david pritchard. bibliography.

Notes on Moore and Thorsnes, The Transportation/Land Use Connection [15]

Moore and Thorsnes present an interesting take on the transportation/land use situation. Their analysis is quite solid and internally consistent, but it does betray their background in civil engineering. As they explicitly note, their interest lies solely in efficiency, and they make no effort to analyse the fairness of their proposals. Their policy recommendations are quite sound, but need to be taken with a grain of salt due to the limited scope of their analysis.

Personally, I contrast this with Jane Jacobs' work [9], which I'm reading simultaneously. She approaches the issue from a more sociologic point of view, and reaches different conclusions. The interesting approach will be a combination of the two ways of thinking: an efficient and fair system.

The history is also telling. The social and environmental movements were much quicker to realise the damage of the automobile than the engineers were; Jacobs' book is from the early 60s, while Moore and Thorsnes (and much of the engineering community) only began tackling the issue in the mid-80s. While they're late to the table, it's good to see a real consensus forming: auto dependency is a serious problem to both our society and our economy. It has to be dealt with.

I would add a little analysis to their comments. Much of the history they describe is a shift from high property values, dense, centralised development around a rail import/export node, to low property values, sprawling, polycentric cities. They tend to describe this as a more efficient system, eliminating manufacturers' requirement to compete for scarce central land and allowing them to spread across the landscape to cheaper land. However, from an environmental perspective, the cheapness of this land is illusory. Land itself is underpriced, since the ecosystem services provided by that land are not reflected in its price. Furthermore, access to undeveloped land also has a value, as I've noticed since I moved to Vancouver and began enjoying the nearby mountains and hiking; this value is also completely ignored by Moore and Thorsnes' analysis.

Overall, their analysis of transportation is quite solid, but I feel they could still learn more about land use, and about social issues.

The rest of this document is just notes, drawn chapter-by-chapter from the text of their report. This entire document is really just my private notes on the report, but I've put it up on the web for search engines to slurp up.

Chapter 1: Introduction

Chapter 2: Market Forces that Determine Urban Land Use and Transportation Patterns

Chapter 3: The Interaction of Public Policy with the Market Forces that Drive Land Use and Transportation

Chapter 4: Ideal Policies for Increasing the Efficiency of Travel and Land-Use Patterns

In this chapter, the authors present an analysis showing the current subsidies given to automobile and truck transportation. They follow with a range of ideal policies for addressing efficiency issues in roadways and land use. Many are not realistic, implementable policies.

The Magnitude of Subsidies to Highway Travel

Pricing Policies in Transportation

Pricing Policies in Land Use

Second-Best Policies for Increasing the Efficiency of Land-Use and Travel Patterns

This chapter describes policies that influence prices, but do not necessarily bring about a system of efficient prices.

Supply-Side Policies

Demand-side Policies

Land Use Policies

Market-Oriented Policies to Influence Land Development

Policies to Provide Urban Services


  Effectiveness   Costs   Implementation    
Policy Extent Impact Direct to commuters To all society Required institution Ease of administration Political Acceptability
Supply-side              
Rapidly removing accidents Variable Great None Minor None Easy Good
Improving highway maintenance Broad Moderate None Moderate None Moderate Moderate
Building added HOV lanes Variable Moderate None Great Cooperative Hard Moderate
Building new roads without HOV lanes Variable Moderate None Great Cooperative Moderate Poor
Upgrading city streets Variable Moderate None Moderate None Easy Moderate
Building new off-road transit systems, expanding existing ones Narrow Moderate Minor Great Cooperative Hard Poor
Increasing public transit usage by improving service, amenities Narrow Minor None Moderate None Hard Moderate
Coordinating signals, TV monitoring, ramp signals, electronic signs, converting streets to one way Narrow Minor None Minor None Moderate Good
Demand-side              
Instituting peak-hour tolls on main roads Broad Great Great None Regional Moderate Poor
Parking tax on peak-hour arrivals Broad Great Great None Regional Hard Poor
Eliminating income tax deductibility of providing free employee parking Broad Great Great None Cooperative Moderate Poor
Providing income tax deductibility for commuting allowance for all workers Variable Great None Minor None Easy Poor
Increasing gasoline taxes Broad Moderate Great Moderate None Easy Poor
Keeping densities in new growth areas above minimal levels Broad Moderate None Minor Regional Hard Poor
Encouraging formation of TMAs, promoting ride sharing Narrow Moderate None Minor Cooperative Hard Moderate
Encouraging people to work at home Broad Minor None None None Moderate Good
Changing federal work laws that discourage working at home Broad Minor None Minor None Moderate Moderate
Staggering working hours Variable Minor None None Cooperative Moderate Moderate
Clustering high-density housing near transit station stops Narrow Minor None Minor Cooperative Hard Moderate
Concentrating jobs in big clusters in areas of new growth Narrow Minor None Great Regional Hard Poor
Increasing automobile license fees Broad Minor Moderate Minor None Easy Poor
Improving the jobs-housing balance Broad Minor None Moderate Regional Hard Poor
Adopting local growth limits Narrow Minor None Minor None Easy Good

A Process for Integrated Land-Use and Transportation Planning

[pp. 93-103]

Creating Coordinated Land-Use and Transportation Policy

Package 1: Do what you do a little bit better—the likely policy future

Policies:

Effects:

Package 2: Substantial improvements in the efficiency of transportation and land use—the desirable policy future

Policies

Effects:

Bibliography

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15
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The transportation/land use connection.
Technical Report 448/449, American Planning Association, Chicago, IL, USA, January 1994.

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22
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23
Martin Wachs.
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David Pritchard 2007-12-10