The mayor wants to consolidate the city’s approach to transportation.

Roadmaps don’t come in puzzle boxes – except perhaps on Bainbridge Island.

“You can’t plan for better roads when they’re broken into fragments, but that’s what we have,” said Mayor Darlene Kordonowy, who hopes to improve transportation planning by reducing the number of related committees. “Too many committees are fragmenting the approach on transportation issues.”

Kordonowy is proposing that the city explore consolidating aspects of four citizen advisory groups into a single, broad-reaching transportation committee. The existing groups under consideration include the Non-Motorized Transpiration Advisory Committee, the Parking Committee, a not-yet-formed “motorized” committee dealing with street issues, and, in a more limited sense, the Forestry Commission.

“Said differently, we have a committee for the middle of the road, one for the shoulders and paths, one for parking and one for vegetation along a road,” Kordonowy said. “This has led to, at best, an uncoordinated approach to understanding, discussing and finding a common approach.

“At times, this has created conflict within the community.”

Kordonowy will ask the City Council tonight to convene a 90-day task force to make recommendations on the structure and goals of the new transportation committee. The volunteer-based group may also undertake issues that fall through the cracks of existing committees, such as traffic safety and public transportation.

Poor coordination has, in the last few years, led to unpopular or stalled improvement projects on Grow Avenue, Kallgren Road and Wing Point Way, she said.