Highland Planning was a key member of the consultant team that developed our 2040 Long Range Transportation Plan. As this plan was an opportunity for us to focus on a broad range of transportation and mobility issues, ECTC prioritized the public outreach process and endeavored to reach as many Chemung County residents as possible. We knew from previous interactions that Highland would help us to achieve that goal, and they went above and beyond to attend community events, engage people and help us incorporate public feedback into our implementation plan. ECTC and our partners will work on solutions for the next five to ten years with the confidence that our plan accurately represents public opinion thanks in part to Highland’s planners and their creative engagement strategies.

I really appreciated that the survey was well-publicized and available via text. These extra steps (going well beyond the typical link buried on an obscure page of the city website or flyer on some bulletin board) gave me the impression that my opinion, and that of my generation, was being actively sought and might actually be valued. There was a good mix of multiple choice and open-ended questions presented in logical sequence and opportunities to provide further comment on multiple platforms. Overall I was impressed that this survey felt like a genuine request for community input rather than the usual obligatory step in an opaque process.

Highland Planning is redefining how public input is gathered and integrated into our projects. The staff is always so personable and inspired that they are able to build a trustworthy relationship with the community, leading to more effective and engaging community participation; and more effective and engaging community participation results in a project that is supported by the community... We look to Highland Planning whenever we come across challenging community engagement efforts to ensure that our projects are implementable and will have a positive community impact; and bringing about positive community impact is what all urban planners aspire to achieve.