Imagining the future for metro counties

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Picture this:

The Omaha area's 1.7 million people celebrate New Year's Day 2050 with a parade at 72nd and Dodge Streets, past the high-rise apartments and condos on each of the four corners. The event is a sort of Main Street, midcity tradition.

The commuter rails along the thoroughfares are empty for the holiday, but on Jan. 2, solar-powered shuttles carry thousands of workers to their desks downtown, while others pedal bicycles to their jobs or simply walk to their places of employment in the mixed-use developments where they live, work and play.

Downtown Omaha remains a vital center of commerce and the arts. Central High School still graduates future leaders, part of a local school network that educates 400,000 students, most of whom end up working in the area. A series of urban centers dot the landscape, following the template set 40 years earlier by Midtown Crossing and Aksarben Village.

The suburbs are still a choice, but denser urban living, Omaha-style, has developed a certain cachet that keeps attracting young families.

Or . . .

The metro area embraces the auto, spreads out with quarter-acre residential lots that eat up farmland on both sides of the Missouri River. Cross-country travelers and commuters take the outer-ring freeway, which touches Plattsmouth, Waterloo, Blair and Treynor, Iowa, as it skirts the leapfrogging suburbs.

The old City of Omaha annexed everything in Douglas County in the 2030s, and now the aging downtown and the public schools struggle with a declining tax base and urban blight. Bus service evaporated in the 2020s, when government subsidies ended and fares got too high. Huge sections of the 300-square-mile urban area — more than double the old Omaha city limits — would be too remote for mass transit anyway.

Hold on. Shouldn't someone be thinking about such possibilities?

Turns out there's Heartland 2050.

It's a three-year, $2 million study by the Metropolitan Area Planning Agency and more than 30 government agencies and community groups that will be "partners" in the process. The study will cover Douglas, Sarpy, Cass, Washington and Saunders Counties in Nebraska and Harrison, Mills and Pottawattamie Counties in Iowa.

Governments in the eight counties have the authority over land use, transportation, building standards and other policies. The MAPA study, funded by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, won't change that.

But the goal is to uncover the information that would help policy-makers with decisions in the next few years that can set the course for the urban area's development over the coming generations, said Paul Mullen, executive director of the agency.

The contrasting views of the city's future described above aren't necessarily the sort that the study will develop. But the study will produce a document, due in 2014, that will include various development scenarios that could take place, depending on the policies that political and community leaders embrace over the coming 40 years.

One scenario might examine the street and utility costs and the environmental impact of a 1,000-home development on a 200-acre site. How about the same number of homes on 100 acres? Or a series of 20-story apartment buildings? What would we forgo if we allow housing developments with five-acre lots?

"We can change the costs," said Jake Hansen, manager of community and economic development for MAPA, by building a more compact, more contiguous community that uses undeveloped land wisely. "It's a precious resource. You only get one chance to develop it."

Mullen said Heartland 2050 has goals similar to recent studies such as Denver's Metro Vision, Envision Utah in Salt Lake City and Blueprint Sacramento in California. The federal grant is supported by the time and effort promised by the study's partners.

In terms of time, geography and issues, Heartland 2050 is the broadest study in MAPA's 44 years. The agency is overseen by 63 representatives from governmental units in the region.

"The point of this is not to usurp the local land use authority," said Greg Youell, MAPA's transportation and data manager. And the study will reach out to community groups and others to seek a wide range of viewpoints, including a series of public "visioning workshops" that will be held in the region.

Omaha, Youell said, is "sort of at this fork in the road. We don't want to do things the wrong way."

Heartland 2050 starts with a striking prediction: The area's population is projected to nearly double by 2050.

If Omaha struggles to keep its streets repaired, lighted and clear of snow today, what will it be like if the metropolitan area doubles its footprint in 40 years?

Will its air and water quality remain high? Will its sewer system, power grid, natural gas lines, traffic patterns, school buildings, handle the crunch? How will developers build homes for those 850,000-plus additional people? What will happen to surrounding farmland? How could the community tackle its problems of poverty and education?

How will the city protect its quality of life?

"That's a lot of people to accommodate," Hansen said. "The decisions we make now are going to impact us that far off."

The existing Interstate 80-680 ring around the city and the West Dodge Expressway provide some traffic relief, but how many people and cars would justify building an outer ring? What would such a freeway cost, in dollars and land use?

How could the city grow but not need a second freeway ring?

"The costs are going to be substantial," Hansen said, and the decisions by government agencies will vary. Some of the smaller communities in the eight counties want to see their populations grow, but some don't.

MAPA transportation planner Sloan Dawson said the various scenarios to be outlined in the study will include factual information that the government agencies can use when they adopt rules for land use. The study also will address education, the arts, jobs, health care, social services and other aspects of urban life.

The study will build on various forward-looking plans already in place, such as Omaha by Design's urban design proposals, and lay out options for community groups and leaders to consider.

One objective is to make the public aware that communities can develop in different ways, Dawson said, and that neighborhood groups, civic groups and individuals can have a say in government policy. Partners in the study will help reach as many people as possible to discuss housing, jobs, environmental impact, taxes, utilities, schools, government services, transportation and other topics.

Dawson said the resulting document won't be a master plan for the Omaha area but rather provide tools that planners and the public can consider when it comes to important decisions on future growth. "It's a living document," he said, that should be revisited about every five years to keep its information current.

Maintaining a "shared vision for the community" can help policy-makers avoid serious problems, such as a crisis in traffic or environmental quality, he said.

Hansen said Omaha can preserve its advantages, such as good commuting times, which attract employers and add value to all parts of the region. The question is how to make that happen, he said, since "we're going to grow one way or the other. We're kind of looking beyond beyond."

Contact the writer:

402-444-1080, steve.jordon@owh.com

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