Principles of Smart Growth

Create Walkable Neighborhoods
Reports

2004 American Community Survey

Smart Growth America and the National Association of Realtors® prepared this survey in October 2004 on Americans’ preferences for the type of communities they want to live in and the policies they support for creating those communities. The preferences and other opinions expressed in the survey suggest a direction for solving the conflicting pressures of the desire to develop and the wish to preserve communities.

2007 Walk to School Survey Findings

The 2007 Walk to School Survey Findings report provides a brief background on Walk to School events in the U.S.; summarizes findings from the 2007 Walk to School Organizer survey; proposes implications of the findings; and recommends actions that would likely strengthen the conduct of future events and increase capacity and demand for SRTS programs.

A Bridge to Somewhere: Retooling the U.S. Transportation System

A Bridge to Somewhere is a report from Brookings that analyzes the current state of the U.S. transportation system, identifies weaknesses, and outlines crucial points of action to build a transportation policy that works on the federal, state, and local levels.

A Healthy Community: New Ideas for an Older California

A Healthy Community: New Ideas for an Older California is a report from Center for Civic Partnerships that looks at how, in a sweeping demographic transformation, the over-65 population will skyrocket over the next 25 years -- and the effects that will have on community life.

A New Path Forward: Action Plan for a Sustainable Washington
Achieving Long-Term Economic, Social, and Environmental Vitality

From the Executive Summary:
Governor Gary Locke convened the Sustainable Washington Advisory Panel in September 2002 because of the widening gap between our state’s current reality and a Washington that is equitable, healthy, and prospering. The Panel concluded that it is imperative to initiate significant changes now if we want Washington’s quality of life to improve, not diminish, over the next generation.

A Roadmap to Revitalizing Urban Neighborhood Business Districts

This report describes methods that the Local Initiatives Support Corporation and the National Trust for Historic Preservation have used to successfully revitalize urban neighborhood districts.

A Toolkit for Tomorrow’s Schools

This analysis examines how schools and development can be planned together using common population projections, facility budgeting, comprehensive plans, and even common review staff.

Access to Safe Parks Helps Increase Physical Activity Among Teenagers

Access to Safe Parks is a brief from the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research that presents policy recommendations aimed at improving neighborhood environments and access to parks to encourage physical activity by California adolescents.

Active Living and Social Equity

Active Living and Social Equity describes how local managers, department heads and local government staff can design healthy communities for all residents, regardless of income, race or ethnicity, age, ability or gender.

Active Living Approaches by Local Government

Active living -- the integration of physical activity into daily routines -- is one innovative approach to making communities healthier. This survey by the National Association of Counties and the International City/County Management Association seeks to understand how local government leaders view their role in enabling active living in communities.

Active Transportation for America: A Case for Increased Federal Investment in Bicycling and Walking

Active Transportation for America from the Rails to Trails Conservancy makes the case and quantifies the national benefits -- for the first time -- that increased federal funding in bicycling and walking infrastructure would provide tens of billions of dollars in benefits to all Americans.

Affordable Housing and Smart Growth: Making the Connection

This report identifies a range of policies and approaches that help achieve both smart growth and affordable housing objectives. The report provides case studies of towns, cities, and states that have benefited from linking these two interrelated goals.

Aging and Smart Growth: Building Aging-Sensitive Communities

This report posits that the sprawling, automobile-dominated landscape so prevalent throughout the United States seriously limits the continued mobility and independence of older people, a reality that is of enormous consequence to the aging experience.

Alternatives for Coastal Development

NOAA Coastal Services Center offers an extensive online library of information and tools for coastal development, mapping, and restoration. In Alternatives for Coastal Development: One Site, Three Scenarios, the Center examines design scenarios in terms of Smart Growth.

An Alternative Future: Florida in the 21st Century 2020 2040 2060

An Alternative Future is a comprehensive look at an alternate trend for development that would accommodate the predicted doubling of Florida's population by 2060 without changing the character of the landscape. By creating an efficient transportation infrastructure, a significant cost-savings can be realized -- up to $526 billion dollars -- over the current development trends.

Around the Table: Community Partnerships for Healthier Eating

Communities throughout the United States are experimenting with innovative ways to support adults and youth in making healthier food choices. Around the Table: Community Partnerships for Healthier Eating is a report from the Center for Civic Partnerships (CHCC) that reviews the Healthy Cities and Communities program in California, which promotes an inclusionary and systems approach to improving community health and encouraging healthier eating.

Bay Area Burden: Examining the Costs and Impacts of Housing and Transportation on Bay Area Residents, Their Neighborhoods, and the Environment

Bay Area Burden provides a comprehensive analysis of the “cost of place” in nine counties located throughout the San Francisco region by examining the costs and impacts of housing and transportation on Bay Area residents, their neighborhoods, and the environment.

Bay Area households spend an average of more than $28,000 annually on housing—about 39 percent of the area median income. In addition to the high cost of housing, Bay Area households spend nearly $13,400 annually on transportation. Combined, this cost burden of $41,420 per year represents 59 percent of the median household income in the Bay Area. The high combined costs of housing and transportation leave many Bay Area households with insufficient remaining income to comfortably meet their basic needs. This underscores the importance of broadening our understanding of housing affordability to consider the combined costs of housing and transportation, as well as the impacts of longer commutes on the environment and quality of life.

This report exposes the complexity of the interaction of housing and transportation choices as well as expenditures, and the unintended consequences on the natural environment when they work at cross purposes. The report also highlights the importance of “location efficiency” — the proximity of housing to transportation hubs, employment, and retail centers — as a driver of both affordability and environmental sustainability. Land use decisions play a critical role in determining the availability of housing that is affordable to Bay Area working families in locations that are near employment centers and transit. By strengthening the coordination of land use, housing, and transportation policies, Bay Area jurisdictions could create, preserve, and expand communities that are both environmentally sustainable and affordable to Bay Area households.

BC Sprawl Report: Walkability and Health

The 2009 BC Sprawl Report: Walkability and Health from Smart Growth BC links physical activity and health data from 16 neighborhoods dispersed throughout British Columbia, spanning the urban to rural spectrum, with objective and subjective walkability index scores.

Beltway Burden: Housing and Transportation Costs Squeeze Working Families

Housing located far from transit and employment centers places a heavy financial strain on working families in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan region, according to a 2009 publication from the Urban Land Institute (ULI) Terwilliger Center for Workforce Housing. Beltway Burden: The Combined Cost of Housing and Transportation in the Greater Washington, DC Metropolitan Area, documents the challenges faced by area working families who are forced to ''drive 'til they qualify'' for housing, incurring higher transportation costs that eventually erode their housing cost savings. It finds that area families are victim to combined housing and transportation costs that constitute, on average, nearly 47 percent of the area median income.

