Transit and Economic Development

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Transit and Economic Development

• Transit as a Place Making Strategy

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What is Place-Making?

• A place-making approach to livability involves
  assessing the concerns and needs of a local
  community and then using this assessment to make
  improvements to the many places in that
  community.

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What is Livability?

• When people speak of livability they mean
• clean air and water,
• safe streets,
• positive race relations,
• affordable homes,
• quality public schools,
• greenery and open space,
• uncongested roads, and
• low taxes, among other things.

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A Place-Making Approachto Community Livability

• Seeks to focus community participation around
  very specific issues to enhance quality of life
  in that place.
• Through this approach, people are encouraged to
  clearly define issues, contribute ideas and
  develop agendas that address their concerns as
  well as encourage them to participate in
  implementing strategies to address such questions
  as the following
• What works and does not work about this
  neighborhood or space?
• What problems exist?
• What would make it work better?
• What kind of design improvements are needed?
• What types of management strategies should be
  introduced?
• How can transit support and enhance the
  activities of the place?

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Place Making in Practice


The Streets are Alive
A Bus Stop So Lively You Won't Mind Waiting
The Streets are a Fashion Show
The Square as a Downtown Living Room
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Enlivening the Street and Commercial Environment

• Using the principles of place making, it's
  entirely possible to undertake transportation
  projects--involving foot, bike, transit and even
  automobile traffic--that bring life to a place
  rather than take it away.

Portlands Pioneer Courthouse Square
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Visible Signs of Success with Strategies for
Creating Livable Places

• Many different types of activities are occurring.
• Many different kinds of people and different age
  groups are using a place (children, elderly,
  families).
• Activities are not necessarily related to a
  specific facility or a planned event.
• There are several choices of things to do, and
  it is easy to go from one choice to another.
• Designate a liaison from a transit agency to
  coordinate with users in the area.
• Train on-site transit personnel (such as ticket
  agents) to provide information about uses and
  activities in the areas adjacent to a facility.

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Visible Signs of Problems with Strategies for
Creating Livable Places

• Spaces are empty of people for all or part of the
  day.
• Security problems are evident (broken windows,
  graffiti, vandalism).
• Buildings are vacant or underutilized.
• Uses are isolated from each other or cannot be
  seen.
• Spaces are too small and congested for the number
  of transit riders present.

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Ways of Measuring Impacts of Strategies for
Creating Livable Places

• Record the number and type of activities at
  different times of the day and of the week.
• Survey the community or space users about their
  perceptions of current uses and activities and
  what they would like to see there in the future.
• Inventory existing land-use patterns to determine
  what activities are present or missing.

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Design Strategies for Creating Livable Places

• Create a public space that can be programmed for
  a variety of uses.
• Provide amenities that support desired
  activities.
• Provide specific uses and activities in adjacent
  or nearby structures.

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Transit Strategies for Creating Livable Places

• Make a transit stop the central feature of a
  place.
• Develop easy transfers between buses or modes of
  transportation.
• Provide amenities for transit patrons.
• Provide information about attractions in the
  area.
• Designate a liaison from a transit agency to
  coordinate with users in the area.
• Train on-site transit personnel (such as ticket
  agents) to provide information about uses and
  activities in the areas adjacent to a facility.

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Transit and Place-Making

• A focus on place-making can bring the ridership
  goals of the transit agency and the livability
  goals of the community together.
• For transit operators, this means that each
  decision made to provide service, locate a
  station or stop and maintain that station should
  be made in the context of how transit can
  contribute positively to the experience of that
  place.
• Mobility options must be developed and improved
  in response to expressed as well as observed
  community needs.
• These transportation options also must be
  regarded as a set of alternatives (cars, buses,
  trains, vans, bicycles, walking) that fit into a
  communitys broader vision as well as its
  self-image.

