Michael Brick, operations engineer and traffic engineering at the City of Everett Public Works Department and project manager for the transportation element update, told the Planning Commission the update sets a 2044 planning horizon and will cover existing conditions, forecasting, facilities and needs, funding and goals and policies aimed at guiding 20 years of transportation investment.

“The transportation element is really a 20 year long range picture to get where how or how we will accommodate the growth that is projected over the next 20 years in the city of Everett,” Brick said.

Brick said the update responds to state and regional legal requirements, including changes such as middle housing laws, and aligns local goals with county and Puget Sound regional plans. He cited regional growth targets staff used in forecasting — nearly 40,000 new homes and more than 75,000 new jobs apportioned across the region over the next 20 years — and said the team used a “dispersed growth” alternative to model resulting travel demand.

Staff presented existing conditions and noted a strong reliance on private vehicles: transit and walking each account for about 4 percent of trips, and bicycles about 1 percent; Brick flagged that the mode-share figures in the consultant packet add to roughly 88 percent and said staff will follow up to resolve the missing share. “The key takeaway here is transit, bikes and walking are all viable modes, but collectively they make up about 10% of the trips and vehicles make up the bulk as of today,” he said.

The briefing described freight and transit connections: the Port of Everett and Boeing rely on street, rail (BNSF mainline) and marine links, and multiple agencies provide fixed-route and regional service. Brick said freight mobility was added to the goals this cycle because of the port’s local economic importance.

On funding, staff cautioned the commission that most money for projects comes from external grants and is therefore uncertain. Brick described local transportation impact fees and mitigation revenue trends, saying that under the city’s current fee rate development could generate roughly $23,000,000 a year in mitigation funds during higher-growth years but that actual receipts are highly variable (historical years have ranged from about $1,000,000 to $6,000,000). “Funding becomes really one of the bugaboos of getting to where we need to,” he said.

The draft goals and policies emphasize equitable multimodal access, safety, sustainability and interagency coordination; Brick highlighted a goals-alignment matrix showing how local policies meet regional and statutory objectives. “We have goals that specifically focus on each mode — transit, vehicle, active transportation — and a heavy emphasis on safety and sustainability,” Brick said. He also noted that staff will coordinate the transportation element with updates to the bicycle master plan, transit development plan and a separate freight access and mobility study.

Commissioners asked detailed questions. On traffic calming, Commissioner (recorded in the transcript as Speaker 4) asked whether the city was moving away from a previous position limiting speed tables and speed humps. Tom Hood, city engineer, and Corey Hertz, city traffic engineer, said traffic calming will be part of the safety action plan funded through a Safe Streets for All grant and that a wide range of measures — from low-cost, temporary treatments to roundabouts and speed tables — are being considered and would be developed through public process.

On wording, a commissioner challenged language in draft policy TR9 (intelligent transportation systems), suggesting the wording read more like a goal than a descriptive statement; staff agreed to review the phrasing.

Next steps: staff asked commissioners to focus comments on goals and policies ahead of the Jan. 21 meeting, said they will present to the Transportation Advisory Committee, synthesize feedback in March–April, and bring a package to city council in April–May with an objective of adoption before the end of June to align with new middle-housing regulations.

The presentation materials and public outreach timeline are posted to the project webpage; Brick asked commissioners what technical level of detail they preferred for the Jan. 21 follow-up and requested commissioners flag the specific goals and policies they want to prioritize.