#32: Introducing Journey Together, our planner-led engagement practice

Welcome to The Weekly Journey - your two-minute journey through the world of mobility and beyond. Use it to stay informed, find a new go-to source, or just have a peek inside how we think. Brought to you by the team at Journey.

Today, we’re excited to launch Journey Together, our full-service planner-led community engagement practice.

We’re living in a pivotal moment for how planners approach community engagement. Many communities have big agendas and no shortage of projects requiring community engagement. With engagement fatigue setting in and big mobility challenges still to face, Journey Together can help you meet this challenge by bridging local voices and technical planning expertise. Check out our engagement approach tailored to delivering smarter, community-backed solutions that move projects forward:

Integrated Engagement

Community outreach that is directly connected to the underlying planning process. As planners, we weave in engagement throughout the project and make sure that it shapes project outcomes, so you get smarter, community-supported solutions.

Bridging Local & Technical Expertise

We design our engagement to answer specific questions, solve problems, and build support. As planners, we know the data and insights needed to meaningfully incorporate community input and advance technical work. Whether you need support leading public workshops or diving into hard conversations with technical stakeholders, our full suite of engagement services and mode-specific technical knowledge takes the guesswork out of crafting the right questions to ask and how to ask them at the time they’re needed.

Implementation Focused

We strive to build community support and stakeholder consensus at all planning stages, increasing the likelihood of project implementation. For every project, we work across silos in the planning world knowing each travel mode is just one part of a broader community conversation and it all needs to make sense together.

Place-Based Strategies

We leverage our deep experience with market assessments and community ground-truthing to identify who, how, and when to engage. These insights steer us towards the best strategy for each project ranging from messaging and graphics to meeting facilitation, pop-up events, and surveys.

Nurtured Community Relationships

We know this is not the first time you’re speaking with the community, nor will it be your last. We will work collaboratively with you to make community connections where needed, so you can feel confident leaning into community conversations.

Boots in Austin

We have a team located in the heart of Texas with many years of experience collaborating with the local community. We stay up-to-date on all things happening in Austin and in conversation with local stakeholders across varying perspectives. We’re up to speed and ready to help you with any in-person engagement in the Austin area.

How We Can Help You

• Public Engagement Plans and Strategy

• Stakeholder Management

• Construction Mitigation Outreach

• Transportation Demand Management Outreach

• Workshop and Focus Group Facilitation

• Survey Development and Analysis

• Storytelling and Messaging

Let’s Journey Together!

Book a meeting with Jolene Holland, our Journey Together Lead, or reach out to her by email.

A few interesting things. 🧠

⛰️ Fiscal Cliff: Lilly Chen built an app that lets you see how traffic congestion generated by upcoming SEPTA service cuts would affect your commute. Can someone send it to Springfield?

🏗️ Development 101: The Urban Land Institute published a great primer focused on “Development for Non-Developers”.

🚴 Biking: Madeleine Pelzel and team created an awesome guide for where to bike and where not to bike in Houston. Check it out. 

📊 Data: Adam Millard Ball of UCLA shared his urban data science course materials.

🤠 Austin in Transit: Dottie Watkins shares a back-to-school update focused on CapMetro service upgrades. Make sure to check out the CapMetro Transit Plan 2035 virtual and in-person open houses next week.

A quick Journey update. 🏗️

👩‍🏫 Upcoming Events:

• Movability: Lauren will be at the Movability Summit in Austin on September 19. Make sure to check out her panel on Best Practices for Employee, Student, & Residential Pass Programs.

• APTA: Dan will be in Boston during the APTA TRANSform Conference on September 14-17. Reach out if you’d like to connect during the conference!

📚 Book Clubs:

• ACT Book Club: Lauren hosts the monthly Association for Commuter Transportation Book Club. Next week, TDM supercommunicator Jeffrey Tumlin will join the club to share his communications insights and reflections as the club discusses Supercommunicators by Charles Duhigg. Sign up here to join us on August 27 at 3:00 PM Eastern / 12:00 PM Pacific.

• Chicago City Builders Book Club: Lauren co-hosts the monthly Chicago City Builders Book Club - check out their LinkedIn page to learn more.

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