Best and Worst Developments in the Bay Area

The Transportation and Land Use Coalition (TALC) has produced this report that rates 18 projects in nine counties of the San Francisco Bay area.

Beyond 50.05: A Report to the Nation on Livable Communities

Beyond 50.05 -- Livable Communities: Creating Environments for Successful Aging takes a fresh look at the adequacy of communities to serve the needs of persons of all ages, especially those 50 and older, and provides AARP’s prescription for improving them.

Bicycling and Walking in the United States: 2010 Benchmarking Report

Bicycling and Walking in the U.S.: 2010 Benchmarking Report is an effort by the Alliance for Biking and Walking to collect and analyze data on bicycling and walking in all 50 states and the 51 largest U.S. cities and promote human powered transportation as an important alternative choice. This second biennial report reveals data including: bicycling and walking levels and demographics; bicycle and pedestrian safety; bicycle and pedestrian policies and provisions; funding for bicycle and pedestrian projects; bicycle and pedestrian staffing levels; written policies on bicycling and walking; bicycle infrastructure including bike lanes, paths, signed bike routes, and bicycle parking; bike-transit integration including presence of bike racks on buses, bike parking at transit stops; bicycling and walking education and encouragement activities; and public health indicators including levels of obesity, physical activity, diabetes, and high blood pressure.

The report concludes that where bicycling and walking levels are higher, obesity, high blood pressure, and diabetes levels are lower. Higher levels of bicycling and walking also coincide with increased bicycle and pedestrian safety and higher levels of physical activity. Increasing physical activity through transportation can help improve health and reduce obesity. Bicycling and Walking in the U.S.: 2010 Benchmarking Report also includes numerous measures local and state governments can implement to make their communities friendlier to walkers and bikers. International efforts are also studied to show what programs have worked overseas and potential ways to copy those successes in the United States.

Alliance for Biking & Walking (formerly known as the Thunderhead Alliance) is the North American coalition of grassroots bicycling and walking advocacy organizations. Bicycling and Walking in the U.S.: 2010 Benchmarking Report was funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and made possible through the additional support of Bikes Belong and Planet Bike.

Blueprint Buffalo

Blueprint Buffalo is a report from the National Vacant Properties Campaign (Campaign) and Local Initiatives Support Corporation -- Buffalo (LISC-Buffalo) that outlines a strategy to rebuild the Buffalo, New York region using smart growth development principles, with an emphasis on reclaiming and reusing vacant and abandoned properties.

Boston Indicators Report

The Indicators Report provides high quality data and information about Boston by engaging hundreds of participants and experts in presenting data in 10 categories, drawn from the wealth of research and information generated by public agencies, civic institutions, researchers, think tanks and community-based organizations.

Briefing Papers on Benefits of City Parks

To demonstrate the benefits of city parks and the varied positive affects they can have on a community, the City Parks Forum is producing a series of briefing papers on ''How Cities Use Parks For…''

Bringing Safe Routes to Scale

The Transportation and Land Use Coalition (TALC) has released Bringing Safe Routes to Scale, a report that outlines the need for regional funding to support Safe Routes to Schools programs that help students safely walk and bike to and from school without having to be driven in a car.

Brookings Greater Washington Research Program Outlines Vision for Capital Renewal

''Revitalizing Washington's Neighborhoods: A Vision Takes Shape,'' a new discussion paper by Alice Rivlin and others, provides a roadmap for revitalizing the District of Columbia and boosting its population by targeting development resources on key neighborhoods.

Brookings Institute Releases Reports on Vacant Properties, Urban Land Reform

The Brookings Institute Center on Urban and Metropolitan Studies has released several reports on vacant properties and policy reforms.

Brownfields Redevelopment: Best Practices Report

The NGA Center for Best Practices examines innovative state practices in brownfield redevelopment that encourage urban cleanup and revitalization. Two PDF files included as resources on this site.

Building Better: A Guide to America's Best New Development Projects

Building Better: A Guide to America's Best New Development Projects from the Sierra Club reports on the current state of development in the United States and highlights some of the best new developments that are producing healthy neighborhoods and livable communities.

Building the Line to Equity

PolicyLink and Action! offer Building the Line to Equity: Six Steps for Achieving Equitable Transit Oriented Development in Massachusetts, a report that lays out a set of principles for achieving transit development without displacement.

Building the Livable Urban Edge

This resource from the Cleveland Waterfront Coalition is a Best Practices for Urban Waterfronts slideshow that you can view in your web browser. More than 150 slides show the current condition of Cleveland's lakefront and photos from other cities.

Campus Sustainability Report -- Indiana University 2007

The Indiana University Task Force on Campus Sustainability has released the Campus Sustainability Report, a collective work of more than 100 IU faculty, staff, and students who have been engaged, over the past six months, in developing a sustainability plan for the IU-Bloomington campus.

Campus Sustainability Report -- Michigan State University 2007

The Michigan State University Committee for a Sustainable Campus (UCSC) has released the 2007 Campus Sustainability Report, a collective work that builds on the initial report from 2003. The report presents the latest trends in interdependence between the social, environmental and economic components of the campus -- and adds several new indicators.

Canada's Sustainable Cities 2009

Corporate Knights Magazine has issued its 2009 Sustainable Cities Report, the third annual report detailing which Canadian cities have the smallest environmental footprint.

Case Studies for Transit-Oriented Development

Case Studies for Transit-Oriented Development, a report prepared for Local Initiatives Support Corp. by Reconnecting America, is a short summary of the TOD tools that are used by communities all across the country.

Central Florida Regional Indicators Report 2005

The Central Florida Regional Indicators Report 2005 establishes a regional key indicator system that not only measures progress in the myregion priority areas but indicates the region’s success in becoming less fragmented and more coordinated.

Century Commission for a Sustainable Florida

The Century Commission for a Sustainable Florida was established by the Governor and Legislature of Florida to envision the future of Florida -- to help citizens and state leaders prepare for a continued increase in population and to craft a plan that meets the challenges and opportunities this presents. This First Annual Report lays the foundation for the creation of a sustainable Florida.

Charting the Course for Rebuilding a Great American City

A special volunteer six-member team of planners assembled by APA visited New Orleans October 23 to October 28 to assess the city's needs for developing and implementing plans to guide redevelopment in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. The team has put its findings and recommendations into a report, Charting the Course for Rebuilding a Great American City.

Child-Friendly Transport Planning

As a step to developing child-friendly planning guidelines, the Centre for Sustainable Transportation has completed a limited literature survey and canvassed several planning experts to determine whether child friendly planning guidelines have been developed elsewhere in the world. Child Friendly Transport Planning is a report that outlines the results of this search.

City Parks Forum Briefing Papers

The City Parks Forum, a special initiative of the American Planning Association (APA), has published a second series of briefing papers that show mayors, city managers, planners and others how to use healthy parks to create safer neighborhoods, protect and enhance urban environments, improve learning among children, and improve public health.

