Posts Tagged ‘Land use’
Growing Smarter
This is the title of a new report. Actually the title is longer than that but I like to be snappy when I can. The publisher adds “Integrating Land Use and Transportation to Reduce GHGs” which you may be sure is right up my alley.
Two things before I go further. This report was published on September 27, and I have only just learned of it. I thought I had spent quite a bit of effort making sure that I kept on top of this topic since it is specifically addressing BC. It was not until today that I saw a tweet from Charlie Smith which linked to an article in the Georgia Straight by Carlito Pablo.
Secondly, the report was commissioned by The Real Estate Foundation of BC. Now my association with Real Estate in BC had lead me to create a mental link between realtors and the BC Liberals. During the campaign against the expansion of Highway #1 there were credible sources saying that the then Minister of Transport, Kevin Falcon, was holding fundraising breakfasts for the realtors in this region and the Fraser Valley and promising that highway expansion would enable them to continue to build and sell single family homes. As opposed to the denser forms of development that tended to support transit. The implication being that RS1 supports right wing voters.
The other important thing to note is that you do not have to rely on my opinion or that of Carlito Pablo. You can download the full report for yourself from the link above.
But I am going to copy here the list of recommendations
Recommendations include:
- Bolster regional government authority and integrate transportation planning with land use in ways that support climate action.
- Strengthen the Agricultural Land Commission’s authority to protect farmland and limit non-agricultural use of protected land.
- Strengthen coordination amongst key agencies, ministries, and orders of government and support collaboration through the Climate Action Secretariat and the Local-Provincial Green Communities Committee.
- Use market-based tools to more fairly share the costs of transportation infrastructure and expand transportation choice.
- Update tax and fee structures to support sustainable financing of civic infrastructure.
- Help establish a Low Carbon Innovation Centre in the Lower Mainland.
- Create long-term transportation financing agreements between local, provincial, and federal governments.
- Update community GHG reduction target requirements and provide provincial support to help meet these requirements.
- Establish GHG impact assessment standards for local and provincial transportation projects and planning agendas.
- Reinvest in BC’s Community Energy and Emissions Inventory (CEEI) system to provide defensible transportation sector data.
The report was commissioned by the Real Estate Foundation of BC as part of its research on sustainable built environments in British Columbia. The report was prepared by Boston Consulting, in consultation with the Smart Growth Task Force, with contributions from MODUS Planning, Design and Engage
This all looks very promising, and I am going to download it myself before I type anything else.
Weekly Photo Challenge: Dense
This is a photograph of Vancouver’s downtown, which in recent years has become – in terms of urban development – one of the densest parts of the region. This was the result of a set of inter-related planning decisions, to allow for towers, closely spaced, and mainly for residential use. This was a departure from the way other places kept downtowns for other, non-residential uses. This has allowed for much greater choices in terms of how people get to and from work – and other activities. In most modern cities, built since World War II, the plan has been to allow for most use of cars, which has created large swathes of low density suburbs. Traditionally, prior to motorised transport, cities were designed to allow for most trips to be completed by walking. Railways and streetcars allowed things to be spaced out a bit more, but the greatest impact was the use of the personal automobile. Most North American cities are now turning away from this pattern of development and rediscovering the benefits of urbanity. (Most European cities made that choice much sooner – to retain the amenities and cultural significance of their central areas. ) Not just better energy efficiency, and cleaner air – though both are worthwhile improvements – but in greater interaction between people. More sociability, greater opportunities to meet other people – more culture, more entertainment, more choices of where to go and what to do. Indeed the pursuit of higher densities remains a central plank of urban and regional planning – the subject matter of most of this blog – made possible by increasing the choices of transport open to residents. More trips that can be made without needing a car, by walking, cycling and public transport. That produces happier, healthier places. It doesn’t just protect the environment it increases economic activity.
Note too that one important lesson of developing a dense urban core is that green spaces – that’s Stanley Park in the foreground – can be successfully protected and made available for many more people to enjoy, rather than the large areas that get fenced off to keep people out in low density suburbs and exurbs.
Daily life shapes sustainable transportation
I would like to start by acknowledging Pamela Zevit as my link to this story. She put a link to it on Facebook. I would not normally see phys.org – but I found this article very heartening.
I have been very critical here, and elsewhere, of our reliance on the very limited four-step transportation model, and especially the paucity of data we rely on for some very important decisions. It could be that since 2004 things have improved, but I see no evidence of that. Land use is still treated as an exogenous variable, there is no feedback loop and no ability to predict induced travel making. We still seem to be obsessed by the false analogy that traffic flows like water which must be accommodated. The reduction in driving seen across North America does not seem to apply here, even though there is clear evidence from Vancouver that it is happening here too. And we also have a government that prefers not to pay any attention to science and data, since that deals in facts which disprove most of its preferred political dogmas and ideologies.
In Southern California they have been tracking the movements of 18 million people. Not a small sample, and not just journeys to work or journeys by vehicles. All their trips, for all purposes all day and every day.
this is a new method to reflect the activities, and show how those activities change, in the everyday life of people—how their behavior changes, and how a change in land use is going to provide more incentives for people to walk and bike and not use their car
All of that data goes into the model – and “the researchers were able to map and predict movements and activities down to the mile, land parcel and minute.”
What it means is that instead of the stumbles made here – like Translink’s inability to forecast usage of the Golden Ears Bridge, which means that the company that builds and runs it gets paid so that there is less money for much more essential transit service – the model can actually deal with what happens in real life. Such as the impact of the 405 toll road which put more traffic on parallel streets in stop and go traffic, and creates more emissions.
I would like to think that we are going to emulate that model here, but we will have to continue to deal with the paucity of data, not the least of which is the absence of the long form census, one of the few reliable sources of long term trend data on journeys to work.
Journal of Transport and Land Use
Thanks to Twitter – and The Transit Fan – I now know about another on line journal that appears to be free with each article downloadable as a pdf
The inaugural meeting of the World Symposium on Transport and Land Use Research (WSTLUR) was held in Whistler, British Columbia, July 28–30, 2011. The conference brought together academics and practitioners at the intersection of economics, planning, and engineering in the fields of transport and land use.
In addition to presentations based on rigorously peer-reviewed papers, the conference included a plenary presentation from Ed Glaeser, the Fred and Eleanor Glimp Professor of Economics with the Department of Economics, Harvard University, and author of the book Triumph of the City.
Stephen Rees's blog 