Complete Streets: How Policy and Design Shape Urban Mobility
Communities thrive with greater connectivity. When this includes a multimodal approach that’s designed to accommodate users of all ages and abilities, it can be referred to as complete streets. The concept redefines the design of roadways to support a more holistic view of mobility, shifting from vehicle dominated corridors to spaces that serve everyone.
Complete streets are uniquely positioned to meet multiple goals at once. Increased public accessibility unlocks opportunities for economic growth, enhanced infrastructure, and improved public health. It not only promotes sustainability with active transportation and green infrastructure but also improvements for motorists with safety and traffic calming features.
Comprehensive in nature, a complete streets policy can also be complex in its implementation. Each community has its own needs, constraints, and priorities, meaning complete streets must be thoughtfully tailored to their context.
In this blog, we’ll explore what complete streets are, the common elements that make them effective, and the process of creating policies leading to projects that bring them to life.
What Are Complete Streets?
Complete streets are an approach to planning, designing, building, operating, and maintaining streets that enable safe access for people of all ages and abilities. Rather than focusing primarily on vehicular traffic, this approach considers how all users interact within the transportation network to increase efficiency throughout.
At its core, complete streets emphasize multimodal transportation. This means integrating infrastructure for pedestrians, cyclists, transit users, and motorists while also adding improvements to infrastructure like stormwater management. The goal is to create streets that are not only functional but also inviting and efficient, improving both mobility and overall environment within a corridor.
Examples of Complete Streets Design Features
Complete streets incorporate a variety of design features that work together to improve access to businesses, essential services, and public spaces. This often leads to comprehensive improvements along a corridor impacting multiple aspects of public infrastructure.
Tualatin Moving Forward Transportation Bond
Boones Ferry Corridor Improvements
A two-mile corridor is improved with practical, cost-effective solutions that enhance bike and pedestrian access.
Martinazzi & Sagert Intersection
Increased traffic capacity is combined with protected bike lanes and widened sidewalks as part of improved overall operations.
Tualatin School Pedestrian Improvements
Removal of barriers to students biking and walking to Tualatin Elementary also reduces roadway congestion in the area to improve safe routes to school.
Sandalwood Swale
To account for added impervious surfaces across the Tualatin Moving Forward Bond Program, a vegetated swale is designed to treat stormwater in the area with green infrastructure.
Roadways
Roadways can often be barriers to broader accessibility. While complete streets place less priority on a community’s vehicular traffic, improving roadways for their use is no less important. Taking a wider perspective, the design often seeks to reduce overreliance on cars, improving safety and traffic for everyone in the area.
Features such as wider shoulders, curb extensions, and roundabouts are commonly used to calm traffic and reduce speeds. These elements enhance safety for both drivers and pedestrians while maintaining efficient road diets. The result is a roadway that’s safer and more integrated with other modes of transportation, removing barriers for all.
Sidewalks, Bike Lanes, and Multiuse Paths
Active transportation infrastructure is a defining feature of complete streets. Sidewalks, bike lanes, and multiuse paths are designed to create safe and convenient options for people who walk, bike, or use growing forms of micromobility.
Municipal policies often guide these features, such as requiring sidewalks of a certain width along new developments. Increasingly, designers must also account for emerging transportation modes like e-bikes and e-scooters, as well as designated spaces for rideshare services that do not disrupt traffic flow. These improvements benefit local businesses by increasing accessibility and walkability. When people can reach shops and services without a car, it expands the customer base and enhances the overall experience of an area.
Accessibility is essential to this goal. Features like pedestrian bridges, median islands, and well-marked crosswalks with updated signals help ensure that streets are safe and usable for individuals of all abilities.
Transit Stops and Bus Lanes
Public transit plays a vital role in complete streets. Integrating transit options such as bus rapid transit or light rail helps reduce congestion and provides reliable alternatives to driving.
Dedicated bus lanes can improve efficiency by allowing transit vehicles to bypass traffic, making service faster and more predictable. Equally important are the transit stops themselves. Comfortable, accessible, and well-designed waiting areas can significantly improve user experience and encourage more people to use mass transit. Providing adequate space for waiting passengers, along with amenities like seating and shelter, contributes to a more welcoming and functional system.
Stormwater Infrastructure
While it may not be the first thing that comes to mind with transportation, stormwater infrastructure can be one of the most important features. As with any roadway, complete streets must effectively manage water runoff, especially as these new developments can increase impervious surfaces, or change existing conditions.
These requirements can lead to opportunities to integrate green stormwater infrastructure solutions. A nature-based design approach may use features such as vegetated swales and rain gardens to not only manage water efficiently and with low impact, but also to enhance the environment of a corridor.
Parks and Green Space
Complete streets often connect to parks, trails, and other recreational areas, expanding their reach and usefulness. By linking neighborhoods to regional trail systems, these projects can improve mobility across larger areas.
Green spaces add recreational value while also supporting environmental functions like stormwater management. Amenities such as bike racks, benches, and open spaces create new opportunities for alternative transportation and outdoor community activity.
Creating a Complete Streets Policy
Implementation of a complete streets design begins with a complete streets policy. This process, which can often take shape through comprehensive planning, establishes a framework for how streets will be planned and designed, ensuring consistency and alignment with community goals.
Because every community is different, policies must be flexible and context-sensitive, reflecting local priorities and conditions. There are several essential elements to that effort.
Build a Team of Stakeholders
A successful complete streets initiative begins with assembling a diverse group of stakeholders. This often includes neighborhood organizations, government agencies, elected officials, public safety advocates, business groups, and design professionals.
Property owners are especially important to be involved, as they may be directly impacted by changes. Early collaboration helps identify concerns, build consensus, and create a shared vision for the project.
Align Regulation and Requirements
Regulations can play a significant role in shaping complete streets policies. Municipalities might require a minimum sidewalk width around redevelopment or have a Vision Zero policy directed at eliminating transportation related injury and deaths.
These requirements can not only guide design decisions but also be used to advance complete streets initiatives that enhance safety. Shifting responsibility toward system designers, such as engineers and policymakers, the focus moves to safe speeds, forgiving infrastructure, and equitable, data-driven actions, rather than relying solely on individual behavior.
Identify Deficiencies and Opportunities
From an engineering perspective, the design process begins with evaluating existing conditions. Identifying gaps, from missing sidewalks and inadequate transit stops to a lack of bike infrastructure, helps define priorities and opportunities for improvement.
Designers must also account for constraints like existing utilities, walls, and right-of-way limitations. Traffic data and modeling can inform decisions about lane configurations, including opportunities for road diets or additional capacity where needed.
Community Engagement
Engaging the community is essential to creating successful complete streets. Public input helps identify desired features, anticipate how spaces will be used, and build support for the project.
Engagement can range from working with key stakeholders to broader public outreach efforts. Ultimately, incorporating community feedback ensures that the final design reflects the needs and values of the people it serves.
A Multidisciplinary Approach to Complete Streets and Vibrant Communities
Complete streets represent a shift toward safer, more connected, and sustainable transportation systems. They’re designed to safely accommodate pedestrians, cyclists, transit users, and motorists by integrating multimodal infrastructure, accessibility features, green spaces, and stormwater management. With thoughtful policies formed through a diverse set of stakeholders, these solutions are tailored to each meet the local needs of a community.
The approach ultimately helps foster neighborhoods where people of all abilities benefit from more vibrant, functional, and inviting environments for generations into the future.