Clearing the Air

Nearly half of all Americans are breathing unhealthy air, and air quality in dozens of metropolitan areas has actually gotten worse over the last decade according to a new report from the Surface Transportation Policy Project.

Climate Neutral Campus Report

The Climate Neutral Campus Report contains peer-reviewed white papers, case studies, executive interviews and vendor profiles that share strategies, challenges and solutions for higher education institutions that are striving for climate neutrality.

Commentary Links Economic Vitality to Growth Management

This commentary in the Springfield (MO) News-Leader argues that Springfield's economic resilience depends on the city setting a statewide example of growth management in the Show Me State.

Community Design for Healthy Eating

Community Design for Healthy Eating: How Land Use and Transportation Solutions Can Help, a research paper from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, examines how community design and transportation flaws have contributed to a decrease in physical activity among Americans and an increase in rate of obesity.

Community Development and Smart Growth: Stopping Sprawl at its Source

This paper describes examples of community development projects that have taken shape in explicitly “smart” deliberations with regional authorities and planners.

Community Partnership Profiles -- Active Living by Design

The Community Partnership Profiles report reviews each of the 25 community partnership locations selected by Active Living by Design. Facts for each location include summaries of demographic information, description of each project, and its primary areas of focus.

Complete Streets: Best Policy and Implementation Practices

Complete streets accommodate pedestrians, bicyclists, transit, and cars, creating multimodal transportation networks. But how do communities achieve complete streets? What are the policies and practices that need to be put into place?

Drawing on lessons learned from more than 30 communities around the country, this report provides insight into successful policy and implementation practices that have resulted in complete streets. Readers will learn how to build support for complete streets, adopt a policy, and integrate complete street concepts into plans, processes, and standards. In addition, this report provides insight into design issues, handling costs, and ways of working with various stakeholders. Case studies highlight communities that have adopted and implemented complete streets, and model policy language provides guidance to communities interested in writing and adopting a complete streets policy.

Complete Streets: Best Policy and Implementation Practices is a product of a joint research project of APA and the National Complete Streets Coalition, with model policies prepared by Public Health Law and Policy.

Connecting Florida: Transit + Florida's Economy

New transportation connections within and between the five largest urban regions in Florida – including Miami/Fort Lauderdale, Tampa Bay/St. Petersburg, Orlando, Jacksonville, and Lee and Collier counties – will enhance the long-term economic and environmental sustainability of the entire state, according to this new report from the Urban Land Institute (ULI) and its five Florida District Councils.

''Well-planned, integrated transportation systems, including transit, translate into sustainable communities. A sustainable community is also an economically viable one,” observed ULI Southeast lorida/Caribbean Infrastructure Chair Debbie Orshefsky, also a Fort Lauderdale attorney with Greenberg Traurig.

The Connecting Florida examines transit alternatives being built, planned or proposed for each of the state's five major urban regions, which include more than 80 percent of both the state's population and the state’s jobs, and which are expected to absorb at least 80 percent of the five million additional people projected to live in the state by 2030. The systems range from a rejuvenated express bus service in Miami to commuter rail service in central Florida to a federally funded high-speed rail line system connecting Tampa to Orlando and other areas. With use of the limited transit service now available already on the rise, the potential is great for widespread use of the new systems, which will provide much-needed relief to traffic gridlock throughout much of the state, the report says. (Between 2000 and 2007, vehicle miles traveled in the state rose 35 percent, compared to a 17- percent population increase and a 6-percent increase in road lanes.)

''Regionally integrated transit systems coordinated with compact development and metropolitan intensification will benefit not only Florida's economy, but also the state's environment and quality of life,'' Connecting Florida states. ''For a state long associated with tourism and attracting in-migrants, quality of life is one of Florida's most significant economic assets.'' Connecting Florida was prepared as part of the ULI/Curtis Regional Infrastructure Project, supported by ULI trustee James J. Curtis, III, principal at the Bristol Group, Inc. in San Francisco. The project includes research on the relationship between infrastructure and land use, and seeks to position infrastructure as a key component of sustainable communities and a major contributor to economic competitiveness. The ULI district councils in Florida are among several nationwide that are participating in the project. The report notes that the passenger capacity of 400 cars can be accommodated by eight buses or one commuter train. It points to five elements of a regionally integrated transit system:

• Commuter rail and express buses to connect multi-county metro regions
• Light rail and bus rapid transit to expedite movement throughout urban areas
• Local buses and streetcars to connect neighborhoods to regional transit
• Intercity passenger rail and bus service to expand connections between metro regions
• Walkable community design to permit pedestrian access to transit

Connecting Florida highlights the multiple benefits of well–designed, integrated transit systems: 1) more transportation choices for consumers means having to spend less on auto maintenance and gas; 2) high-quality transit lowers expenditures on road use and parking facilities; and 3) transit investments create jobs (every billion dollars of annual spending on transit in the United States generates 36,000 jobs, according to the American Public Transportation Association.)

The viability of the transit systems will hinge in large part on the degree to which the infrastructure systems are planned in coordination with land use planning in the regions, the report states. ''Clustering development around transit stations or stops improves the efficiency of the transit system, allowing for higher-quality service, which with supportive planning and development policies, increases property values,'' the report says.

It points to more concentrated, transit-oriented development as a way to conserve land, preserve the environment, encourage transit use, and create a safe walking environment (each of the five major urban regions are rated as among the nation's highest for pedestrian fatalities, according to the Surface Transportation Policy Project and Transportation for America). In addition, the report notes that more compact development in walkable neighborhoods connected by transit will be the likely preference of the two age groups influencing future housing demand: aging baby boomers trading large homes on large lots for smaller homes on smaller lots; and Generation Y, the highly mobile children of baby boomers who place a high priority on convenience and connectivity.

The report emphasizes the need for a long-term commitment to transportation infrastructure, including local, metro and regional coordination, consistent state government support, and private sector leadership. “Collaborative partnerships will be needed to develop plans, policies, regulations and investment strategies…As the ingredients come together, Florida's metropolitan regions will become more competitive.”

The report can be downloaded at the link below.

County Government Approaches to Combating Youth Obesity, Encouraging Physical Activity, and Creating Healthy Communities

This report from NACo reviews what county officials have done to promote physical activity and provide healthy eating choices for their citizens, and what future steps need to be taken to assist officials to create healthier communities.

Creating Great Neighborhoods: Density in Your Community

Creating Great Neighborhoods highlights the success of nine community led efforts to create vibrant neighborhoods through density. Building great dense places with good design is not just an abstract theory -- it is a practical approach to growth that is being used in diverse places across the country.

Crossroads Hamlet Village Town

Crossroads Hamlet Village Town broke new ground by offering specific design guidance to planners, developers, and others involved in laying out, regulating, and reviewing proposals for “traditional neighborhoods.'' This new 2004 edition addresses many particulars of residential site design and the use of open space, parks, squares, greenways, and greenbelts.

