Regional Planners Looking for Transportation Ideas

By Ed Marcum, The Knoxville News-Sentinel, Tenn.

May 30–The Knoxville Regional Transportation Organization wants people to do some soul-searching to help come up with ideas on how Knox and surrounding counties will be able to sustain a viable transportation system into the future.

The TPO is working on the 2035 Regional Mobility Plan and has set several public meetings to get input. These will be Monday at the Halls public library branch,Tuesday at the Anderson County Chamber of Commerce, Wednesday at the Blount County public library and Friday, at the Cedar Bluff and the Burlington Library branches.

All meetings are at 6 p.m.

The mobility plan is about setting goals and priorities to help the region become a set of connected, sustainable communities with various means of transportation, said Jeff Welch, TPO director.

“This impacts neighborhoods, this impacts businesses, this impacts our economy,” he said. “Things have changed drastically over the last 18 months to two years, particularly with higher fuel costs. How are we going to cope? How will we foster ourselves as the junction of three interstates if truckers are parking their trucks?” he said.

“We need to get a dialogue going on the future of mobility in this community,” Welch said.

More information is at www.knoxtrans.org.

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