Transportation Plan

Link to the Transportation Plan Story Map.

  Background

Home to many diverse peoples and communities, the City of Cortez was settled in the late 19th century by pioneers from the east in search of new beginnings. Unlike most cities, Cortez was not settled around a river or transportation network. Rather it was settled to house hundreds of men working on completing an elaborate irrigation network focused on diverting water from the Dolores River to the Montezuma valley. Cortez remained a small town until the 1950’s when it received a boom following an oil strike in Aneth, Utah. Since then, the city has experienced periods of boom and bust, but Cortez continues to grow while maintaining its rich tradition and history. Cortez remains home to lifelong residents, including members of the Ute Mountain Ute, Pueblo, Navajo, and other tribes, and welcomes newer additions to the community.

Need for a Study

As Cortez City continues to grow and develop, the need to establish a comprehensive transportation planning document increase. A Transportation Plan (TP) will greatly improve the City’s ability to anticipate growth, maintain existing roadways, and manage development.

 Cortez City’s roadway network plan has been established in this TP to plan for all transportation needs of Cortez’s residents, businesses, and visitors. This TP is intended to be used as a tool to plan for future transportation capital projects, future development, and future roadway network inventory. This TP includes planning guidelines for future vehicular, bicycle, heavy truck traffic, and pedestrian use.

 

The benefits of establishing a TP include:

 

  1. Establishing an existing transportation network inventory. This inventory includes roadway classification mapping, average daily traffic (ADT) mapping, existing pavement information, existing vehicular speed and classification data, demographic data, and vehicular crash data.

 

  1. Improving development and future growth standards by creating guidelines for corridor preservation, standards for access management, and standards for Traffic Impact Studies (TIS).

 

  1. Improving planning for future roadway capital projects with an emphasis on limiting funding waste and construction delays and properly locating future transportation infrastructure.

 

  1. Improving planning for funding acquisition.

Scope of Work

The City of Cortez TP includes the

following primary objectives:

Assess Existing Conditions

Analyze existing traffic and roadway conditions to establish an inventory of the existing roadway network and determine likely growth patterns and future transportation-related needs.

 

Plan for Future Growth

Based on existing inventory, plan for future transportation-related development, roadway network mapping, roadway maintenance projects, roadway construction projects, and funding acquisition opportunities.

 

Transportation Guidelines and Policies

Guide future development by establishing and compiling transportation-related development standards.

 

Transportation Corridor Preservation

Provide a framework for the preservation and establishment of existing and future transportation corridors.

 

GIS Story Map

Create a Geographic Information System (GIS) Story Map that includes all planning data from the TMP as well as other relevant City GIS and mapping data.

 

These objectives will allow the City to establish a transportation plan for the city that will guide a continuingly functional transportation system adaptable to changes and unanticipated growth.