About the San Angelo Metropolitan Planning Organization

The San Angelo Metropolitan Planning Organization is a stand-alone entity, which serves as the transportation planning body for the City of San Angelo and adjacent areas. By working together, federal, state, and local agencies use one unified approach for planning which avoids conflicting plans, duplicated projects, or funding conflicts between priorities in the metropolitan planning area.

The San Angelo Metropolitan Planning Organization strives to support the economic vitality of the San Angelo area, make transportation safer, give people and freight greater access to mobility options, protect the environment while promoting energy conservation, improve the connectivity and integration of the current transportation system, promote efficient transportation options, and preserve existing transportation as much as possible.

We are responsible for creating and reviewing transportation plans, including the Metropolitan Transportation Plan, Transportation Improvement Programs, and Unified Planning Work Programs.

The Unified Planning Work Programs (UPWPs) detail the projects for a given fiscal year, and are revised annually.

The Transportation Improvement Programs (TIPs) detail projects for the next four years.

All these plans work together to identify transportation programs and financing alternatives.

What is a Metropolitan Planning Organization?

A Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) is an agency created by federal law to provide local input for urban transportation planning and allocation of federal transportation funds.

In 1974, the U.S. Congress amended the Federal Aid Highway Act, which mandated that all urbanized areas having a population of 50,000 or more designate a single agency to administer federal transportation funds. The agencies that were established were called Metropolitan Planning Organizations. These organizations were to provide a transportation planning process for local, state and federal officials. Today, there are more than 300 MPOs across the country, including the San Angelo MPO.

When Congress created the requirements for the MPOs, they identified several key reasons that are essential in the function of an MPO:

  • transportation investment means allocating scarce federal and other transportation funding resources appropriately;
  • planning needs to reflect the region�s shared vision for its future;
  • adequate transportation planning requires a comprehensive examination of the region�s future and investment alternatives; and
  • an MPO is needed to facilitate collaboration of governments, interested parties, and residents in the planning process.

To put it in simpler terms, the federal government wanted to see federal transportation funds spent in a manner that benefitted the region best.

Within a region, transportation planning is important to everyone. How well a citizen can travel to work, school, the shopping mall or the hospital affects their safety and quality of life. The mission of a MPO is to provide comprehensive, coordinated and continuous transportation planning for the safe and efficient movement of people and goods consistent with the region's overall economic, social and environmental goals.

For More Information...

For more information about the San Angelo MPO, feel free to check the links below.