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A Neighborhood Transit Station as a Livable Place
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The Transit-Oriented Place Making Strategies for
San Mateo CA

• Turning Transit Stops and Stations into Places.
• San Mateo's commuter rail stations and bus
  stops should be attractive, mixed-use
  destinations that give people an extra incentive
  to take transit.
• Transforming El Camino Real into a Grand
  Boulevard.
• As the common link between the towns of San
  Mateo County, El Camino Real can be reborn as a
  walkable boulevard with housing, retail, and
  transit stops that connect a series of improved
  public spaces throughout the region.
• Creating Balanced Access.
• When transit facilities are designed and located
  with only automobile access in mind, they become
  isolated from town centers. A balanced approach
  takes pedestrians and bicyclists into
  consideration and improves connections between
  transit stops and other civic destinations.
• Adding Housing and Creating a Lively Downtown
  Mix.
• With San Mateo County facing a severe lack of
  affordable housing, the Peninsula Corridor Plan
  presents an excellent opportunity to create new
  mixed use residential neighborhoods near transit
  stations and downtowns.

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Transforming El Camino Real into a Grand Boulevard

• Today, most pedestrians would rather avoid El
  Camino Real yet it could become a walkable
  boulevard connecting people to transit stations
  and public spaces.

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Turning Transit Stops and Stations into "Places

• To make transit an attractive alternative to
  driving, bus stops have to be more than just
  waiting areas they should be attractive,
  mixed-use destinations.

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Place Making by Using Transit, Adding Housing and
Creating a Lively Downtown Mix

• Place making used to relieve gridlock and
  increase transit ridership by transforming
  auto-dominated downtown streets into
  pedestrian-friendly public spaces.

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Creating Balanced Transportation Access
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A Model for Determining Economic Impact of
Transit on Land Values
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The Basic Principle

• Transit-oriented development (TOD) (also called
  pedestrian pockets or transit villages) is
  the term commonly used to express new development
  constructed around transit facilities.
• These facilities act as focal points for a
  community and are generally accompanied by higher
  densities of land use, with an emphasis on
  walking.
• The car becomes an option rather than a
  necessity.

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Principles Governing Detailed Plans for Each
Station Area

• Highest densities should be concentrated within
  walking distance of stations, with building
  heights, densities and uses tapered down to
  existing single-family residential neighborhoods.
• Existing single-family residences and most
  residential communities should be preserved.
• Commercial revitalization should come about
  primarily as a function of redevelopment of the
  core area and associated increases in residential
  land-use density.
• Each station should feature integral pedestrian
  circulation systems connecting residential areas,
  commercial facilities, and station entrances, and
  a streetscape program focused on pedestrian
  amenities and landscaping.
• Adequate open space in the station areas in
  general, and the core areas in particular, would
  be obtained through a combination of county
  acquisitions and the site plan approval process.

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A BART Transit Village
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Arlington County VAs Application of the Station
Planning Principles

• As a result of these policies, the overwhelming
  state of the countys commercial and residential
  development between 1970 and 1994 has taken place
  in these corridors within 1/2 mi of a Metrorail
  station.
• This development includes
• 14,700 residential units,
• 21 million sq ft of office space,
• more than 6,000 new hotel rooms, and
• 2.2 million sq ft of service and destination
  retail.
• These designated transit hubs have absorbed 94
  percent of the countys new office development
  and more than 90 percent of its hotel and retail
  development.
• This concentration of intense mixed-use
  development has yielded a much higher use of
  transit in this corridor than in other inner
  suburb locations in the greater Washington
  region.
• As a result of the development pattern, several
  Metrorail stations in this corridor have the
  highest daily boarding of any stations outside
  the district central office core.

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N. Hollywood CAs Transit Art Park

• For years the old downtown of North Hollywood had
  been reinventing itself as an arts and theatre
  district, but progress was slow.
• The N. Hollywood Community Forum has jump started
  the process by transforming a bus stop on a
  vacant lot into a Transit Art Park.

