Brief Description
In the last half of the twentieth century, transportation planning was driven by industry and economic development initiatives that translated to moving people and goods from Point A to Point B as quickly and efficiently as possible. But, at what cost to society and the environment was this accomplished? Transportation planners tried to keep up with the ever expanding network of commerce and commuters with a tunnel-like mission seemingly regardless of direct and secondary impacts on communities, farmland and natural resources.

S.A.V.E. has been instrumental in raising awareness and bringing about positive policy changes in the Commonwealth reflecting the growing recognition that transportation needs can be met while also accommodating community needs, land use goals, and conservation, and minimizing environmental impact.

S.A.V.E. was established in 1997 as a grassroots nonprofit community group concerned with a PennDOT proposal to significantly expand the capacity of ten miles of Route 41 from the Delaware state line to Route 926 through the rural countryside of southern Chester County. The proposal would convert a two-lane highway into a multiple-lane grade-separated highway with construction of two new high-speed bypasses around an historic borough and a village. The direct and indirect impacts of such a large infrastructure project would be devastating to the surrounding countryside, accelerating the loss of open space and farm land due to the phenomena of induced traffic and induced development. S.A.V.E. initially challenged the Commonwealth’s largest bureaucracy but eventually developed a working partnership to lead the way for dramatic institutional change within PennDOT. S.A.V.E. raised and spent more than $1.2 million in private contributions and grants over ten years to achieve these successes. In 2006, PennDOT announced that the conventional approach of widening and bypass construction would not take place, but only online improvements to Route 41 would be made – in keeping with S.A.V.E.’s proposed Two Lane Alternative.

The supporters of S.A.V.E. were motivated by a desire to protect the rural community of southern Chester County by addressing one of the root causes of sprawl – the expansion of highways and creation of excess roadway capacity that catalyzes development of open space and farm land and leads to watershed and air quality degradation, loss of historic resources and community character.

To make its case, S.A.V.E. contracted with professional engineers and planners to develop an innovative, state-of-the-art, “Two Lane Alternative” solution for Route 41 that addressed the stated transportation needs of improved safety, congestion, and infrastructure through a series of modern roundabouts and traffic calming. The S.A.V.E. plan, however, looked more comprehensively at the project, examining broader impacts on the community, the environment, cost comparisons, etc. The Two Lane Alternative addressed the transportation goals of improving safety and congestion, but would do so while minimizing environmental impacts, redirecting development to existing village centers, maximizing conservation potential throughout the corridor, and reducing air pollution – all at a cost approximately one-fifth that of the conventional PennDOT proposal. S.A.V.E.’s success with Route 41 provides a case study in how transportation projects can be planned to foster economic development, minimize economic impacts on the environment and communities.

Sustainability Narrative

S.A.V.E.’s accomplishments sustain and improve the quality of life throughout the region.

The Route 41 initiative led to PennDOT’s adoption of the new Context Sensitive Design approach to planning road projects as well as instituting innovative techniques such as traffic calming and the use of modern roundabouts. The Two Lane Alternative embodies a more environmentally sound approach to solving transportation needs, saving many acres that would be directly impacted by new roadway construction as well as decelerating the rate of lost open space which would have resulted from induced development. The watershed and air quality also benefit from this more innovative approach. By not catalyzing sprawl in rural open space, S.A.V.E.’s goal is to encourage revitalization of existing urban centers which are pedestrian and transit friendly, leaving the green fields to perform their function in sustaining our food network.

The Two-Lane Alternative costs approximately one-fifth of the conventional DOT “wider-is-better” approach initially pursued by PennDOT (cost comparisons anticipated ~$150m versus $30m). S.A.V.E.’s approach fosters local economic development while supporting the sustainability of agriculture in southern Chester County – still one of the area’s largest industries. This innovative approach is one of “Wide Nodes, Narrow Roads” – fix congestion where it occurs – at the intersections – rather than adding lane miles to the whole corridor.

S.A.V.E. increasingly provides technical assistance and support to other groups in the County, the Commonwealth and across the country, facing similar challenges. Route 41 can and already does serve as a model for projects everywhere. Often, historic bridges face the same issues in microcosm as Route 41, and S.A.V.E.’s work has led to a dramatic new policy within PennDOT regarding historic bridges. The exponential growth in traffic calming and interest in roundabouts in Pennsylvania is due largely to S.A.V.E.’s leadership.

