The City Council of the City of Larkspur finds that as a result of increasing regional growth, significant residential, commercial office and industrial development is expected to occur within the City. This anticipated development, including development currently approved or submitted for approval, cumulatively will generate a substantial increase over existing levels of traffic within the City. This increase in traffic will result in traffic volumes which exceed the capacity of the existing City-wide transportation system to provide acceptable levels of service.

The City Council also finds that unless certain actions are taken, the above factors will result in adverse impacts such as unacceptable levels of congestion on streets and at intersections, traffic accidents, air pollution, noise and restrictions on access for emergency vehicles. To prevent these undesirable consequences, the capacity of the City-wide transportation system must be expanded at a rate which will accommodate the expected growth in the City.

The City Council also finds that, in the absence of this ordinance imposing a traffic impact fee, existing and future sources of revenue will be inadequate to fund a substantial portion of the improvements required to meet the goals, objectives, policies and programs identified in the Transportation Element of the General Plan.

Accordingly, it is the intent of the City Council to adopt by this chapter a fair and equitable method of securing some of the revenues necessary to fund the construction and implementation of improvements to the City-wide transportation system sufficient to accommodate the traffic volumes generated by new development at acceptable levels of service throughout the City. This chapter is adopted pursuant to and to comply with Government Code Section 66000 et seq.

It is also the intent of the City Council that the adoption of this chapter will assist the City to meet the goals of the Larkspur General Plan, including, but not limited to, preserving the historic character of the community, and avoiding the disruption of neighborhoods from through traffic. (Ord. 1030 § 2(12), 2018; Ord. 840 § 1 (part), 1992)