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N. Hollywoods Innovative Economic Development
Strategy

• Sublet the park from the Community Redevelopment
  Agency to a new restaurant that moved into a
  building facing the Transit Art Park.
• Received 60,000 in additional park landscaping
  and design improvements for the park from the
  restaurant, which maintains the park

• Transformed a city-owed vacant lot that only had
  a stick in the ground with a sign identifying
  it as a bus stop, by adding grass, trees, an
  art-poster-adorned information kiosk, and a new
  bus shelter.

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New Jersey Transit and Merchants Link Commuters
and Commerce

• When NJT attracted vendors and businesses to
  locate inside its stations, it looked first to
  businesses in the immediate area or to small
  vendors.
• At the Maplewood Station, the Maplewood Concierge
  Company offers the services and products of
  nearly 70 local businesses everything from car
  repair to take home dinners to the 2,000
  commuters who use the station every day.
• NJT worked with the local Chamber of Commerce to
  convince area merchants to buy shares in the
  for-profit concierge company.
• Customers place orders in the morning, in person
  or by fax, and pick up their orders in the
  evening at the train station, for retail cost
  plus a 10 surcharge.
• Service providers such as accountants, insurance
  agents and housing contractors advertise through
  the concierge service.

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Boulders HOP, SKIP JUMP Program

• The HOP is a bus that follows a route connecting
  the towns three major activity centers the
  downtown business district, the University of
  Colorados (CU) main campus, and a major retail
  area.
• The shuttle is dramatically different than
  anything Boulder residents had seen before.
• Instead of traditional 40-foot diesel buses, the
  HOP is a small, brightly colored shuttle, which
  comes every six minutes, not every fifteen, and
  burns clean, low-sulfur, diesel fuel.

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Boulders HOP, SKIP JUMP Program

• SKIP is a high-frequency bus route that serves
  the Broadway corridor, a busy artery connecting
  Boulders northern- and southern-most
  neighborhoods and the commercial centers in
  between.
• A partnership between the university and the city
  keeps the buses running until 3 a.m. when school
  is in session.
• The university covers the cost of the night
  service.

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Boulders HOP, SKIP JUMP Program

• JUMP, a high-frequency, high-volume bus service
  that commenced operation in 2000, connects the
  cities of Boulder and Lafayette with
  high-frequency transit for the first time.

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Five Steps to Getting Startedon a Place Making
Transportation Project

• Go out into the field.
• Seek out partners.
• Develop a shared vision for the project
• Get started.
• Keep the big picture in mind.

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Go Out Into the Field

• Take a walk around the community.
• Visit transit and transportation facilities and
  observe what kinds of activities occur there.
• Talk to people, and ask them what works and what
  doesnt work about the place.
• Listen to their suggestions.
• Through this process, you will develop a better
  understanding about how a place operates and how
  it can be improved.

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Seek Out Partners

• If you are with a transportation agency, reach
  out to community organizations, businesses, and
  local officials to elicit their ideas and
  opinions - and support.
• If you are with a community organization, get in
  touch with the staff of your transportation or
  transit agency.
• Invite them for a tour or site visit of an
  existing or proposed project.
• Discuss ways of working together to plan, design,
  and implement a project.

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Develop a Shared Vision for the Project

• Address the future needs of the community and of
  the transportation agency and specify short- and
  longer-term goals, immediate actions steps, and
  additional partners.
• Seek ways to solve problems, overcome obstacles,
  and innovate and identify a range of funding
  sources that may be available to the community or
  to the transportation agency.

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Get Started

• Implement some short-term projects by
  experimenting with low-cost improvements.
• Collaboratively plan special events, cleanups,
  and beautification projects, and make simple
  physical improvement to transportation
  facilities, streets, and the areas adjacent to
  them.
• Invite the public to help.

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Keep the Big Picture in Mind

• Make more major changes using short-term projects
  as stepping stones.
• Use the partnership as a mechanism for addressing
  the broader livability and environmental concerns
  of the community.

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Placemaking in NYC

• http//www.pps.org/info/placemaking_in_new_york/pp
  s_streetfilms/reclaiming_grand_army_plaza