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Master Plans and Studies

 

The Master Transportation Plan (MTP) is currently being updated. The draft includes an overall plan which provides general goals and strategies to guide Arlington 's transportation system through the year 2030. To comment on the draft MTP, click the link above.

Arlington has a long history of planning for bicycles.  The First Arlington Bicycle Transportation Plan was adopted in 1974.  The plan has been updated twice since it was adopted.  The current version of the plan was adopted in 1994 and has been revised twice, adding a section on bike lanes in 2001 and a few additional projects in 2003.  

Other County master plans and studies that have literally laid the groundwork for what is now the County's physical form.

A few that have especially influenced Arlington's bikeability include the Sector Plans - small area plans for defined areas around each Metro station that are documents supporting the County's Comprehensive Plan, developed with communities and adopted by the County Board. Sector plans analyze and recommend specific mixes of uses, infrastructure issues, roads, transitions to adjacent neighborhoods and provide urban design guidelines Sector plans are intended to tell landowners, developers and residents what the future of the station area will be and how individual parcels can be redeveloped and what transportation system improvements are needed. Because so much of Arlington's growth is centered around the Metro corridors, these plans are critical in shaping Arlington's future. The recently-revised Virginia Square Sector Plan provides significant new guidance in this area and an intensive Clarendon Sector Plan revision process is nearly complete.

Other master plans and studies currently being revised deal with issues relating to open space, public art and arterial traffic management. The County is also one of only relatively few municipalities in the country to have a Pedestrian Transportation Plan. Arlington's plan was adopted in April 1997 and is due to be updated in the near future.

A newly-adopted plan developed largely around pedestrian and bicycle needs and which has already begun to have a significant impact is the Columbia Pike Initiative. South Arlington's "Main Street" connecting the Pentagon to Fairfax County, hopes to re-invent itself as the center of pedestrian and bicycle activity south of Arlington Boulevard.