Cross-Sector Dialogue on the Impact of Housing/Land Use and Mobility

On June 22, 2006, the Center for Civic Partnerships organized and hosted a facilitated cross-sector dialogue in Glendale, California on land use, mobility and public health. The purpose of the meeting was to identify promising strategies and resource opportunities involving multi-sectored collaboration. Cross Sector Dialogue on Impact of Housing/Land Use and Mobility on Physical Activity and Older Adults is the final report from this event.

Dangerous by Design

Dangerous by Design, a new report that ranks the nation’s most dangerous metropolitan areas for walking, concludes that ‘incomplete’ streets are a major culprit in the deaths of thousands of Americans every year. The report, from Transportation for America and the Surface Transportation Policy Project, finds that as many as 40 percent of fatal pedestrian crashes are in places where no crosswalk was available and that arterials designed only for cars are the most dangerous.

The report analyzes the more than 9,000 pedestrian deaths in the U.S. in 2007 and 2008, and its findings are reflected in accounts of pedestrian deaths in the news media. “This report shows that making isolated safety improvements after a crash is not enough,” says Barbara McCann, Executive Director of the National Complete Streets Coalition. “We need Complete Streets policies that ensure that every road is planned and designed from the outset for the safety of everyone who will be using it – whether driving, walking, bicycling, or getting on a bus. Complete streets are not only safe, but help create more attractive, livable communities.”

The report also calls attention to the low levels of investment of federal funds in pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure – less than 1.5 percent of federal transportation dollars over the last few years. We know that a cost-efficient way to improve pedestrian safety is to consider their needs as part of every road project – that is what the Complete Streets Act of 2009 would do. It would require states and Metropolitan Planning Organizations to adopt Complete Streets policies that would apply to federally-funded projects. In essence, this could turn just about every road project into one that improves safety for pedestrians.

For more information and links, visit www.completestreets.org/resources/new-pedestrian-safety-ranking-calls-for-complete-streets.

Designing Activity into Our Lives

A Robert Wood Johnson Foundation-funded study reports on the links between active living and health issues. Includes interactive features.

Designing Major Urban Thoroughfares for Walkable Communities

This report from the Institute of Transportation Engineers advances the successful use of context sensitive solutions (CSS) in the planning and design of major urban thoroughfares for walkable communities.

Developing Around Transit

Developing Around Transit from the Urban Land Institute breaks new ground by going beyond the typical formula of a master-planned mix of retail, offices, and housing to show a variety of ways to tap the vast prospects of undeveloped and underdeveloped areas around transit stations, whether large scale or small scale, downtown or suburban.

Draft Report on the Environment

The U.S. EPA's Draft Report on the Environment is a report that describes current national environmental conditions and trends using existing data and indicators. The report identifies data gaps and research needs, and discusses the challenges government and our partners face in filling those gaps.

Ecological Design Manual for Lake County, Florida

The goal of this manual is to illustrate how development objectives and natural resource protection needs within a high-growth area can be addressed through the physical design of residential projects.

Published December 2001. 42 pages; available online as a PDF document at the resource link below.

Energy and Smart Growth (Translation Paper #15)

This translation paper from the Funders' Network for Smart Growth and Livable Communities contends there is much to be gained by expanding the smart growth movement to include greater attention on energy. Through greater use of energy efficient design and renewable energy sources, the smart growth movement could better achieve its goals of environmental protection, economic security and prosperity, and community livability.

Enterprise at Home for Progress at Large: The Economics of Sustainability

This new report focuses on economies in transition—economies that are threatened by the consequences of environmental changes. The report explores how key civic leaders, faced with the challenge of ensuring the future strength of their economies, have employed creative new agendas that not only help reverse the effects of environmental degradation but also leverage the occasion for valuable economic gain.

While national debates rage over which production methods will lead to a stronger, more sustainable environment, and while research and development teams struggle to produce the next revolutionary technology, it is on the local level that incredible progress is being made in advancing sustainability measures beyond rhetoric. City governments and grassroots activists are often the most obvious players, but there is a powerful—and perhaps unexpected—player in the green arena that is leading the charge in cutting emissions and conserving energy while boosting regional economies: the business community.

These activities are not wild expansions of their mission, but are essential to fulfilling it. Businesses that emit little emissions and consume fewer resources are the stronger, leaner and more agile businesses of America’s future and as the organizations that work to support economic development and improve local quality of life, many chambers of commerce have dedicated themselves to aiding in the success of green businesses. The ingenuity and forward thinking exemplified by the chambers highlighted here are the first bold steps toward a more sustainable and robust American economy.

The report provides tells stories of entrepreneurship and success—stories of chambers of commerce throughout the country instituting green business recognition programs, working to attract clean industries, creating green jobs, and providing resources to local businesses to implement more sustainable practices.

Environmental Characteristics of Smart Growth Neighborhoods

This study conducted for NRDC, in cooperation with the United States Environmental Protection Agency, suggests that the environmental benefits of smart growth are real and can be measured. The study focuses on the Metro Square neighborhood in Sacramento, California, and is one of the first to examine a fully completed and occupied development.

Environmental Characteristics of Smart Growth Neighborhoods

This new study (also conducted for NRDC in cooperation with EPA) continues that research by comparing two neighborhoods in Nashville, Tennessee, and suggests that the combination of better transportation accessibility and a modest increase in land-use density can produce measurable benefits even when both sites are automobile-oriented and suburban in character.

Environmental Research and Education Needs

Environmental Research and Education Needs: An Agenda for a New Administration is report from the National Council for Science and the Environment (NCSE), published in December 2008, that organizes the recommendations relating to research and education policy from NCSE's first eight national conferences (2000-2008). It identifies research needed to improve scientific knowledge, and education needed to improve public understanding, professional capacity and a strong workforce.

Equitable Renewal: Ten Points to Guide Rebuilding in the Gulf Coast Region

Equitable Renewal: Ten Points to Guide Rebuilding in the Gulf Coast Region is an outline of steps from PolicyLink to help ensure that restoration of hurricane-damage communities is fair and just.

Essential Smart Growth Fixes for Urban and Suburban Zoning Codes

Across the country, local governments are searching for ways to create vibrant communities that attract jobs, foster economic development, and provide attractive places for people to live, work, and play. But many are discovering that their own land development codes and ordinances often get in the way of achieving these goals, and they may not have the resources or expertise to make the specific regulatory changes that will create more sustainable communities.

In response to this need, EPA's Smart Growth Program convened a panel of national smart growth code experts to identify the topics in local zoning codes that are essential to creating the building blocks of smart growth. The resulting document, Essential Smart Growth Fixes for Urban and Suburban Zoning Codes, presents the panel's initial work. This document explores 11 ''Essential Fixes'' that address the most common barriers local governments face in implementing smart growth. These actions are organized as modest adjustments, major modifications, or wholesale changes -- giving communities options based on their political will, financial resources, and organizational capacity.

