TOD 202: Station Area Planning: How To Make Great Transit-Oriented Places

This manual is intended to help with simplifying the complex decisions that surround planning for TOD projects and station areas by providing details about the scales of development likely to occur in different places, as well as station area planning principles and TOD plan checklists.

The manual begins with a discussion of seven “TOD place types,” followed by a self-diagnostic questionnaire to help identify a particular station area place type in a TOD typology we have applied and refined in several regions around the U.S. There are also typologies of buildings and of the kinds of open spaces sometimes included in transit-oriented neighborhoods. All of these typologies can help inform decisions by enabling the planning partners to visualize and talk about the possibilities for station areas. They are intended to be suggestive only and not a complete list of options.

The second section is a discussion of station area planning principles, and includes TOD plan checklists for each principle to help guide station area planning efforts. Again, the goal is to help all the planning partners better understand the potential outcomes at the beginning of the planning process. The ultimate goal is to facilitate the creation of high-performing TOD projects and great neighborhoods.