• S.A.V.E. provided leadership in researching, education, building partnerships, and creating institutional change in sustainable transportation policies being followed elsewhere around the world to the Commonwealth.
• S.A.V.E. engaged the community to build support and awareness that there were smarter alternatives to the conventional DOT approaches of the past fifty years.
• S.A.V.E. successfully made the case that its sustainable transportation alternative made economic sense, it cost taxpayers less, CSS principles save time, money and community angst, and roundabouts save municipalities operating expense and will eventually save society and industry perhaps millions of dollars each year in reduced costs related to accident rates being reduced by ~ 75% and injury and fatality producing accidents reduced by up to 100%.
• Proving that smarter transportation planning and sustainable commercial development equal economic development – enhancing access, aesthetics and the pedestrian environment, as well as sustaining agriculture, often overlooked as one of the largest industries in the Commonwealth and essential to the growing “sustainable food” network and growth in biofuels.
• S.A.V.E. addressed the outdated notion that transportation projects have the right to be developed in a vacuum, without regard to community, environmental, or land use impacts, incorporating the principles of social justice and equity for communities that previously would bear the direct and indirect brunt of transportation projects with the tunnel-vision “highway capacity trumps all.”
• By reducing delay and unnecessary idling, the use of modern roundabouts are energy efficient solutions that reduce fuel consumption (studies indicate one roundabout can save from 18,000 to 20,000 gallons of fuel annually – a potential savings of 1% of the country’s fuel consumption, according to the NorthEast Roundabout Coalition, ““Roundabouts reduce sprawl and increase densities, have potential for huge social impact, even more important (positively) than when interstate system was invented.”) therefore improving air quality and reducing emissions and air pollution.
• Approaching transportation needs in a more comprehensive fashion integrates the complex interplay between land use, watersheds and water quality, and impacts on air quality, as well as reducing the negative impacts on cultural and historic resources by reducing the “footprint” of a roadway and making the case for rehab of historic bridges, rather than replacement, reduces impervious asphalt surfaces thereby aiding in issues of storm water management, by decelerating sprawl enhanced habitat protection becomes possible,…
• S.A.V.E. has certainly influenced regionally policy and philosophy within Chester County, PennDOT’s District 6-0, and the DVRPC, as well as the adoption of statewide policies regarding right-sizing, context sensitive design and historic bridges.

Results

S.A.V.E. has been instrumental in several significant policy changes and project applications taking place in the region regarding transportation and land use planning, including:

• ROUTE 41:
  • a dramatic shift in PennDOT’s proposals for Route 41 with the conventional highway expansion alternative was discarded in favor of a sustainable rehabilitation of the existing two-lane highway to enhance safety and capacity without the creation of excess, sprawl-inducing capacity.
  • PennDOT overcoming its initial skepticism to eventually, in December 2006, recommending a model roundabout at the PA 41 and Old Baltimore Pike South intersection
• STATEWIDE and REGIONAL POLICY SHIFTS
  • Adoption by PennDOT in early 2005 of “right-sizing” and context sensitive design principles
• ROUNDABOUTS:
  • in 2002 the Commonwealth had no roundabouts, while other states such as Maryland recognized their benefits and already had twenty or more; ~ 300 total in the U.S.
  • in 2006 there are approximately 1,000 in the U.S., 2 in PA, with many in the design phase, many applicants for the $1m in pilot funds recently offered by PennDOT and the DVRPC, and 50,000 predicted to be built in the U.S. over the next 20 years.
  • catalyzing the interest in roundabout usage through the region including:
    • installation of a modern roundabout on Route 82 near Unionville
    • PennDOT partnering with the DVRPC to offer $1m in funds for several roundabout pilot projects, retaining Kittelson & Associates to train PennDOT staff and consult on roundabout proposals throughout the Commonwealth,
    • consideration by Pocopson, Londonderry, London Grove, and Oxford Borough of roundabouts and other traffic calming techniques
• HISTORIC BRIDGES
  • preservation of the historic Mortonville Bridge with PennDOT’s commitment to a “substantial rehabilitation” rather than the once-proposed larger, bypass bridge with the concomitant loss of the historic bridge

S.A.V.E. was influential in Deputy Secretary Rina Cutler’s 2006 “Baby Bridge” initiative, basically the application of Context Sensitive Design principles to low-volume historic bridges, leading to a PennDOT strike-off letter which will provide greater flexibility for low-volume historic bridges to retain their width and historic character