King County City Council Updates Strategic Plan

As our roads continue to be overhauled, those of us who commute far outside of the immediate Bothell area might be facing some unwelcome interruptions in the coming months—or years. Fortunately, the Metropolitan King County City Council voted unanimously to update the county’s strategic plan for public transportation, which extends until 2021.

Councilman Rod Dembowski told the Bothell Reporter: “I believe the process we used to update the plan was a model of cooperation of leaders throughout the region partnering together to improve this vital regional asset…Working together with the Sound Cities Association and the city of Seattle, we were able to address some of our region’s challenging transportation problems; I hope to see this model of cooperation followed in the future.”

Among the new updates to the strategic plan are:

• Requiring Metro to develop a long-range plan;

• Refining the service guidelines to facilitate planning by cities and include college student enrollment when evaluating the need for transit service;

• Requiring a multi-agency study on community infrastructure that supports access to transit, including park-and-ride facilities; and

• Updating policy language to match Metro’s procedures for complying with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

To read more complete coverage of the King County Metro’s Strategic Plan updates, click here.