[media-credit name=’BRYAN FAUST/Herald photo’ align=’alignnone’ width=’648′][/media-credit]The city is looking to take the next step in its Transport 2020 project — a plan aimed at improving transportation in the Madison area — by holding public meetings this week to gain community insight.

David Trowbridge, project manager of Transport 2020, said talk of improving the city's transportation began in 1998 when the mayor's office, Dane County officials and the University of Wisconsin met to discuss the efficiency of the current system. Plans have been developing since, he added, but the first phase of more detailed work began last year.

"In the city, we don't have many opportunities to add roadway capacity because you end up taking houses and creating more congestion," Trowbridge explained.

Though the idea of Transport 2020 is becoming more widespread, Trowbridge said the plan is still in its "study phase," with no details set in place. He also said the eventual goal of Transport 2020 is to give a feasible alternative to driving cars around the city and campus areas, since parking is becoming increasingly difficult to come by on the isthmus.

Project Manager Ken Kinney added that for students, a new transportation system would mean faster trips to any destination, possibly including the airport and other off-campus locales. Increased and more reliable transportation would also introduce the possibility of more part-time jobs for students outside the campus area, he said.

"[Transport 2020] is really to give people the option to get to the central city," Kinney noted. "Parking is already very much a stress situation, so we want to provide something that could be competitive in terms of travel time with a car."

Kinney reiterated the goal is to improve and centralize all of Madison's transportation systems.

"What we're trying to do is serve as many markets as possible — short distance and long distance — with the same equipment and the same infrastructure," he said.

Several options for the new system include a railroad service as well as modifications to the existing bus system, Kinney said. Trowbridge added Transport 2020 officials are working alongside Mayor Dave Cieslewicz in his plan to introduce streetcars to the downtown area.

"As both projects move towards implementation and construction, we will be very careful to make sure the services between the two are coordinated," Kinney said.

But for now, both programs are still in preliminary planning stages, said Trowbridge. The current goal is to get a feel for what the public wants and whether they would actually use the service or how much they would pay for it, he said.

"What we're really doing is putting a package together to take to the federal system and be rated on the merits of our project," he said. "We will continually go back to the community and show them estimated costs."

Students looking to provide input to the Transport 2020 "study phase" are invited to a public workshop scheduled at the Memorial Union from 12 p.m. until 3 p.m. today.