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Planning commission recommends transportation element updates, adopting island‑wide mobility plan
Summary
The Bainbridge Island Planning Commission voted unanimously to recommend updates to the comprehensive plan's transportation element that consolidate prior plans into an islandwide mobility plan and adopt a safe‑systems approach that increases emphasis on walking and biking.
The Bainbridge Island Planning Commission voted unanimously on Jan. 22 to recommend staff updates to the transportation element of the city's comprehensive plan, including replacing the existing island‑wide transportation plan with a consolidated island‑wide mobility plan that emphasizes multimodal travel and pedestrian and bicycle user experience.
The motion, moved and seconded during the meeting, passed after staff described the changes as largely consolidating prior work rather than proposing a new slate of projects. Hannah Boettcher, the city's sustainable transportation coordinator, said the draft embodies policies adopted in 2022 and adds a new policy adopting a safe‑systems approach. "The safe systems approach is a Federal Highway Administration approach to safety," Boettcher said, explaining the Vision Zero‑style aim of designing streets to reduce fatalities and serious injuries.
The mobility plan updates include a new multimodal level‑of‑service (MMLOS) metric that evaluates the user experience of pedestrians and cyclists rather than focusing solely on motor‑vehicle congestion. Staff told the commission the new MMLOS will inform the project list that supports concurrency and other capital planning.
Public works director Chris Wierzbicki said the concurrency concept means city permitting can be tied to transportation capacity: "If our transportation network doesn't provide the capacity for that next additional permit ... that would not be a concurrent development and a permit would not be issued," he said, while also noting some flexibility because many projects are already in planning, design or permitting.
Commission discussion also covered grant eligibility and costs: Boettcher said federal grant programs such as Safe Streets for All may align with the safe‑systems policy, and staff estimated the bundle of prioritized transportation projects on the mobility plan is on the order of $30,000,000 in total capital investment to meet planned growth over time; staff said actual spending per biennium is typically about $2 million to $5 million.
The commission's recommendation forwards the updated transportation element and the draft island‑wide mobility plan for inclusion in the public‑hearing draft of the comprehensive plan, with additional public review to follow under the city's schedule.
