TOD Residents Still Driving
An investigation reveals that transit use remains low for residents of several Los Angeles-area transit-oriented housing developments.
"In Los Angeles alone, billions of public and private dollars have been lavished on transit-oriented projects such as Hollywood & Vine, with more than 20,000 residential units approved within a quarter mile of transit stations between 2001 and 2005."
"But there is little research to back up the rosy predictions. Among the few academic studies of the subject, one that looked at buildings in the Los Angeles area showed that transit-based development successfully weaned relatively few residents from their cars. It also found that, over time, no more people in the buildings studied were taking transit 10 years after a project opened than when it was first built."
"The Times decided to examine driving habits at four apartment and condominium complexes that have already been built at or near transit stations in South Pasadena, North Hollywood, Pasadena and Hollywood."
"The reporting showed that only a small fraction of residents shunned their cars during morning rush hour. Most people said that even though they lived close to transit stations, the trains weren't convenient enough, taking too long to arrive at destinations and lacking stops near their workplaces. Many complained that they didn't feel comfortable riding the MTA's crowded, often slow-moving buses from transit terminals to their jobs."
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how to reduce TOD driving
In Silicon Valley, similar results have been found; however, there is a remedy.
Is South Bay Area TOD without Traffic Reducing Housing Preference actually transit-oriented? No. Suburban residential TOD serving auto-supportive jobs results in "auto-centered TOD." Per Travel Characteristics of TOD in California (Caltrans funded research authored by Lund, Cervero, and Willson), residential TOD by East Bay BART heavy rail stations serving "auto-hostile" job locations in San Francisco produces 40% transit commute mode share (and 50% auto share). Residential TOD by South Bay Caltrain commuter rail stations serving auto-supportive job locations with free parking produces only 17% transit mode share (and 80% auto share). Thus, South Bay TOD, while outperforming adjacent non-TOD (4% or less transit mode share), is still very auto-centered. Traffic Reducing Housing can transform South Bay TOD mode share to 80% "green commutes."
Smart Growth and Transit Villages are policies that are generally headed in the right direction for better handling huge regional population growth trends than traditional sprawl. But, these policies don't go far enough. Smart Growth needs to get Smarter. 17% transit commute mode share at The Crossings by Caltrain in Mountain View shows that the problem is that housing is just so generally desirable in the South Bay that solo driving commuters "crowd out" transit riders in occupying scarce housing by train stations. Hence, there is a public policy argument that incoming transit village residents should be selected to maximize transit ridership and minimize solo driving. This can be accomplished by Traffic Reducing Housing Preference. See: http://www.cities21.org/workerHsng.htm . Three pioneering examples are given: Santa Barbara, Stanford, and Redwood City.
I thought the Times article should have dug deeper in searching for remedies, rather than drawing the false conclusion that TOD is somehow a boondoggle. If we work backwards from CA AB32 Climate Protection goals in light of large expected population growth, we can't help but conclude that we need much more efficient human settlement patterns. The second biggest CO2 reduction that the CA Climate Action Team came up with was Smart Growth: TOD, reduce jobs/housing imbalance, increase density.
LA Times staff should have spoken to the Compass Southern California regional visioning blueprint project: http://www.compassblueprint.org/. They are fighting a really important battle on behalf of our children's children. Times staff should have better understood the big picture before writing "Near the rails but still on the road." Times only told half the story and failed to educate the public.
Steve Raney, Cities21, Palo Alto, CA
TOD and CO2 Reduction
And if we ever get around to dealing seriously with global warming by enacting a carbon tax, the people living in TOD will be in a much better position to adapt by reducing their driving than the people living in sprawl.
Charles Siegel
Key detail buried in fine print
This story says "Although several residents of his building said they had given up their cars, about 30 of the 54 cars in the garage pulled out during morning rush hour."
In other words, 40% (24 of 54) of the TOD residents were NOT driving during morning rush hour. Given that only 10% of LA residents normally use transit (and an even more miniscule percentage bike or walk to work) this sounds like a pretty good market share to me!
Getting TOD Dwellers Out of Cars.
Maybe its time to start building TOD communities without parking, except perhaps for car sharing services like Flexcar and Zipcar?