Planning

Linking Transit Agencies and Land Use Decision Making: Guidebook for Transit Agencies

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This guidebook was developed to help transit agencies better address the connections among transit, land use planning, and development decision making. The guidebook promotes improved transit and land use decision making by providing transit agencies with the tools to be more effective at the decision-making table. The tools, which build on successful transit and land … Continued

Is a Half-Mile Circle the Right Standard for TODs?

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Planners and researchers use transit catchment areas — the land around stations — as geographic units for predicting ridership, assessing the impacts of transit investments and, recently, for designing transit-oriented developments. In the US, a half-mile-radius circle has become the de facto standard for rail-transit catchment areas. There is surprisingly little evidence to justify any … Continued

Transportation and Public Health

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This article investigates various ways that transportation policy and planning decisions affect public health and better ways to incorporate public health objectives into transport planning. Conventional planning tends to consider some public health impacts, such as crash risk and pollution emissions measured per vehicle-kilometer, but generally ignores health problems resulting from less active transport (reduced … Continued

Tools for Mixed-Income TOD

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This paper describes and evaluates tools and strategies that are being used to create mixed-income and affordable housing near transit in regions around the U.S. The first half of the paper explains how these various strategies are being used and the limitations and successes of each, and the second half discusses best practices and provides … Continued

Does TOD need the ‘T’?

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Problem, research strategy, and findings: Transit-oriented developments (TODs) often consist of new housing near rail stations. Channeling urban growth into such developments is intended in part to reduce the climate change, pollution, and congestion caused by driving. But new housing might be expected to attract more affluent households that drive more, and rail access might … Continued

Mixed-Income Transit-Oriented Development Action Guide

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This Action Guide is a tool for local jurisdictions working to foster mixed-income transit-oriented development (TOD) around planned transit stations. The term “mixed-income TOD” (MITOD) is shorthand to describe a set of goals that includes the provision of a mix of housing choices, affordable to a range of incomes, for people at different stages of … Continued