An official website of the POLICY 24: Freight connections
This policy states:
Plan for and invest in first/last-mile freight connections between major freight generators and the regional highway system.
Actions
- Investment Priority (IP): Actions tagged with (IP) provide direction to regional investment processes directed by the plan. This includes the Regional Solicitation, which will complete an evaluation to determine the appropriate framework and application of these actions to the Regional Solicitation. Actions could be applied in the Regional Solicitation in a variety of ways including qualifying requirements, application categories, or scoring measures. These actions can also apply to other regional highway and transit funding programs. Investment priorities targeted exclusively at local governments are tagged as local planning (see below).
- Local Planning (LP): Actions tagged with (LP) are requirements or guidance for agencies to incorporate into the transportation element of their Comprehensive Plans, corridor plans, transit provider plans, and other plans that are not regional or statewide. Major items are noted but this is not intended to be a comprehensive list. Local planning tag may also indicate actions with potential local investment priorities that would help support regional goals and objectives that are not tied to regional or statewide investment programs.
- Technical Capacity Building (CB): Actions tagged with (CB) are technical assistance and support activities to provide guidance and best practices to agencies that builds regional technical capacity.
- Partner (P): Actions tagged with (P) are activities that support the regional goals and transportation objectives where the plan is directing partners to take a direct lead. This tag applies primarily to regional or state partners; the local planning tag provides direction to local partners.
- Work Program (WP): Actions tagged with (WP) are work program activities, including staff time and consultant studies, to be worked on until the next scheduled update of the plan in five years. These items are necessary to further research and policy guidance to support the region in achieving its goals and transportation objectives. Work program items are listed at the end of each policy. More complete descriptions of work program items are provided in the Imagine 2050 TPP Work Program.
| = Lead agency = Supporting agency |
Met Council | MnDOT | Counties | Cities | Transit | Other |
| 24A. Update the Statewide Freight Bottlenecks Report every other year to identify impacts of highway congestion on freight movements, including congestion at MnDOT-identified truck freight bottlenecks, and identify cost-effective mitigation. Action types: Investment Priority Technical Capacity Building Partner |
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| 24B. Improve real-time safety information on major freight corridors to inform drivers of routing disruptions. (See 28A for related action.) Action types: Technical Capacity Building Partner |
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| 24C. Plan for and improve first- and last-mile highway connections between major freight terminals and important freight nodes that may generate significant freight traffic, and the Met Council designated Regional Truck Freight Corridors. Action types: Local Planning Investment Priority Partner |
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| 24D. Prioritize freight reliability and safety in transportation investments. Incorporate findings from MnDOT’s Metro District Freight Plan when completed. Action types: Investment Priority Partner |
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| 24E. Develop a framework for a Complete Streets planning process that considers the safe movement and delivery of freight and goods in addition to other goals. (See policy 23 for related actions.) Action types: Local Planning Technical Capacity Building |
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| 24F. Facilitate discussions between the trucking industry and local and state transportation partners to identify regional truck parking issues, conflicts, and solution opportunities. Action types: Technical Capacity Building Partner |
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| 24G. Partner with private industry and universities in pilot studies and projects that promote and facilitate last-mile distribution through parcel consolidation (through urban / suburban center parcel distribution microhubs), zero-emission vehicles (like cargo e-bikes), and emerging technologies (such as air and land-based drones). Action types: Technical Capacity Building Partner |
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| 24H. Encourage major urban freight delivery providers to provide summary data related to delivery vehicle miles traveled and develop aggregated data metrics for tracking progress in meeting regional and state goals. Action types: Technical Capacity Building Partner |
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| 24I. Explore methods to account for the influences of online shopping on regional freight and household shopping trips in planned updates to the Council’s freight and activity-based travel forecasts. Action type: Technical Capacity Building |
(TBD) | |||||
| 24J. Perform an update to the Twin Cities Metropolitan Regional Freight Study. Action types: Investment Priority Technical Capacity Building Local Planning Work Program |
TBD is to be determined. Agencies have not yet been identified.
