News & ResourcesResource Center Home

Executive Summary The purpose of this white paper is to create a well-supported yet simple illustration of the relationship between household energy consumption and residential development patterns. For the purpose of this illustration, residential development patterns are generally described by housing location and housing type. The paper also takes into account energy efficiency measures in homes and vehicles as factors that aff ect household energy use. Housing that is located in a walkable neighborhood near public transit, employment centers, schools, and other amenities allows residents to drive less and thereby reduces transportation costs. Development in such locations is deemed to be “location efficient,” given a more compact design, higher-density construction, and/ or inclusion of a diverse mix of uses. If American families can reduce their necessity to drive through better housing and transportation options, then commute times and household energy costs will drop.

Executive Summary This report examines specific, actionable non-statutory changes that the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development—and partner agencies—could adopt to better facilitate and encourage the development and preservation of affordable and workforce housing in location-efficient areas. These are areas near transit, employment centers, or other essential services that allow families to reduce the number and extent of necessary car trips. Transit as defined in this report encompasses reliable bus, bus rapid transit, street car, light and heavy rail commuter service and subway. Transit-oriented development (TOD) refers to new residential, commercial, and mixed-use development and the preservation, renovation, or rehabilitation of real estate within walking distance of these modes of transportation. We gathered the challenges and policy options included in this report in the summer of 2010 from practitioners and thought leaders from around the country, including…

What began as a pilot project initiated by a nonprofit organization in partnership with two declining low-income communities has become a 42-city redevelopment effort that is being duplicated in other regions. The potential of this effort to become a national model for redevelopment around historic freight and commuter rail assets was acknowledged in 2010 with a $2.4 million Community Challenge Grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).

Some of today’s most vexing problems, including sprawl, congestion, oil dependence, and climate change, are prompting states and localities to turn to land planning and urban design to rein in automobile use. Many have concluded that roads cannot be built fast enough to keep up with rising travel demand induced by the road building itself and the sprawl it spawns. The purpose of this meta-analysis is to summarize empirical results on associations between the built environment and travel, especially nonwork travel.

Study shows neighborhood compactness, access to public transit, and rates of vehicle ownership are key to predicting mortgage performance

There are many diverse reasons to pursue compact development outcomes. Convenient and conducive to healthy lifestyles, clustered development patterns help lower overall community infrastructure costs by pulling land uses closer together. Now, as interest in building more compact neighborhoods, cities, and metropolitan regions has grown, another, related question has arisen: Can compact development help mitigate climate change by reducing the amount of driving people do?