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Metro’s Transportation Solution represents Nashville’s collective resolve to invest in a better city, an easier lifestyle, and a more prosperous tomorrow by turning growth into opportunity. Growth doesn’t have to mean gridlock. It’s an investment in:

  • Options for getting Nashvillians wherever they need or want to go easily, safely and efficiently. We’ll be the kind of city that makes transportation access and choice a foundation of our unlimited future.
  • Opportunities for residents of all abilities and socioeconomic backgrounds to flourish, neighborhoods to thrive and businesses to grow – because a city that helps people move around also helps them move ahead.
  • Optimism that growth is inevitable so let’s do it our way! We will be the architects of our own destiny, moving forward with confidence that we can grow and still be the Nashville we’ve always known and loved if we act today. Growth doesn’t have to equal gridlock. We can grow along corridors to preserve our neighborhoods.

In other words, it’s an investment in all of us.

And all of us will reap the benefits:

Access

Metro’s Transportation Solution ensures anyone who needs or wants to take public transportation will have access to new or improved modes:

  • People who aren’t able or choose not to drive – Nashville’s elderly, youth, disabled, and disadvantaged residents – will have more flexible, more frequent bus and Rapid Bus service in their neighborhoods. Options mean independence – to get around town and access opportunities.
  • People who choose public transportation over driving can take advantage of the network of new Rapid Bus and LRT lines fanning out across the city along nine corridors that are enhanced with sidewalks, bike lanes and parking options; and those living close to LRT will find it fully accessible, highly reliable and cost effective.
  • People who rely on multiple modes to get where they’re going can count on the system’s connectivity, which will link local bus routes with rapid transit, bus with rail, rail with ride-shares and shuttles, and bike trails and sidewalks with transit hubs.

Affordable Housing

Mayor David Briley is committed to funding, building, preserving, and maintaining Nashville’s supply of affordable and workforce housing so that working families can afford to live, work, and play in Nashville.
Affordability in Nashville is about more than just housing prices – it’s about the entire cost burden on families. Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) allows for both housing and transportation costs to go down. High capacity corridors, both Rapid Bus and Light Rail, also improve the connection between affordable housing and high-paying jobs - residents can access more affordable housing at the end of the transit lines, but still be able to access high-paying jobs at the city center without having transportation costs and commute times increase.
Metro has developed an initial plan to ensure that housing affordability along the corridors is preserved and more housing units are built. It’s also essential that we protect and enhance small businesses along transit corridors, and that’s included in the plan.

Metro’s Transportation Solution expands housing affordability by:

  • Reducing cost burdens for existing low to moderate-income individuals and families by providing transportation options.
  • Offering free or reduced fares for Nashvillians who are experiencing poverty, living with a disability, senior citizens, and those under the age of 18.
  • Expanding housing affordability along corridors and near employment centers to allow for greater opportunities to live near the places where they learn, work, and play.
  • Creating mixed-income communities that improve health, support better education outcomes, and promote upward mobility.
  • Prioritizing strategies in areas along transit corridors to prevent displacement of low to moderate income residents.

Former Mayor Megan Barry convened a taskforce, led by Davidson County Clerk Brenda Wynn and former Nashville Mayor Bill Purcell, to develop a comprehensive plan to preserve and build more affordable housing and protect small businesses. Click here to learn more about the Transit and Affordability Taskforce.

Jobs

Metro’s Transportation Solution will generate two types of job growth:

  • creating direct jobs for local residents throughout construction, many of which will transition into positions maintaining and managing the system;
  • promoting economic opportunity for those across income levels and industries whose access to the system will help them secure and retain employment.

In fact, Metro’s new transportation solution:

  • Gives area employers access to a larger, more reliable pool of employees who are able to exercise additional options for getting to work.
  • Will lead to good paying jobs for Davidson County residents constructing and operating the transit network.
  • Is an economic engine that improves all neighborhoods either directly or indirectly by making them more vibrant places to live, work and shop.
  • Directly supports communities that have historically been left behind or left out as our economy has boomed.
    • The first phase of the plan significantly upgrades our bus system.
    • Buses will run more frequently and for longer hours.
    • People without cars will soon be able to crisscross the city on more convenient bus routes taking them to a wider range of employers and jobs.

Mobility

Metro’s Transportation Solution brings the city together like never before by creating and enhancing a multi-modal system that connects employees with employers, neighborhoods with neighborhoods, families with amenities, and tourists with attractions.

  • People who don’t have cars or choose not to drive can take advantage of –
    • enhanced bus service going both downtown and crosstown with more frequency and longer hours; and
    • high-capacity transit along nine major arteries into downtown, including four Rapid Bus routes, and five Light Rail Transit (LRT) lines coming into and out of downtown from all directions.
  • People who would prefer to take high-capacity transportation if they could get out of their cars have Rapid Bus and Light Rail Transit (LRT) as convenient options they can access by biking, walking or driving to transit centers.
  • People who want to bike or walk more can use a network of new bike lanes and sidewalks designed for safe, healthy and convenient travel.

Quality of Life

Metro’s Transportation Solution is a win for everyone, putting everything residents, businesses and visitors love about Music City within easy reach of all. By loosening gridlock’s hold on the city, the plan keeps intact all those things that have made Nashville so attractive as a destination in the first place:

  • The sense that everything in Nashville is just a few minutes from wherever you are; with an interconnected transportation system, it still can be.
  • The warmth and welcome that comes from an easy pace of life and a friendly, unhurried attitude; transportation options allow us to keep pace and still keep calm.
  • The ability for everyone to take advantage of – and not be inconvenienced by – the  city’s many amenities, from concerts to sports seasons to festivals; multi-modal transportation means you can attend a major Nashville happening without suffering in traffic, or avoid a major Nashville happening the same way.

The fact is automobile traffic contributes 37% of the county’s greenhouse gas emissions and 85% of the county’s smog. A transportation system will keep thousands of new cars off the road, meaning cleaner air for all of us to breathe. This is especially important to our more vulnerable citizens, such as children and the elderly, helping reduce asthma rates and respiratory issues.

A well-integrated transportation system also produces significant public health benefits, including reduced traffic crashes and pollution emissions, increased physical fitness, improved mental health, and improved basic access to medical care and healthy food.

Safety

Metro’s Transportation Solution incorporates a vigilant concern for the safety of everyone who accesses our multi-modal system, whether commuters riding high-capacity modes or children using sidewalks that connect their neighborhoods to their school.

Wherever necessary, the plan will incorporate about 282,000 linear feet of new or improved sidewalks along the light rail and rapid bus corridors; sidewalk extensions; protected bicycle lanes; and bus lanes and walkable, enhanced bus stops.

And it will fix Metro’s most dangerous intersections. Related projects will include re-aligning intersections, sidewalk and curb extensions, crosswalk and traffic signal improvements. And we’ll invest heavily in sidewalks connecting neighborhoods, as well as pilot walking districts and develop safety education campaigns.

Nashville currently has an average of 17 deaths per year from traffic fatalities involving pedestrians. Across the country in 2016, 40,200 people died in accidents involving motor vehicles. But traffic death rates decline when public transit travel increases in an area. Residents of transit-oriented communities have only about a quarter of the traffic fatality rates as residents of sprawling, automobile-dependent communities.