The unemployment rate is staying stubbornly above nine percent and the President is preparing to offer new ideas for job creations. Hopefully he will pay attention to what groups like the American Society of Engineers and Transportation for America are promoting: infrastructure and transportation will create good, sustainable jobs across the country.
State and local leaders are looking for more efficient ways of utilizing existing resources to achieve their housing, transportation and environmental goals. The National Housing Conference’s Solutions for Sustainable Communities, Septmber 26-28, 2011 in Washington, DC, will arm practitioners and policymakers with the best available information on how to work collaboratively and creatively to develop more sustainable and inclusive communities while reducing overall government costs.
Originally written by David Alpert and posted on Greater Greater Washington
August 3, 2011
The classic rule of thumb, “drive ’till you qualify,” holds that the farther you go from a city center, the cheaper the cost of living. But a new report shows how in the DC area, housing near the core and near transit stations can be cheaper when transportation costs are factored in.
The Office of Planning worked with the Center for Neighborhood Technology to customize their “H+T” housing and transportation index for our region, and to incorporate more recent American Community Survey data as well as Census data.
Originally posted on Northjersey.com on Sunday, July 31, 2011
Opinion from Smart Growth America’s Coalition Member, New Jersey Future: How state zoning rules foster sprawl, hike costs
ON A regular basis we hear how sprawl development continues to eat up the last remaining open spaces across New Jersey, and residents continue to express confusion about how this keeps happening.
One look at local zoning ordinances, though, and it becomes obvious that municipalities are getting exactly what they are asking for – a steady procession of large-lot subdivisions that gobble up land, increase infrastructure costs and push housing out of the reach of more and more people.
A new study by Rowan University’s Geospatial Research Laboratory documents the cumulative effect of these local zoning decisions: a land-use pattern that has grown substantially more exclusionary and sprawling over the last two decades.
Smart growth strategies are a key part of protecting water quality. Compact, mixed-use development means fewer paved and impervious surfaces, which helps reduce environmentally damaging stormwater runoff. Walkable neighborhoods with transportation choices mean fewer vehicle miles traveled, which helps reduce air pollution that falls into rivers as rain. And redeveloping greyfields or brownfields can significantly improve the environmental performance of a building site, while accommodating growth that might otherwise occur in greenfields.
Green infrastructure – including green roofs, rain gardens, tree plantings and permeable pavement – can go even further to protect water quality. Environmental advocates (including Smart Growth America) support rules that would require green infrastructure for new development projects as a way to protect waterways and water quality. But should redevelopment projects be subject to the same regulatory requirements for stormwater as greenfield development?
Because redevelopment already benefits water quality, and because it already faces greater regulatory and site-specific hurdles than greenfield development, many advocates argue no. Several groups, including Smart Growth America, have expressed concern that holding redevelopment projects to the same stormwater standards as greenfield development will raise the cost of these projects and discourage developers from reusing already-developed land. Water quality groups counter that evidence is lacking to support this fear, and that other regulatory factors are more significant in making development decisions.
The following is based on an interview with Tom Gerend, Assistant Director of Transportation, Mid-America Regional Council
While anyone who is involved in regional planning can appreciate the difficulties of trying to work across multiple local jurisdictions, Kansas City faces a unique set of challenges. Kansas City lies on the border of Missouri and Kansas, which means the Kansas City Transit Corridors and Green Impact Zone TIGER (Transportation Invesment Generating Economic Recovery) grant, by the U.S. Department of Transportation, is working across not just city and county lines, but state lines as well. That makes the project complex, but also rich with opportunity because numerous streams of federal revenue can be tapped to focus on one region.
The town of Jackson and Teton County, WY, are in the process of jointly updating their 1994 Comprehensive Plan — a piece of legislation that guides policy, investment, programs, and land use decisions in the area. Updating the Plan is a complex process but one which will help it better meet the needs of Town and County residents, businesses, and other stakeholders.
PlanJH, a diverse group of community members from the Jackson/Teton area, has helped facilitate public discussion of the issues surrounding the Comprehensive Plan, and in May the group held a public presentation about smart growth strategies. Roger Millar, Director of Smart Growth America’s Leadership Institute, was on hand to answer questions and offer strategies that could help Jackson residents fulfill their vision of community success.
Members of LOCUS: Responsible Real Estate Developers and Investors, representing some of the leading transit-oriented development companies in America, gathered in Washington, DC on June 15 and 16 to meet with each other and visit representatives on Capitol Hill.
LOCUS members met representatives from nearly 40 Congressional offices to discuss how federal transportation investments can better support one of the fastest-growing segments of America’s housing and real estate market: walkable, mixed-use development.
If you or your organization are interested in advocating for sustainable real estate at the federal level, consider joining LOCUS today. Learn more >>
U.S. Senator Ben Cardin (D-MD) yesterday introduced legislation to prioritize spending on highway repair and preservation for the benefit of America’s drivers, state budgets and the federal funds that support the country’s major roads. The “Preservation and Renewal of Federal-Aid Highways Act” will ensure adequate and consistent investments in the country’s existing transportation infrastructure, a strategy in line with Smart Growth America and Taxpayers for Common Sense’s recent report Repair Priorities: Transportation spending strategies to save taxpayer dollars and improve roads.
Geoff Anderson, President and CEO of Smart Growth America and co-chair of the Transportation for America campaign, issued the following statement:
“With this legislation Senator Cardin has proposed an approach to highway spending that is fiscally responsible for both states and the federal government, and Smart Growth America applauds him for taking action in the face of the significant financial threat posed by decades of neglected road repair.
“Roads in many states are falling in to disrepair and these declining conditions cost taxpayers billions of dollars in preventable expenses. Even worse, many states continue to expand their road networks at the cost of regular repair, and with each dollar spent on expansion states add to a road system they are already failing to maintain.
“Senator Cardin’s proposal incorporates many of Smart Growth America’s recent recommendations, including establishing national standards for state-of-good-repair, encouraging states to invest proportionately more of their transportation dollars in repair, rather than expansion, and taking proactive steps to addressing the country’s backlog of road repair needs. As the Senator said in his statement about the proposed bill, investing in repair makes good fiscal sense, good safety sense, and good business sense for our country and we look forward to supporting this bill as it moves through Congress.”
See current state condition standards along with spending priorities and road conditions at www.smartgrowthamerica.org/repair-priorities.
Join the senior leadership of the federal Partnership for Sustainable Communities on Thursday, June 16, 2011 to celebrate the Partnership’s two-year anniversary and to talk about what initiatives are coming next.
| What: | Celebrating Two Years of Partnership |
| Who: | Beth Osborne, Deputy Assistant Secretary, DOT; Shelley Poticha, Director, Office of Sustainable Housing and Communities, HUD; John Frece, Director, Office of Sustainable Communities, EPA; and Derek Douglas, Special Assistant to the President for Urban Affairs (Invited) |
| When: | Thursday, June 16, 2011 – 1:00 PM EDT |
| Where: | Click here to register for this webinar. Call-in information will be sent to registrants. |
On June 16, 2009, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT), and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) joined together to help communities nationwide improve access to affordable housing, increase transportation options, and lower transportation costs while protecting the environment to better support local economies.
The Partnership for Sustainable Communities works to coordinate federal housing, transportation, water and other infrastructure investments to make neighborhoods more prosperous, allow people to live closer to jobs, save households time and money, and reduce pollution. Over the past two years, the Partnership has visited with residents and business leaders in hundreds of communities, coordinated to provide new funding opportunities, and worked to reduce barriers at the federal level. For more on the Partnership, visit www.sustainablecommunities.gov.