Conservatives And Public Transportation
Reconnecting America co-publishes book with Paul Weyrich and William Lind
Reconnecting America is co-publishing the book Moving Minds: Conservatives and Transit, a collection of studies by renown conservative transit advocates Paul Weyrich and William Lind. Weyrich, who in 1977 founded the Free Congress Foundation, a conservative Washington, DC, think tank that focused on grassroots political organizing, died this past year. The studies that he and Lind did on public transportation helped conservatives understand why transit should be an essential part of the conservative agenda: because it enhances national security, promotes economic development, helps maintain conservative values including a sense of community, and provides welfare recipients with access to jobs.
The book is available from Reconnecting America for $20 each. We offer non-members discount rates for orders of 20 or more copies. To order 15 books or more or for international shipments, please contact Crystal Henle.
Members can purchase the book for $16.
Not a member? Get Connected!
(June 5th, 2009)
Connecting Destinations Is Key To Transit Success
CTOD paper analyzes performance of 19 transit lines to understand factors contributing to ridership
The effectiveness of transit is typically measured by ridership – ridership projections, for example, often determine whether a project will win federal funding. But the complex movements of people within a region make accurate predictions difficult. Indeed, three of the most successful lines that have opened since 2003 (Minneapolis, Denver’s Southeast line, and Los Angeles Orange BRT line) received only a medium-low rating from the Federal Transit Administration, and under current rules would not have been funded.
The Center for Transit Oriented Development has just released a paper, "Destinations Matter: Building Transit Success," that analyzes the performance of 19 transit lines to better understand the factors contributing to high ridership. Of the 19 lines examined, seven exceeded projections, eight are on track to beat projections, and two did not meet projections, while data for three was unavailable. The conclusion: that connecting destinations is key, and that the funding decision-making process needs to take into consideration a fuller range of factors that enhance ridership.
(May 13th, 2009)
Growing Mixed-Income TOD
CTOD’s MITODAG shows communities effective strategies and tools
As TOD planning processes proliferate there is a broader understanding that mixed-income housing supports many TOD goals including stable transit ridership, better public health, broadened access to opportunities, and deeper affordability. This Mixed-Income TOD Action Guide was developed for the nonprofit Great Communities Collaborative (GCC), which is working in the San Francisco Bay Area to ensure TOD planning processes result in neighborhoods that include households of all income levels. The guide “walks” users through a three-step analysis to determine the most effective strategies and tools.
(April 8th, 2009)
Street Smart
Streetcars and Cities in the 21st Century (Reconnecting America, 2009)
Edited by Gloria Ohland and Shelley Poticha
The second edition of our popular award-winning book on how to plan, finance and build streetcar systems contains an update on the status of the U.S. streetcar movement and case studies of new streetcars in Seattle and Savannah. There's a foreword by U.S. Rep. Peter DeFazio, chair of the House Subcommittee on Highways and Transit, and updated contact info for every streetcar project planned or underway in the U.S. This richly illustrated book is intended to promote a learning network among the cities and transit agencies that are interested in building new systems, with or without federal funding.
The book is available from Reconnecting America for $35 each. We offer non-members discount rates for orders of 20 or more copies. To order 15 books or more or for international shipments, please contact Crystal Henle.
Members can purchase the book for $28.
Not a member? Click here.
(March 5th, 2009)
Jumpstarting the Transit Space Race
Reconnecting America releases new report on federal transit funding
The demand for transit in the U.S. has never been greater, with ridership at its highest levels in 50 years and almost 400 new rail, streetcar and bus rapid transit projects proposed in large and small regions from Massachusetts to Hawaii, according to a new report by Reconnecting America. Americans took 10.1 billion trips on transit in 2007, saving 1.4 billions of gallons of gasoline -- the equivalent of a supertanker leaving the Middle East every 11 days.
