A New Beginning…

Welcome to Bucks2040, a website dedicated to Bucks County’s comprehensive plan update!

The Bucks County Planning Commission is beginning a new county comprehensive plan, “Bucks2040.” This update to the 2011 comprehensive plan will form a collective vision for Bucks County and set a direction for future Bucks County policies and programs. Bucks 2040 will focus on the quality-of-life issues that are most important to Bucks County residents and how planning can help our communities achieve better land use outcomes.

With this plan, we hope to help our boroughs and townships…

• Make good land use decisions for better development outcomes
• Make homeownership more attainable for Bucks County families
• Improve our roads and give residents more options in getting where they need to go
• Keep our air clean and help fight climate change
• Give residents more economic and educational opportunities
• Keep our communities safe and healthy
• Preserve the county’s natural, historic, cultural, and agricultural legacy

Public Outreach and Plan Vision

In the coming months, a random sampling of Bucks County households will receive the Bucks2040 survey. This survey will help us understand what our residents like about Bucks County, what they would like to see improved, what they value most in terms of quality of life, and what most concerns them about the future.

We will also be conducting meetings with municipal officials and community open houses to get direct feedback from the community and discuss ways of improving our communities.

These meetings, along with our survey results, will help identify outstanding issues and form the vision for the plan.

Analysis of Conditions and Trends

BCPC staff will evaluate current conditions and trends that are important to the future of Bucks County. In this part of the plan, we hope to answer questions such as:

• How are we growing and where?
• Where is housing most and least attainable?
• How successful have our farmland and open space preservation programs been?
• Where are our critical remaining natural resources located?
• Where do we need to focus our transportation and other infrastructure upgrades?

An evaluation of these trends will be important in making sure future initiatives address the county’s most critical needs.

Guidance

We will also meet with local officials and community and business leaders to get feedback on potential planning practices and policies that will be most effective in attaining the plan’s vision.

The plan will be organized by themes and a unified vision for the plan will be developed. The plan’s recommended policies and guidance for our communities will reflect the goals and values inherent in the plan’s vision.

An implementation document will be developed to provide local policy guidance to our municipalities in addressing residents’ most pressing issues and future challenges.

How the Plan Will Be Used

We envision Bucks2040 being used several ways:

• A Collective Vision for Bucks County—The plan will encompass the values, ideas, and hopes for all the county’s residents.
• Municipal and Agency Guidance—The plan will provide policies tailored to urban, suburban, and rural areas of the county to help them meet the land use challenges of the twenty-first century.
• Countywide Plan for Action—The plan will provide guidance for the county in its role of providing services to its residents and working with its municipal partners to help solve regional problems.
• BCPC Work Program—The plan will serve as a work program for the BCPC, as it seeks to implement the plan’s core recommendations.

The future success of Bucks2040 relies on Bucks County residents and municipalities, the County of Bucks and its departments, and the Bucks County Planning Commission coming together to plan for a better future. We are very excited to be a part of this!

How to Reach Us

We would love to hear from you! If you would like to give your opinion on the future of Bucks County or sign up for updates on Bucks2040, we can be reached at: Bucks2040@buckscounty.org. 

Visit the Notify Me page to sign up to receive calendar and news notifications for Bucks2040

Bucks2040 – Plan Timeline

June 2: Plan Kickoff

June 15: Key Partner Meeting I – Municipal Officials – Issues and Values

June – July: Resident and Business Survey – Distribution and Tabulation of Results

Fall 2021: Public Open House – Issues and Values (Can't attend the meeting? Visit our Bucks2040 Virtual Room for more info.)

Fall 2021: Key Partner Meeting II – Policies and Solutions

Winter 2021-22: Plan Development

Spring 2022: Public Open House II – Draft Comprehensive Plan and Comment Period

Summer 2022: Plan Adoption