This tool does not include model language, codes or ordinances. It can, however, help communities evaluate their existing codes and ordinances and apply that information to create more sustainable comunities. It is an evolving document that will be regularly revised and updated, and is intended to spark a larger conversation about the tools and information local governments need to revise their land development regulations.

Estimating the Jobs Impact of Tackling Climate Change

The new report Estimating the Jobs Impact of Tackling Climate Change suggests that tackling climate change will be a major net job creator for the U.S. economy. According to the report, aggressive deployment of renewable energy and energy efficiency can net up to 4.5 million new U.S. jobs by 2030 and provide the greenhouse gas emission reductions necessary to tackle climate change.

According to the analysis, renewable energy and energy efficiency deployment costs would be revenue neutral (or better), as costs to implement the technologies are offset by savings from lower energy bills, making total net costs near zero.

“The twin challenges of climate change and economic stagnation can be solved by the same action—broad, aggressive, sustained deployment of renewable energy and energy efficiency,” said Brad Collins, ASES’ Executive Director, “the solution for one is the solution for the other.”

This jobs report offers the most detailed analysis yet on the potential role of the new energy economy in tackling climate change. It suggests that policy can play a significant role in both generating jobs and mitigating carbon emissions.

“For job growth the status quo is no match for innovation,” said Mr. Collins. “Congress can help get the economy back on track with smart energy policy - reduce energy consumption in buildings by 50%; adopt an aggressive national renewable portfolio standard; commit to end dependence on foreign oil by 2025; and implement an upstream cap and auction system to manage greenhouse gases at the points where they first enter the energy economy.”

This report analyzed the job potential of improving energy efficiency in buildings, transportation, and industry, and assessed six renewable energy technologies: concentrating solar power, photovoltaics, wind power, biomass, biofuels, and geothermal power. Estimates in this report refer to net jobs since advancing new energy technologies can both create new jobs and displace jobs from less efficient industries. This report suggests that, in total, more than 4.5 million more jobs can be created by tackling climate change than would be lost.

F as in Fat

F as in Fat: How Obesity Policies Are Failing in America, 2005 from the Trust for America's Health (TFAH), reports that obesity rates in the United States continued to rise last year in every state but one.

Fertile Ground

Fertile Ground is a report on the first year of Green Communities, a five-year, $555 million initiative to build more than 8,500 environmentally healthy homes for low-income families. The report states that the initiative exceeded expectations in its first year, as a diverse array of partners embraced the initiative’s holistic, cost-effective approach to sustainable development in low-income communities.

Food, Markets, and Healthy Communities

Food, Markets, and Healthy Communities, a new report from the Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC), discusses how food markets can affect low-income neighborhoods and provides several strong case studies that illustrate their significant impact, emphasizing that the presence of a high-quality food market is a critical component to a community’s physical and economic health.

Footloose and Fancy Free -- Walkable Urbanism

Footloose and Fancy Free: A Field Survey of Walkable Urban Places in the Top 30 U.S. Metropolitan Areas from The Brookings Institution is a field survey that attempts to identify the number and location of ''regional-serving'' walkable urban places in the 30 largest metropolitan areas in the U.S., where 138 million, or 46 percent, of the U.S. population lives.

Foundations and Real Estate

This report from the Funders' Network for Smart Growth and Livable Communities presents 19 stories from foundations that demonstrate the strategic use of varying types of investments a foundation can make toward supporting more thoughtful real estate investment in a region as well as how a foundation might approach such investment.

From Wall Street to Your Street: New Solutions for Smart Growth Finance

Commissioned by the Funders' Network, From Wall Street to Your Street: New Solutions for Smart Growth Finance reassess the current methods for smart growth finance and sketches out two different ''fixes'' for the problem of financing smart growth.

Funders' Network Publishes Health and Smart Growth Translation Paper

The Funders’ Network for Smart Growth and Livable Communities has published its most recent translation paper: Health and Smart Growth: Building Health, Promoting Active Communities.

Getting Transportation Right for Metropolitan America

This brief details the importance of TEA-21 reauthorization for the nation's metro areas and offers a comprehensive policy agenda for Congress' work on the bill.

Global Age-Friendly Cities

To help cities make the most of an ever growing older population, the World Health Organization (WHO) is releasing the Global Age-friendly Cities Guide in several cities around the world. WHO recognizes that population ageing and urbanization are two global trends that together comprise major forces shaping the 21st century. At the same time as cities are growing, their share of residents aged 60 years and more is increasing.

Going to Town: New Urbanism and Neighborhood Success Stories

Going to Town is a special report from the Michigan Land Use Institute (MLUI) that documents newfound interest among northwest Michigan’s developers and government officials in town center developments. Rising gas prices, escalating traffic congestion, and a rapidly growing population wary of both -- and eager for a more sensible, healthier lifestyle -- are fueling that interest. Today traditional-style neighborhood or town center developments are being planned, are already rising, or are now full of satisfied residents not only in larger towns such as Traverse City, Manistee, and Petoskey, but also in villages like Empire and Harbor Springs, and even rural townships like Acme.

Going to Town: New Urbanism Arrives in Northwest Michigan

Going to Town: New Urbanism Arrives in Northwest Michigan, a new report from the Michigan Land Use Institute (MLUI), discusses a new approach to residential and commercial development that is saving tax dollars, protecting the environment, and increasing prosperity and quality of life in northern Lower Michigan.

Green Building Policy in a Changing Economic Environment

Green Building Policy in a Changing Economic Environment is a new report that provides an inventory of policies and best practices intended to help policymakers advance a more sustainable legislative agenda for growth and development. The report also contains detailed case studies of the green building programs in Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Boston, Nashville, and Grand Rapids, Mich.

According to the report, the number of U.S. cities with green building programs has increased 50% in two years. Green buildings generally include energy-efficient designs and other sustainable features. Among AIA’s findings, 138 cities have green building programs, compared with 92 cities in 2007, and 24 of the 25 most populated metropolitan regions are built around cities with a green building policy.

The report also notes that DOE's Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant program, funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, is providing ''an unprecedented opportunity for the advancement of green building and sustainability efforts in our nation's cities.'' AIA has stated a goal of making all building designs carbon neutral by 2030.

Greening the World's Capital Cities

How do some of the world's best-known national capitals contribute to creating an environmentally and socially sustainable world? And how do they build successful support for sustainable development? Learn what capital cities are doing to lead the way to a greener planet in this report from the Capitals Alliance.

Growing by Choice or Chance

Growing by Choice or Chance details how South Carolina communities have an opportunity to direct their growth through more efficient land use that decreases the amount of land developed to accommodate population growth, and offers more variety in how people live, work and shop.

