Using technical analysis, Alta developed a methodology to help estimate where improvements can be made to reduce collisions, potentially increase active transportation trips, and address congestion in South Orange County over the next 20 years.
Alta is assisting OCTA with developing a long-range, comprehensive multimodal approach to address South Orange County’s congestion and mobility needs. Alta contributed heavily to the technical analysis of the multimodal transportation study, which was used to determine where improvements could be made to reduce collisions and potentially increase active transportation trips.
To assess existing conditions and identify deficiencies in the active transportation network, Alta used Python to generate TAZ-level summaries of short, total, and non-motorized trips estimated by the OCTAM model. These trip estimates informed how active travel improvements could increase active trips and be represented in the model to understand larger changes in vehicle miles traveled (VMT) and other metrics of interest. Alta leveraged its origin-destination visualization tool, Alta Flow, to generate an interactive map of where in the study area there is active trip potential (ATP), trips with distances short enough to be accommodated for walking or biking. Alta Flow is used to analyze and demonstrate various forms of origin-destination data and has been used to support project recommendations and overall prioritization.
The Alta Flow tool presents data in clear, digestible visuals for decision-makers and the public to understand where important connections exist and how projects facilitate active transportation trips. These maps can also be used to supplement grant applications to provide critical information to evaluators. For this study, Alta used the data to identify points of connectivity and locations that saw high ATP, particularly between important origins and destinations such as UC Irvine, Irvine Spectrum Center, and Newport Center. Alta’s team then produced interactive maps, which demonstrated where high ATP trip pairs could be enhanced by active transport and electric new mobility investments.
