Members of MPAC and JPACT used green, yellow and red cards to show whether they were comfortable with an investment plan for transit.
The dials on a regional plan to reduce tailpipe emissions have been set.
Now comes one more study.
The Portland region's Climate Smart Communities effort reached a milestone Friday, when the Metro Policy Advisory Committee and the Joint Policy Advisory Committee on Transportation both unanimously agreed on a conceptual funding plan to study further.
The plan, which must be finalized and adopted by December, is a response to a state mandate to curb tailpipe emissions in the Portland region. The joint gathering of MPAC and JPACT was a follow-up to an April 11 summit on the same topic.
Friday's vote didn't mandate light rail to the suburbs, raise the gas tax nor mandate a road diet for bike lanes. Instead, it was simply a way to gauge how far policymakers – primarily elected officials from the region's counties and cities – think the region should go in certain policy areas to meet the state's mandate.
Based on the votes from MPAC and JPACT:
- The tailpipe emission reduction study should look at how much emissions would be curbed if the region spent somewhere between $2.2 billion and $4.1 billion in the next 20 years on capital improvements for transit, with roughly another $8 billion projected for operations in the coming decades.
- Planners should study how much of a carbon reduction would happen if the region spent at least $173 million on improving the technology behind the region's transportation system. The study should also include a projection the region will expand its commuter information programs by 2035.
- Regional leaders said the study should project that the region will spent between $948 million and $1.75 billion in new sidewalks, trails and bike lanes in the next 20 years. Roughly another $9 billion, leaders said, should be projected for building streets and highways.
- Leaders said they're willing to do somewhat more to manage parking in a way that encourages more business in downtowns.
The transit portion attracted the most debate, and attention, from the regional leaders on MPAC and JPACT. Many suburban representatives, including Clackamas County Commissioner Paul Savas and Hillsboro Mayor Jerry Willey, were skeptical of more capital improvements to the transit network, instead wanting more operational expenditures on buses that could better connect suburban residents to jobs away from downtown Portland.
"If it got home to say I even was thinking about voting for light rail, I might not be allowed to go home," said Dick Jones, an MPAC member representing the Oak Lodge Water District.
Still, there was general support for increasing transit service as the backbone for meeting the state mandate.
"If we're serious about greenhouse gas reduction, this has the greatest impact, and that's where the money should go," said Lake Oswego City Councilor Jef Gudman, a JPACT member.
"I don't look at transit capital and operations as light rail. I look at the overall system, which I believe is the best bang for the buck," Willey said. "I really don't believe light rail is the best bang for the buck. It's too expensive. We should be focusing heavily on TriMet's system of buses around the region."
Portland City Commissioner Steve Novick echoed the call for more transit.
"To paraphrase Samuel Gompers, I want more," Novick said. "We need a huge investment in transit to give people an alternative."
There's still the open-ended question of where the money should come from. Metro Councilor Carlotta Collette pointed out that Oregon's state-level investment in local transit is among the lowest in the nation.
"For us to get (more transit service), we really do need to ask the state to kick in some money to transit operations," she said. "That is very reasonable to ask of the state legislators."
But there's one place the money probably won't come from exclusively, said Metro Councilor Bob Stacey – drivers. No plan, he said, should be simply about "taxing people out of their automobiles."
"We benefit because a UPS truck can arrive, a school bus can go by and pick up our kids, whether or not we leave the house.
Having a transportation funding strategy that addresses all the needs and benefits of the transportation system is a good part of the strategy for meeting those goals," Stacey said. "I think we can all drive less if we have the opportunity, but we don't need to be telling people they have to."
Friday's votes were hardly the last word on the topic. The regional leaders from MPAC and JPACT weren't endorsing a strategy to curb emissions, merely guiding planners on what direction to take as they craft a final strategy.
That final plan is expected for release in September, with the Metro Council set to vote on the plan by December.