New Report: Advocates Working with MPOs

Updated: This report has been updated to include several key frequently asked questions. Take a look, share, and let us know if you have any questions! 

If you live in a city or suburb and want to make biking better, you need to know your MPO.

Especially under the new federal transportation law, Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs) make big behind-the-scenes decisions about how transportation dollars are spent in cities and their surrounding regions. For advocates who want to make sure that available dollars help create great places to bike, walk and live, it’s important to work with the MPOs that make these critical funding decisions.

So Advocacy Advance — a partnership of the League and Alliance for Biking & Walking — worked with key advocates across the country to better understand what’s working, on the ground, in effectively engaging MPOs and impacting these important funding decisions.

The result: A new report that will give you action-oriented advice on how to make sure bicyclists are involved in these behind-the-scenes decisions. 

In “Working with Metropolitan Planning Organizations: Lessons and Answers for Advocates,” we hear from Gerik Kransky of the Bicycle Transportation Alliance, Barb Chamberlain of the Bicycle Alliance of Washington, Scott Bricker of BikePGH, Ed Barsotti of the League of Illinois Bicyclists and Kim Irwin from Health By Design to arrive at five key principles: 

1. Learn who makes decisions
2. Show up
3. Get the right project prioritization process
4. Be a watchdog
5. Treat MPO involvement like any other campaign

Read much more including quick tips and first-hand stories from successful campaigns. Click here to download the full report. Questions? Feedback? Email the author, Darren Flusche, the League’s Policy Director, at [email protected]