Strategy Description:

The goal of this strategy is to manage access for locally generated traffic along key highway corridors which are not adjacent to key interchanges to enhance commercial vitality, traffic safety, and gateway aesthetics and to minimize the impact of increasing through traffic served by the I-99 corridor. The strategy develops a comprehensive program of access management throughout the study area (if not county-wide) which accounts for the reduction of traffic conflicts associated with driveways and intersections along key corridors which pass through several local municipalities.

Key Components:

The following components indicate the process needed for developing the comprehensive access management program.

• Educate local municipal officials regarding the need to "retrofit" and plan for improved access management along existing and new corridors by conducting a series of workshops to achieve their support. Also include business owners located along the corridors to indicate how conceptual changes in access would impact their access and yet benefit their businesses long-term.

• Understand the impediments to preplanning access management too far into the future. Based on current enabling legislation, these impediments are that right-of-way can be reserved for only 20 years (Federal law) and that PENNDOT can not stop driveway access. Respondses to these impediments include:

• Coordinated land use planning and design will help to avoid access management problems (see Strategy 28: Sustainable Design Toolkit).

• The courts in PA are starting to allow PENNDOT to consider local ordinances controlling highway access restrictions. The successful communities have had more detail regarding access management in their comprehensive plans and their land use ordinances, which helped to prove their case before the courts.

• A nonregulatory approach may also work, if the municipalities would develop a process to work more closely with developers on design of development and the location of points of access (see Strategy 28: Sustainable Design Toolkit).

• Compare PENNDOT access management legislation to local municipal legislation to ensure that access management can be locally applied and coordinated among more than one municipality on a corridor.

• Create a regional access management task force and/or coordinate as an aspect of the County Comprehensive Planning Process and Long Range Transportation Planning Process in cooperation with the region’s municipalities, planning organizations, and the private sector to develop and adopt a comprehensive access management program strategy which includes legislative, technical, enforcement, and municipal coordination provisions

• Legislative provisions: A policy statement, regulatory corridor measures, and an inter-municipal coordination agreement

• Technical provisions: Criteria and guidelines to control the number, location and design of access points along a roadway

• Enforcement provisions: monitoring and enforcing at the local level and confirming at the state level

• Coordination among agencies, municipalities, and the private sector. Very critical to the success of this program is the means by which access management responsibilities are shared and implemented by municipal officials along corridors which extend throughout the region like PA 26, PA 550, US 322 and PA 144. This coordination applies to both existing corridors, which will require that access management be "retrofitted", and new corridors such as US 322 extended and other new roads for which access management can be accounted for in the comprehensive planning process. Such long-term planning will require that all municipalities along a corridor treat the corridor with similar if not the same access management techniques throughout its length.

• Select and prioritize existing and new corridors for application of the access management program and adopt provisions into the local and multi-municipal comprehensive plans and ordinances.

• Monitor the program (either through the regional task force or a planning organization) and update as needed.

"Retrofit" access management should be considered for the following corridors and related municipalities in the region.

• PA 150 – Benner Pike to US 220 and I-80 and North Atherton Street. These two projects are under consideration for a statewide program. These projects could become pilot projects for the region. The leaders of the region may choose to watch the progress and use the pilots as an educational forum on how to accomplish these ideas in two diverse settings.

• PA 26 from PA 45 to PA 550/PA 64
• PA 550 from I-99 to PA 26
• SR 3040 (formerly US 220) from Port Matilda to Howard
• Shiloh Road between PA 26 and I-99 and extended past the airport

• PA 144 between US 322 and PA 26 if not replaced by a new highway corridor
• US 322 between PA 144 and PA 26 if not replaced by a new highway corridor
• Any new roadway with direct access to I-99 and other major roadways which link activity areas

The education and planning components may be initiated as part of the County Comprehensive Planning Process and the Long-Range Transportation Plan in cooperation with the County Planning Office and the Metropolitan Planning Organization. A community-based planning process will be required to engage the appropriate stakeholders. An intermunicipal cooperation agreement should be signed between affected municipalities agreeing to adopt a common set of access management standards for specific corridors. These standards would be adopted into appropriate subdivision and land use regulations. Appropriate state, county, and multi-municipal agreements would need to be investigated and implemented.

Indicators:

• Current versus future improved corridor intersection levels of service
• Current versus future accident situation (i.e. a safer corridor; number of accidents per miles of travel)
• More economic investments along the corridor (i.e. increasing sales and new developments)

Federal and state transportation funds.