Assuming the county chooses to move forward with an MSPLOST referendum that includes a dedicated surface transportation funding source, a key question emerges:

• Should the investment approach focus on trails, sidewalks and lower cost operational and safety projects or should the county focus more on investing in road widening/capacity projects?  Or should the investment approach distribute the investment equally among these?

These scenarios were developed to help residents visualize the surface transportation investment options based on possible revenue collections as well as data and public input from the 2021 Comprehensive Transportation Plan Update (in progress).

Tradeoffs

A one-percent referendum would allow for investments in projects to expand the capacity of the current system while a one-half or one-quarter-percent referendum would focus investments more on connectivity and operational/safety improvements.