2040 Comprehensive Plan: Envision Shakopee

FUTURE ROADWAY CONDITIONS

Running Header Place Holder

OVERVIEW

238 Running Header Place Holder 2 1 3 4 6 7 8 Transportation 5 Running Header Place Holder Running Header Place Holder Running Header Place Holder Running Header Place Holder Running Header Place Holder

As part of their 2040 Transportation Plan, Scott County, in partnership with all the cities within the county, prepared a county-wide travel demand model (TDM). The goal of this analysis is to predict future vehicle traffic, based on forecasted demographic information for a given area based on the assumption that the more people there are, the more cars there will be. The following section provides a summary of the inputs and findings of that analysis as they relate to Shakopee. The countywide TDM is based on the larger, regional TDM used by the Metropolitan Council. Both models divide the study areas into geographic groups called Traffic Analysis Zones (TAZs). These TAZs are defined based on census block populations and can vary in size. In denser areas, TAZs tend to be smaller, while in suburban and rural areas, they can be larger. Additional zones require additional computational power. As a result, the Metropolitan Council TDM has fewer TAZs for Shakopee, resulting in aggregated, higher level information. However, for the Scott County TDM more TAZs were created based on municipal boundaries, roadway alignments, and local travel sheds. This allows for a more detailed estimate of future traffic in Scott County and Shakopee. Both models provide forecasts of daily traffic volumes, and do not account for traffic conditions related to peak hour travel, such as the morning or evening commute. Depending on how traffic volumes are spread out during the day, areas where volumes are shown to be near capacity may in reality have more or less congestion during these peaks.

ENVISION SHAKOPEE | SECTION IV: BUILT ENVIRONMENT