations and "would not be elaborate enough to run a simulation per se," though she said additional resources could add simulation capability.

On data and modeling, WSP said the study uses the latest available inputs and a base year of 2024 for the travel-demand model, then forecasts to 2050. "Our base year data sources are the base year of the model is 2024," Bellato said. Commissioners pressed for current peak-hour counts and clarity about data methodology. Commissioner Weiss asked whether the team would "be pulling actual data from some source that aggregates what is happening on our roadways as, you know, now?" Bellato and the team confirmed they are aggregating near-real-time sources and traditional counts, and are using tools such as Google-derived aggregate data and a platform called Replika; WSP said it is also conducting a sentiment analysis of user-reported behavior (for example, Waze) to complement counts.

Staff and consultants said the next two months will focus on technical analysis and modeling. The county also discussed whether to expand WSP's scope to add planning-and-zoning work; staff said the existing contract may accommodate additional services but any expansion would require cost and timeline estimates from the consultant. The board provided direction to proceed with the current scope and revisit scope expansion later if needed.

No formal action was taken on the plan itself at the meeting; the update was presented for information and to guide upcoming technical work.