TCI Regional Policy Design Stakeholder Submissions

We must provide upgrades to our transportation systems to help thwart climate change and the health of Americans

Thank you for this effort to improve our air, the climate, and access to transportation. Please focus on efforts to minimize carbon emissions as much as possible, which will help my patients' health and my children's future. And please focus on providing transportation access to underserved communities who tend to have very little voice in these processes.

I would mostly like to see drastically improved investments in, and saturation of, public transportation. I applaud this multi-partisan initiative to focus on our inefficient and dangerous fuel consumption and resulting pollution. Our military surely burns a lot, too, we need them to be strong but also not guzzling irresponsibly. Thank you.

We are in climate crisis, and we need a strong, regional low-carbon transportation system. The highways are clogged with too many cars, and making more lanes is not the answer. We need to preserve our natural areas and reduce our dependence on automobiles.

The looming global climate crisis--caused by humankind's relatively rapid combustion of millions of years of accumulated fossil fuels--is an existential threat to human existence. Since transportation is now our largest source of global-warming emissions. rapidly achieving a carbon-neutral transportation sector is essential for human survival and the quality of life for future generations.

I urge the Commonwealth of Virginia to formally join this plan to reduce transportation-related emissions.

It's important that the adopted policy have a strong equity component, by prioritizing clean investments in areas overburdened by pollution and/or for those who don't have access.

It's long past time to stop expanding limited-access highways for toll-free travel by single-occupant motor vehicles. Rather, existing general-purpose freeway lanes should be converted into managed travel lanes for express buses and other multi-occupant vehicles.

I applaud the bipartisan nature of this project, moving us forward while the federal government has been taking us backward by lowering future automobile emission standards and expanding fossil fuel extraction and publicly subsidized fossil fuel infrastructure.

I am concerned about our climate and we need to take immediate action to reduce pollution from transportation, which is our largest source of global warming emissions (regionally and nationally). Virginia must formally join the Transportation and Climate Initiative to reduce emissions. The policy must have a strong component of equity by prioritizing clean investments in areas overburdened by pollution and/or for those who don't have access. Our transportation system is stuck in the dark ages. Traffic congestion from millions of cars and trucks are polluting our lungs and planet more than ever before. As we enter this new decade, we have an opportunity to modernize how we get from point A to point B. I appreciate that this plan was created in a bipartisan nature to move us forward while the federal government takes us backward.

As a Virginia resident, I have witnessed the increasing vehicle air pollution and periods of dangerous air quality with concern. Reducing vehicle emissions must be a priority for the sake of the health of area residents, particularly children (with developing respiratory systems), and many with health vulnerabilities. Virginia should formally join the regional initiative to reduce emissions and take direct action to invest in clean solutions to achieve reductions in areas that have high levels of pollution.
I am grateful that this regional bipartisan initiative is taking us forward to cleaner air, while the federal government is moving backwards.
Thank you for your consideration.