This paper studies the intersection of policies promoting affordable housing, transit-oriented developments (TODs), and the reduction of vehicle miles traveled (VMT) in metropolitan areas.
Transit-oriented development—higher-density residential or mixed-use development centered around high-quality transit stations—has emerged as a strategy to reduce greenhouse gases while increasing housing supply. Researchers at the University of California, Davis completed in-depth case studies of 11 California cities to understand their mix of strategies and how they have needed to reconcile sometimes competing policy goals in advancing transit-oriented development.
This presentation will describe results from a two-year research project for Caltrans on local policymaking in California for transit oriented development (TOD), transit, and active transport.
California, like most of the country, was facing a transformation of retail before the COVID-19 epidemic. Increasing Internet shopping has ushered closing of anchor stores, such as Macy's, Sears, as well as the closure of many regional shopping malls, which have sizeable footprints, ranging from 40-100+ acres. The epidemic has accelerated these trends. This offers opportunities for redeveloping failing malls to address pressing needs in California, the need for housing, and for efficient transit provision for such redevelopments.
This project is a second-year project extension that will allow the researchers to complement the survey research on local finance and planning mechanisms for transit-oriented development with extensive case studies.
California taxpayers have supported more than a billion dollars of bonds to support affordable infill housing in neighborhoods with access to rail transit.
The dataset for this study was collected from various sources including Affordable Housing Communities Data, demographic information from the American Community Survey, OpenStreetMap road network, Points of Interest (POIs) data, General Transit Feed Specification (GTFS) data, and Longitudinal Employer-Household Dynamics (LEHD) data.
The dataset provided here is an anonymous version of the survey results of city planning directors in these regions, conducted between April and July, 2019.
This policy brief summarizes research that tested whether or not rail transit developments cause an influx of high-income residents and an outflow of low-income residents near rail stations.
