Transportation planning for healthy communities: Best practices from regions and states

Public health and transportation practitioners are increasingly recognizing the relationship between the built environment and the physical, social, and mental health of communities. As one important component of the built environment, transportation has a significant influence on the physical activity and well-being, safety, and ability of community members to access destinations that are essential to a healthy lifestyle. Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs), the primary units for transportation planning at the regional level, and State Departments of Transportation (State DOTs) both have the responsibility to work collaboratively with public health and other partners to plan multimodal transportation systems within their respective jurisdictions. This research uses MPO and State DOT case studies to test and refine a conceptual framework that transportation and health professionals can use to successfully incorporate health into the transportation planning process, from goals to funding to performance measures. The analysis of the case studies demonstrates that although each transportation agency may have a unique context, approach, and set of actors; the planning processes, strategies, and challenges are very similar. Partnerships, leveraging of grants, building internal technical capacity, and an emphasis on incremental change and stakeholder and staff engagement are common themes. This research provides public health professionals an opportunity to better understand and access the transportation planning realm so that together the fields can effectively consider the health impacts and benefits of transportation projects to help achieve healthy communities.