Gov. Timothy M. Kaine promised to link transportation and land use planning, and so he will, thanks to passage of Senate Bill 699. The legislation, which goes into effect in July 2007, will require rezoning projects in fast-growth counties to be subjected to review by the Virginia Department of Transportation for their traffic impact.
The law is essentially toothless — there are no sanctions for local governments that spurn VDOT’s advice — but the Kaine administration hopes that it will force local governments to at least consider the traffic impact of their rezoning decisions.
The law doesn’t go into effect for another year because VDOT needs time to write the regulations. But that won’t stop the Kaine administration from initiating a “pilot project” in Loudoun County, where the board of supervisors will make decisions this summer on a number of massive development proposals that could shape the county for decades to come.
Road to Ruin writer Peter Galuszka has the skinny here.