1.2. Context-Sensitive Solutions Guiding Principles

“CSS is an approach that considers the total context within which a
transportation improvement project will exist.”           
Federal Highway Administration

 

For the purposes of roadway planning and design in Georgia, there are five Guiding Principles that define and promote good CSS practices.  These Guiding Principles will allow GDOT roadway design decision-makers and project managers to better balance transportation, land use, economic, social and environmental goals and objectives:

Principle #1:  Interdisciplinary Teams

To bring to the roadway design process the best of all possible alternatives and options, it is important to consider and create an interdisciplinary approach to project development and decision-making.  Project teams should include multiple disciplines such as community outreach professionals, design engineers, landscape architects, land use planners, environmental resource specialists, historic preservation and cultural resources staff, and public transportation professionals who can address the multi-modal issues of a transportation project.

Principle #2:  Community and Stakeholder Focus

CSS requires an early and continuous commitment to public involvement.  Community residents and stakeholders play an important role in identifying local and regional issues and concerns, as well as neighborhood values.  Furthermore, they have much to offer regarding strategies or solutions that may better meet and balance the needs of community stakeholders and the project. These teams can be used as a conduit of informational gathering and dissemination to the community they represent.

 

Principle #3:  Environmental Sensitivity in Design

Understanding the natural and built environments, the roadway as a part of the landscape and the valued resources within that landscape, must be accomplished before engineering design progresses.  In addition, the design approach of avoiding and/or minimizing effects on important resources to the extent possible, and creating resource enhancement opportunities where impacts are unavoidable, should be pursued.

Principle #4:  Design Flexibility in Reaching Solutions

Informed design decision-making should not preclude new ideas, new ways of thinking, to ensure flexibility in roadway design standards where it is feasible.  Designers and CSS practitioners should be encouraged to research new ways of solving transportation project needs and to keep an open mind to flexibility in community settings due to the unique natural and social contexts in these areas.

Principle #5:  Context-Sensitive Solutions is a Process

CSD and CSS is a process that begins during early transportation planning and programming and continues through specific project development, preliminary engineering, final design and construction and maintenance. 

 

Since every project has a setting or context, CSS can be applied throughout a project’s life.  Key elements of the CSD/CSS process include managing diverse technical resources, incorporating meaningful public involvement, integrating collaborative solutions to develop multiple alternatives, and maintaining open and honest communications and decision-making processes that are well documented. Listening and clarification of what is being said are key components of the communication plan.