Transportation accounts for more than 60 percent of emissions in Mountain View with drive alone trips representing the biggest contributor to emissions and pollution. Drive alone trips and vehicle dependency also affect sustainability in other ways—encouraging sprawling land uses that are difficult to serve by transit, requiring heavily-paved public spaces for roads and overabundance of parking; consuming land that could be used for social space or green infrastructure; increasing urban runoff and water pollution; and leading to a cycle of induced travel demand and intractable traffic congestion.

Mountain View’s current mode split has been shaped by historic patterns of freeway-based suburbanization.  To maintain community livability, economic vitality and environmental sustainability, however, the City’s General Plan calls for strategies to reduce travel demand and encourage more healthy, sustainable patterns of transportation. This shift is reflected in the City’s land use plans that focus growth within change areas and the City’s capital projects that retrofit auto-oriented roadways to make them pedestrian-, bicycle- and transit-friendly.  It is also reflected in a patchwork of City policies that encourage Transportation Demand Management (TDM) strategies in conjunction with private development projects.  Examples of TDM strategies include transit pass discounts, parking cash out programs, incentives for bike commuting, corporate shuttle services, carpool coordination, and preferential parking spaces for carpool and vanpool. 

In order to create more consistent, transparent and predictable conditions for TDM implementation in Mountain View, the City has embarked on a project to develop a citywide TDM Ordinance. As such, implementation of a citywide TDM Ordinance has been identified as a Council strategic priority in fiscal years 2023-2025. The goal of the TDM Ordinance is to improve transparency around how TDM policy is applied citywide to future projects of all sizes. Key milestones of the project include developing a recommended TDM framework comprised of a TDM toolkit and menu of TDM options; preparing a draft TDM ordinance to shape development conditions of approval and standardize requirements across all City code sections; as well as establish ordinance management procedures for monitoring and enforcement to better understand how TDM programs are performing. You can view the project workplan below:

 The City has hired Steer to support this work and staff presented the draft vision and goals of the TDM Ordinance to the Bicycle Pedestrian Advisory Committee (BPAC) on October 25, 2023, the Environmental Planning Commission (EPC) on November 1, 2023, and the Council Transportation Committee (CTC) on January 30, 2024. The purpose of these study sessions was to seek feedback from advisory bodies and Council on key project objectives and the means for achieving the overall intent of the policy.

For more project information, please email Gary Hsueh, Associate at Steer, at Gary.Hsueh@steergroup.com, and Ben Pacho, Transportation Planner, at Ben.Pacho@mountainview.gov. You can download and share TDM Factsheet below with other interested stakeholders who would like to get in touch with the project team.

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TDM Factsheet