Growing Economy, Shrinking Emissions: A Transit-Oriented Future for Connecticut's Capital Region

This new report illustrates a strategy for growth in Greater Hartford that expands housing and transit options while reducing our transportation-related carbon emissions. At the May 2009 Redesigning the Edgeless City workshop, a diverse group of planners, environmentalists, community advocates, and business people met in Hartford to discuss the link between transportation and development and to test how coordinated land use and transportation policies could impact Greater Hartford. RPA has analyzed existing zoning regulations of each town in the CRCOG region and found that housing and commercial development produced by current policies would raise emissions by 22% without even meeting the anticipated needs of our residents or supporting pending public transit investments. The report documents alternative transit-based scenarios developed at the May meeting which would reduce the projected growth in emissions by 11% and provide access to transit necessary to reduce our dependence on automobiles, saving the average household in the region approximately $360 each year in gas cots alone.

Growing Economy is a template for the type of regional planning that will be supported by the recently announced HUD/DOT/EPA Sustainable Communities initiative--planning which combines economic development, housing supply and demand, environmental quality, and transportation needs of a region into an integrated and achievable vision. As Tisha Ferguson of Connecticut Fund for the Environment tells us, Growing Economy is ''a blueprint for making the right choices to reconnect the urban and outlying communities, creating a vibrant urban hub and realizing Hartford's potential for regional economic leadership.''

The report was prepared in recognition that the Hartford region is about to invest in two transformative transit projects: the New Britain-Hartford busway, expected to receive a full-funding grant agreement later this year from the federal New Starts program, and the New Haven-Hartford-Springfield commuter rail, now completing its environmental assessment. RPA estimates that transit-oriented development can reduces miles driven by the average Hartford-area household by 2,400 miles per year, reducing the need for a second or third car. Given the challenges faced in shifting to renewable energy, more efficient cars, and more efficient buildings, transit-oriented development represents a strategy to harness private investment to achieve the State of Connecticut's carbon emissions reduction goals of 10% below 1990 levels by 2020.

Growing Economy was produced with the support of Lincoln Institute of Land Policy in cooperation with Capitol Region Council of Governments.

Growing Smarter at the Edge

Growing Smarter at the Edge, a new publication from the Sonoran Institute, reviews and evaluates urban edge development associated with large-scale planned communities, or master-planned communities.

Growing with Less Greenhouse Gases

This National Governors Association report cites expanding transportation choices, conserving greenspaces, and promoting new community designs as effective smart growth strategies for reducing greenhouse gases.

Guides and Manuals of “Better Practice” -- UK

This three-part essay discusses the general national planning situation in Britain, specifically dealing with that in force in England. Urban Design Issues, Planning Tools, and Planning Guidelines are discussed in the context of recent British development trends.

Healthy Communities Initiative

The Regional Plan Association Healthy Communities Initiative, supported by the Centers for Disease Control, the Milbank Memorial Fund, and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, restores the historic relationship between the disciplines of town planning and health science.

Healthy Community Design

Healthy Community Design: Success Stories from State and Local Leaders profiles the notable efforts of elected and appointed government leaders who are supporting healthy community design across the nation. Some of these efforts stem from a desire to support economic development, others to decrease environmental degradation or improve residents’ quality of life. But all of the policy changes and programming efforts have a positive effect on health because they support community design that provides more opportunities for people to engage in routine physical activity.

Healthy Places, Healthy People: Promoting Public Health & Physical Activity Through Community Design

October 2001. A Robert Wood Johnson Foundation report of a meeting held in November 2000 in Washington, DC, in which 26 experts exchanged information, identified barriers, and formulated possible strategies for reintegrating physical activity into community design.

Healthy Schools, Healthy Communities and Youth Obesity

Healthy Schools, Healthy Communities and Youth Obesity is a report from the the NACo Center for Sustainable Communities that looks at how the effects of obesity are disproportionately felt by certain segments including minorities, the poor -- and youth.

Healthy Urban Design -- UMD Presentation

Healthy Urban Design: Maryland’s Smart Codes and the Pedestrian Environment examines Maryland’s Smart Codes, a state initiative that encourages local communities to adopt principles of Smart Growth. The paper examines the efforts of three communities that participated in the Smart Codes initiative and the potential for these codes to transform the walkability of neighborhoods and town centers.

Helping Johnny Walk to School: Policy Recommendations for Removing Barriers to Community-Centered Schools

School districts are responsible for the education of almost 50 million public school students. Nearly all decisions about the use and location of school facilities are made by local school districts—but the impact of these decisions goes far beyond the school and the education of its students.

This report identifies the larger community interest in decisions about retaining existing schools and deciding where to locate new ones. It describes the states’ role in school siting decisions and identifies state level policy changes that will ensure that educational, environmental, health, community, and fiscal considerations are weighed by communities when school districts make school closing, consolidation, and site selection decisions.

The report was produced through a cooperative agreement with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and with support from Building Education Success Together (BEST).

To download a copy of this report, visit the link below.

Heritage Dividend

English Heritage (with EEDA & the HLF) has recently launched the results of research into the regeneration impact of heritage investment in the East of England. Included in the report are 11 case studies showing local success stories.

Hidden in Plain Sight: Capturing the Demand for Housing Near Transit

Hidden in Plain Sight: Capturing the Demand for Housing Near Transit, a new study by Reconnecting America’s Center for Transit Oriented Development, shows that demand for compact housing near transit is likely to more than double by 2025.

Historic Neighborhood Schools in the Age of Sprawl: Why Johnny Can't Walk to School

National Trust for Historic Preservation. This report looks at how public policies are contributing to mega-school sprawl -- giant education facilities in remote locations that no child can walk to -- and at what citizens and public officials are doing to change them.

Housing Strategies for Houston

Houston, one of America’s largest and fastest growing cities, faces a daunting challenge: by 2025, the city’s population is expected to double with an additional two million citizens. Housing Strategies for Houston: Expanding Opportunities outlines recommendations of a team of national experts for realizing a new vision.

How Cities Use Parks

The City Parks Forum has begun an initiative to produce a series of briefing papers on ''How Cities Use Parks For ...'' to provide information on how healthy parks are fundamental to many aspects of community prosperity.

How Shall We Grow: Creating a Shared Vision for Central Florida

As Central Florida faces the opportunities and challenges associated with the projected doubling of our population from 3.5 million citizens in 2006 to 7.2 million in 2050, the region has been given the opportunity to be the first in Florida to create a shared vision to answer the question, ''How Shall We Grow?''

Implementation Issues for Transit Sensitive Suburban Land Use Design.

