Metro looks ahead at the next 20 years of planned transportation projects (through the Regional Transportation Plan) and tracks the next four years of committed investments (through the Metropolitan Transportation Improvement Program). Part of its responsibilities include an assessment of how these transportation investments could benefit or burden communities of concern like people of color, people with low income, older people, younger people and people who do not speak English well.
This assessment is one part of local and regional responsibilities toward equity and civil rights as they relate to transportation planning. This analysis takes a programmatic look at the region's short- and long-term planned investments, looking at the region and its demographics as a whole and the planned investments in total.
This assessment does not analyze transportation equity in the region – it does not provide a picture of what’s needed by these communities on the ground or how these investments will work to meet those needs. Other planning processes that lead into the Regional Transportation Plan and the Metropolitan Transportation Improvement Program allow for more localized, even project-specific, assessments.