Vital Streets Program: Improving Transportation

We're improving our transportation network through the Vital Streets Initiative. In this site you can see our progress, where we are making improvements, and how the program works.

What is Vital Streets?

Vital StreetsComplete Streets + Green Infrastructure

In 2014, Grand Rapids voters established the Vital Streets fund. This fund dedicates its focus to improving our street conditions. This focus is fueled by our community values:

  • Safety
  • Healthy places
  • Vibrant economy
  • Environmental sustainability
  • Diverse transportation options

Interested in our program outcomes?

Below are a series of dashboards, maps, and reports related showing to the state of this program. 

One of the overarching goals of the Vital Streets program is to increase our road conditions. Using the PASER  rating system we measure our street conditions annually. Vital Street's goal is to have 70% of streets in good or fair condition by 2031 (PASER 10 - 5).

 

Source: City of Grand Rapids Engineering Department

Continuing the complete street focus on focusing on all types of transportation, the Vital Street Program wants to create safe and comfortable walking paths.

Our Goals

  • Inspect or repair/replace all existing sidewalks in a 15-year revolving cycle
  • 250% increase in miles of sidewalk repaired annually
  • Increased and accelerated ADA ramp installation
  • Improved sidewalk connectivity, by adding 5 additional miles by 2020

Source: City of Grand Rapids Engineering Department

The Vital Streets team tracks information on crashes on our street. Data is updated on an annual basis. 

Please note: this data does not include crashes on state owned roads, like US-131 and 28th Street.

source: Michigan State Police

Vital Streets funds are tracked across multiple attributes. They are track for balance among wards, street type, and repair type. There are three levels of streets we measure:

There are also three levels of repair types:

  • Preventative Maintenance
  • Rehabilitation
  • Reconstruction

Source: City of Grand Rapids Engineering Department