Milwaukee, WI: Center for Urban Transportation Studies,1995. Efforts to incorporate public transport service into suburban areas in the United States have had limited success. Travel patterns are highly diverse with trips from many origins to many destinations and few concentrated corridors of demand. Recently, however, there has been an emergence of new approaches to suburban land use design in the United States which is more transit friendly. These include traditional neighborhood development projects, pedestrian pockets and corridor based design. This paper discusses the issues that are involved in the implementation of such techniques

Improving the Pedestrian Environment Through Innovative Transportation Design

Improving the Pedestrian Environment, a report from the Institute of Transport Engineers, features samples of how transportation professionals and citizens have brought walking back into focus, not only in the capital budgets of government agencies but also in the lives of citizens.

Integrating Schools into Healthy Community Design

The National Governor's Association (NGA) has prepared this Issue Brief that examines state policies on school siting, school construction financing, and Safe Routes to School programs focusing on how policies can benefit communities, improve children's health, and reduce the need for infrastructure expansion.

Integration of Planning, Public Health Builds Active Communities

The American Planning Association (APA) has released preliminary findings of a nationwide survey to measure how communities can create opportunities for citizens to be more physically active.

Jumpstarting the Transit Space Race

ReConnecting America's report Jumpstarting the Transit Space Race: How the New Administration Could Make America Energy-Independent, Create Jobs and Keep the Economy Strong tackles the expansive issue of inadequate transportation facilities in many of the U.S. urban and suburban areas and how a comprehensive program to enhance alternate transportation options could have a positive ripple effect throughout the economy.

Katrina Index: Tracking Variables of Post-Katrina Reconstruction

The Brookings Institution's Metropolitan Policy Program offers the Katrina Index: Tracking Variables of Post-Katrina Reconstruction. This publication provides a benchmark for reconstruction progress, indexing nearly 50 economic and social indicators that measure the impact of rebuilding efforts in Orleans Parish, the New Orleans metropolitan area, Louisiana, and Mississippi.

Land Use and Driving: The Role Compact Development Can Play in Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions

This new report concludes that compact development is a key component in efforts to mitigate climate change. Given that the United States will grow by more than 130 million people by 2050, with research showing the majority will continue to choose living in metropolitan areas, land use will continue to be critical to lowering overall greenhouse gas emissions by reducing driving and energy consumption.

Land Use and Driving: The Role Compact Development Can Play in Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions summarizes the research and findings of three in-depth studies on land use – Moving Cooler, Growing Cooler, and Driving and the Built Environment. The publication focuses on how the three reports connect land use, driving, and energy consumption. While sprawl has long been recognized for its effects on combined housing and transportation costs, quality of life, and infrastructure, the report points out that more compact development can dramatically have positive environmental implications.

The ULI report identifies the trends in vehicle miles traveled (VMT) and shows that there is a potential for reducing VMT by 8 to 18 percent between now and 2050, when compact development makes up at least 60 percent of all future development. According to demographic trends, the development needed to accommodate major metropolitan growth has not yet been built. This presents a major opportunity to shape land use patterns that help curb the development of sprawling, automobile-oriented suburbs. Even though consumer demand will drive the amount of compact development, policy and regulatory changes will be essential for it to work as an effective climate change strategy. While there are financial obstacles and regulatory challenges to compact development, interest and policy support are continually gaining traction in the promotion of more livable, sustainable communities.

Land Use and the California Economy: Principles for prosperity and quality of life.

This report, commissioned by ''Californians and the Land,'' a group of leaders from California's business, government, and environmental sectors, addresses three major issues: How much growth should California expect and why?; How are land use and quality of life issues related to the California economy?; and, What are the principles that must be addressed if Californians are to combine economic growth and a high quality of life­ now and for future generations?

LandVote 2002 Is Available On-Line

LandVote 2002, the annual publication of the Trust for Public Land and the Land Trust Alliance that documents American voters' continued support for parks and open space funding, is available on-line or can be order on-line.

Learning from Abroad

This paper is designed to help further the understanding of and contribute to learning from international approaches to smarter growth policies and sustainable development.

Lifelong Communities: A Regional Guide to Growth and Longevity

Lifelong Communities: A Regional Guide to Growth and Longevity from the Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC) is a report that documents the results of the Lifelong Communities charrette. It focuses on the core principles that go into making a Lifelong Community: connectivity, good pedestrian access and transit, neighborhood services and retail, opportunities for social interaction, an array of dwelling types, community design that promotes active living and consideration for existing residents.

Linking the New Economy to the Livable Community.

Palo Alto: Collaborative Economics, April 1998. This paper was written in response to the absence of economy in the discussions about new Urbanism and Livable Communities. Thus this paper aims to interject this concern into the debate, highlighting the economic benefits of livability and smart growth, and defining the place of new urbanism in the new economy.

Living Streets

ICMA has posted on its website the Living Streets report from the Colorado Municipal League. The Denver Living Streets Initiative is a citywide initiative and regional partnership to educate professionals, community and elected leaders as well as the public at large about the benefits of living streets.

Local Government Actions to Prevent Childhood Obesity

''Local Government Actions to Prevent Childhood Obesity,'' a 2009 report from The National Academies Press, presents a menu of recommended action steps for local government officials to consider in their efforts to prevent childhood obesity in their community.

Local Government and Schools: Creating Community-Oriented Schools

Local Government and Schools is an IQ report from the International City/County Management Association (ICMA) that provides local government managers with an understanding of the connections between school facility planning and local government management issues. The report offers strategies for how local governments and schools can bring their respective planning efforts together to take a more community-oriented approach to schools and reach multiple community goals: educational, environmental, economic, social, and fiscal. Eight case studies illustrate how communities across the U.S. have already succeeded in collaborating to create more community-oriented schools.

Making Environmentalism More Urban

This news briefing from the Congress for New Urbanism describes how a group of New Urbanists is bridging the gap between traditional New Urbanism concepts and the principles of green building. The result is an ''enhanced sustainability'' combining the benefits of urbanism and environmentalism.''

Making the Connection: Transit-Oriented Development and Jobs

Making the Connection: Transit-Oriented Development and Jobs is a national study completed by Good Jobs First honoring 25 exemplary transit-oriented development (TOD) projects that provide increased transit access, good jobs, and affordable housing to low and moderate-income people, including many who cannot afford to own a car.

Managing Active Living Communities

This report in ICMA’s active living series provides an introduction to the health impacts of a sedentary lifestyle and the connections between health, community design, and public policy.

Mean Streets 2000

Surface Transportation Policy Project. 2000. This report finds that dangerous streets are discouraging people from walking and may be contributing to serious health problems.

Mean Streets 2004

The Surface Transportation Policy Project (STPP) has issued Mean Streets 2004, a study reveals that walking remains the most dangerous mode of transportation, and some areas of the country are becoming markedly more dangerous.

Measuring the Air Quality and Transportation Impacts of Infill Development

In Measuring the Air Quality and Transportation Impacts of Infill Development the U.S. EPA illustrates how regions can calculate the transportation and air quality benefits of infill, based on standard transportation forecasting models used by metropolitan planning organizations across the country.

