Northwest Indiana’s regional planning agency is trying a new way to get people involved in its work.
It also will have three public meetings soon on public transit in Northwest Indiana.
In the coming days and weeks, staffers from the Northwestern Indiana Regional Planning Commission will show up at several public events to provide information about NIRPC’s next long-range plan for the region.
The “pop-up” appearances begin this weekend at two South Shore Music Festival events — Friday at Wolf Lake Pavilion in Hammond and Saturday at Peter G. Redar Memorial Park in Schererville, both from 5 to 7 p.m.
On Sunday, NIRPC people will be at a booth at the Miller Beach Farmers Market, on Lake Street in Gary, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
On Tuesday, they will be at Taco Tuesday at the Marquette Park Pavilion in Gary from 5 to 9 p.m.
Other events include the LaPorte Farmer’s Market on Aug. 25, the Valparaiso Farmer’s Market on Aug. 28, the New Durham European Market in Westville on Aug. 30, and the Michigan City Farmer’s Market on Sept. 1.
Those events “allow us to meet people where they are,” NIRPC public participation planner Dominique Edwards said.
The new long-range plan for Lake, Porter and LaPorte counties will “identify actions we need to start taking now to be prepared for the year 2050,” Edwards said. The goal is to complete the plan by May 2019.
More information about the new plan, and the current 2040 Plan, is available at www.nirpc.org/2040-plan/transportation/2050-plan/
Also this month, NIRPC has scheduled three public meetings on its Coordinated Transit Plan, a federal requirement to receive funding for transit services for people with disabilities, elderly people, and low-income people.
Those meetings are:
* Tuesday at 2:30 p.m., at the Porter County Public Library in Valparaiso. Transit is available on the V-Line for those who call for a ride up to two days beforehand.
* Aug. 25, at 5 p.m. at the Gary WorkOne office, 504 Broadway. Transit is available on all Gary Public Transportation Corp. routes. The office is two blocks from the Metro Center.
* Aug. 16, at 3:30 p.m. at the Michigan City Public Library. Transit is available on Michigan City Transit. A ridership survey on public transit services is available on NIRPC’s website, www.nirpc.org under “hot topics/news.”
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Teresa Torres, executive director of Everybody Counts, noted that this would be the first update of NIRPC’s Coordinated Transit Plan since 2009.
She criticized NIRPC for scheduling only one of its public transit meetings in Lake County — and none in Hammond, which lost most of its public transit services when the Regional Bus Authority folded in 2012.
And, she said, the Gary meeting is at a time past when dial-a-ride bus services, which people outside Gary rely on, stop running.
“It isn’t as if these events are designed to solicit feedback,” Torres said.
Tim Zorn is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.