"Jumpstarting the Transit Space Race: How the New Administration Could Make America Energy-Independent, Create Jobs and Keep the Economy Strong" documents the interest in transit projects around the U.S., and calculates the investment required to build all the proposed new lines. The report concludes that a transit building program not unlike the National Interstate and Defense Highways Act after World War II would help address many of the challenges facing this country -- from rising gas prices to climate change -- and it would create jobs.
(February 19th, 2009)
Opportunities for Equitable Transit-Oriented Development
Somerville Community Corp. study for city of Somerville
Somerville: Reconnecting America worked with the Somerville Community Corporation to identify needs and opportunities for equitable transit-oriented development in the City of Somerville, with a focus on the planned extension of the Green Line. The report highlights demographic and real estate trends, and outlines a series of strategies for achieving mixed-income TOD.
(November 21st, 2008)
- Download this report · PDF
Financing Transit-Oriented Development
Policy Options and Strategies in the San Francisco Bay Area
The Center for Transit-Oriented Development prepared this white paper to help the Metropolitan Transportation Commission consider alternative methods for providing regional funding for transit-oriented development in the San Francisco Bay Area. The report outlines the need for such a funding source, case examples of other Metropolitan Planning Organization programs, and key considerations in implementing a new program targeted to this purpose.
(November 21st, 2008)
- Download this report · PDF
Capturing the Value of Transit
A report by the Center for Transit-Oriented Development
Over the past decade, it has become increasingly clear that the presence of transit can increase property values and result in valuable development opportunities. In this era of constrained transit funding and widespread demand for new and expanded transit systems, policy makers, transit planners and elected officials are increasingly interested in harnessing a portion of the value that transit confers to surrounding properties to fund transit infrastructure or related improvements in station areas. This idea, known as “value capture,” is much discussed in planning, transit, and local government circles. However, confusion abounds. Where does the value come from? What is the best way to measure it? And, most importantly, what is the best way to capture this value?
Those are the questions addressed in "Capturing the Value of Transit," a new report by Reconnecting America's Center for Transit-Oriented Development.
The Center for TOD is the only national nonprofit effort dedicated to providing best practices, research and tools to support market-based transit-oriented development. We partner with both the public and private market sectors to strategize about ways to encourage the development of high-performing TOD projects around transit stations and to build transit systems that maximize the development potential.
The Center for TOD is a partnership of the national nonprofit Reconnecting America, the Center for Neighborhood Technology, and Strategic Economics, an urban economics firm in Berkeley, CA.
(November 8th, 2008)
- Download this report · PDF
TCRP 128: Effects of TOD on Housing, Parking and Travel
Transit Cooperative Research Program research findings
G.B. Arrington, Robert Cervero, Center for TOD and the Urban Land Institute
New research recently completed for the Transit Cooperative Research Program provides the ammunition to build TODs that take the benefits of transit into account. The study completed by PB PlaceMaking, Dr Robert Cervero, The Urban Land Institute and the Center for Transit Oriented Development looked at how automobile use of residential TODs compared to conventional development.
Our research looks at the actual transportation performance of 17 built TOD projects. This was done by counting the passage of motorized vehicles using pneumatic tubes stretched across the driveways of TOD housing projects of varying sizes in four urbanized areas of the country: Philadelphia/N.E. New Jersey; Portland, Oregon; metropolitan Washington D.C.; and the East Bay of the San Francisco Bay Area.
In fact, the results of this research clearly show TOD-housing produces fewer automobile trips in the four urbanized areas. The research confirms the ITE trip generation and parking generation rates over estimate automobile trips for TOD housing by 50%.
(August 13th, 2008)
- TCRP Report 128 · PDF
TOD 202
Transit & Employment: Increasing Transit's Share of the Commute Trip
Ellen Greenberg & Dena Belzer edited by Gloria Ohland
“Station Area Planning: How To Make Great Transit-Oriented Places” is the second in a series of “TOD 202” guidebooks to promote best practices in transit-oriented development.
(August 4th, 2008)
