The Process

Twenty years ago, the California Coastal Commission and California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) took a chance on a unique partnership to improve coordination and design of transportation projects in a manner consistent with coastal policy requirements. The partners hoped that this interagency agreement would result in smoother permitting processes and improved transportation and environmental outcomes. At that time, many of Caltrans’ transportation projects were being denied—or approved with major redesign or large-scale mitigation requirements—resulting in much interagency friction, time sinks amid limited staff resources, and significant project-cost increases.

Caltrans and the commission initiated a cooperative agreement in which Caltrans provides funding resources to help with staffing capacity issues that previously inhibited engagement between the agencies. Having more needed staff members under their management allowed the commission to work with Caltrans on building an interagency team approach. This necessarily took patience, and improved communication, to build trust. Tami shared that investing the time to better understand each agency’s mandate, and finding “shared goals and opportunities while also reviewing barriers and underlying causes of conflict, ultimately brought success.”

The two agencies also put together an integrated planning team that included a Plan for Improved Agency Partnership. The team conducted statewide reviews to better understand what the agencies’ interactions were like, develop a crosswalk between both agencies’ strategic plans and goals, and gather suggestions for program improvements. In doing so, both agencies were able to identify their shared goals and opportunities to move California toward more sustainable transportation planning and design practices. Then the two agencies jointly developed workplans and initiatives focused on processes and products of mutual benefit.

According to Tami, it is not uncommon for transportation projects to overlook certain resource agency mandates, such as the protection of wetlands or agricultural lands, or public access to the coast. Projects might also overlook the development of appropriate mitigation strategies or the need to “factor in” effects of predicted sea level rise over the design life plans for the overall corridor.

Through the integrated planning team, staff members from the commission’s Statewide Transportation Program continue to collaborate with Caltrans in addressing such concerns early on in the planning and design process, which helps bring about speedier and more successful permit application reviews. “One measure of this success is that before our enhanced partnership, we had a number of permit appeals, but now, because we continue to work more effectively together earlier on in the transportation planning and project development processes, there hasn’t been an appeal brought by a commissioner in over a decade,” shares Tami.

The commission and Caltrans have agreed that highest-priority focus areas are (1) to improve understanding of transportation critical infrastructure vulnerabilities to sea level rise and (2) to adapt the transportation system effectively for greater resilience to those anticipated, changing conditions over the next century. One aspect is to look toward incorporating nature-based solutions that can enhance resource protection as part of adaptation strategies.

These new approaches to nature-based solutions are not yet well tested within West Coast environments and may face barriers that include perceived safety concerns or permitting challenges. Still, the commission hopes to work with various stakeholders to identify and encourage appropriate nature-based solutions in future transportation planning efforts. Over time, Tami believes, there could be increased opportunities to use these approaches in transportation strategies in a manner that protects coastal resources, particularly during some key phases of longer-term adaptation efforts.

For example, the commission often uses a phased approach that allows for interim measures protecting roadway infrastructure, while longer-term or more corridor-specific adaptation plans and projects can be designed and programmed for funding. The approach frequently includes “triggers” to put in place longer-term planning and implementation of sea level rise adaptation actions—prior to losing the existing infrastructure’s critical transportation functions. With clearer permitting pathways, demonstrated design performance, and resulting environmental benefits, transportation asset managers might more readily incorporate nature-based solutions into adaptation planning processes.