Limited Amendment Process of Montana's Statewide Long-Range Transportation Plan to Meet SAFETEA-LU Requirements

Abstract

The Montana Department of Transportation (MDT) uses a limited process to amend its statewide transportation plan and bring it into compliance with the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users (SAFETEA-LU) regulations. This amendment process is an alternative to a full-scale, long-range transportation plan update. An overview is presented of ongoing business and planning processes that have made this limited amendment possible, followed by discussion about the approach used in Montana. The discussion focuses on specific areas addressed by the limited amendment process, including efficient management of the transportation system, economic development and land use planning, environmental mitigation, safety, and new consultations. Existing processes addressing such areas were in place before the amendment, including the performance programming process, the highway economic analysis tool, and the corridor planning process. The policy basis for these processes was established in earlier statewide transportation policy plans, whereas the specific business processes used evolved over several years. Limited amendments support maturing statewide planning processes because the mechanisms used for initial full-scale plans, once established within a state department of transportation, can become the drivers behind planning processes that advance either opportunistically or as evolutionary business process change. Some of these mechanisms are continuous robust public involvement, routine cyclic strategic environmental scans, and ongoing fiscal and technical analysis.

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