Measuring the Health Effects of Sprawl

Obesity has reached epidemic levels, and diseases associated with inactivity are also on the rise. What is creating this public health crisis? This report presents the first national study to show a clear association between the type of place people live and their activity levels, weight, and health.

Metropolitan Recovery and Spending Priorities

On the heels of signing into law a $787 billion economic stimulus and recovery package, President Obama has delivered a 10-year budget plan that could fundamentally reshape the nation's priorities. Brookings experts suggest how the budget plan and recovery package might affect the metropolitan drivers of national prosperity, including innovation, human capital, infrastructure and sustainable places.

Missing the Bus: How States Fail to Connect Economic Development with Public Transit

A 50-state survey of economic development subsidy programs -- such as loans, grants, and tax incentives -- reveals that not one single state effectively coordinates its economic development spending with public transportation planning.

Mississippi Renewal -- Summary Report 2007

The Mississippi Renewal Forum's Final Report in summary format is now available online. This report summarizes the 18 individual reports crafted to guide the rebuilding of the Mississippi Gulf Coast.

Models and Guidelines for Infill Development

This publication from the Maryland Department of Planning addresses infill development and includes model zoning codes, examples of existing zoning codes from jurisdictions throughout the country, and a list of minimum requirements that jurisdictions must meet in order to qualify for certain state incentives.

National Bicycling and Walking Study

The U.S. Department of Transportation has released a 10-year Status Report on its activities to achieve the two goals set forth in the original 1994 National Bicycling and Walking Study.

Neighborhood Design and Aging

The Upper Great Plains Transportation Institute at North Dakota State University has released Neighborhood Design and Aging: An Empirical Analysis in Northern California, a report that explores residential and travel choices of the elderly.

Neighborhood Street Design Guidelines

This report from the Institute of Transport Engineers provides guidance in the overall layout and design of transportation elements for new neighborhood developments, where neighborhoods can comprise both residential and mixed residential/commercial subdivision development.

New Community Design to the Rescue

National Governors Association, 2001. This report explains how states and communities can encourage New Community Design -- mixed-use, mixed-income, walkable development that is distinctly different from sprawl -- by eliminating institutional barriers in the marketplace.

New Data for a New Era: A Summary of the SMARTRAQ Findings

''Linking Land Use, Transportation, Air Quality and Health in the Atlanta Region'' is the subtitle of New Data for a New Era: A Summary of the SMARTRAQ Findings, a report that summarizes the results of one of the largest, most comprehensive planning studies yet undertaken for a large metropolitan areas.

New Schools for Older Neighborhoods

Local Government Commission. 2002. The case studies highlighted in this report illustrate the need for ''neighborhood-based'' schools and show how they can improve neighborhoods by helping them become more compact, livable and walkable.

New Study Ranks 83 Metropolitan Areas on Sprawl Components

Measuring Sprawl and Its Impact, based on research conducted by professors at Rutgers and Cornell universities, ranks 83 metropolitan areas on the basis of twenty-two measurable components of sprawl.

New Urbanism: Comprehensive Report and Best Practices

New Urbanism: Comprehensive Report & Best Practices Guide by Robert Steuteville and Phillip Langdon, is the definitive reference for new urban ideas, practices, and projects. This wire-comb bound edition is available directly from the publisher, New Urban News, with a special price for students.

New Zealand Urban Design Protocol

The New Zealand Urban Design Protocol provides a platform to make New Zealand towns and cities more successful through quality urban design. It is part of the Government's Sustainable Development Programme of Action and Urban Affairs portfolio.

No Place to Play

No Place to Play, a new report by the Trust for Public Land, finds that two-thirds of children 18 and under in Los Angeles do not live within walking distance of a public park.

Ontario Community Sustainability Report

The Ontario Community Sustainability Report -- 2007 was produced by The Pembina Institute to evaluate whether policies and plans that use the language of sustainability are being translated into tangible progress on the ground.

Open Space for Tomorrow

This study by the Open Space Institute and the Center for Policy Research at the University at Albany finds that local governments in New York’s Capital District are not prepared to handle the heavy toll of sprawl.

Opportunities for Advancing Environmental Justice

Opportunities for Advancing Environmental Justice: An Analysis of U.S. EPA Statutory Authorities from Environmental Law Institute (ELI) looks at environmental justice activities of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). While there are numerous public institutions whose activities bear directly on issues of environmental justice, EPA has jurisdiction over many of the core issues, especially the prevention and control of industrial pollution, that have given rise to the environmental justice movement.

Our Built and Natural Environments: A Technical Review of the Interactions between Land Use, Transportation and Environmental Quality

In recent years interest has grown in Smart Growth as a mechanism for improving environmental quality. In Our Built and Natural Environments, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) summarizes technical research on the relationship between the built and natural environments, as well as current understanding of the role of development patterns, urban design, and transportation in improving environmental quality. Our Built and Natural Environments is designed as a technical reference for analysts in state and local governments, academics, and people studying the implications of development on the natural environment.

Parking Spaces, Community Places: Finding Balance through Smart Growth Solutions

Parking Spaces, Community Places: Finding Balance through Smart Growth Solutions from the U.S. EPA is a report that explores how new, flexible parking policies can help communities encourage growth and balance parking needs with their other goals.

Partnering for Smart Growth Success

The Urban Land Institute's (ULI) California Smart Growth initiative offers this report on how local and regional leaders in the San Francisco Bay area are teaming up with the public and private sectors to make smart growth a reality.

Partnerships for Smart Growth: University-Community Collaboration for Public Spaces

The Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning, in conjunction with the Lincoln Institute for Land Policy, has released Partnerships for Smart Growth: University-Community Collaboration for Better Public Spaces. Written under a cooperative agreement with the U.S. EPA, the report profiles 13 university-led collaborations on smart growth initiatives.

Planning Active Communities

Planning Active Communities from the American Planning Association (APA) looks at how planning processes, development regulations, and community participation can be used to ensure that development patterns facilitate everyday physical activity.

Planning Complete Streets for Aging America

Planning Complete Streets for Aging America from AARP's Policy and Research emphasizes the need for a balanced approach to meeting transportation requirements for all ages.

Policy Options to Improve Specialized Transportation

The congressional authorization of the surface transportation law, coupled with the growing demand for specialized transportation, presents an opportunity to improve these services for people with mobility limitations. This paper describes specialized transportation; highlights promising practices; and offers policy options for improving these services. Specialized transportation is vital to helping people with mobility limitations live as independently as possible.

The report recommends that policymakers take steps to strengthen coordinated planning, increase support for mobility management, and improve data collection and reporting on these services. Policy options include: increasing overall funding for public transportation, especially specialized transportation; strengthening coordinated planning; continuing to support mobility management; collecting and analyzing smarter data to strengthen programs; expanding program flexibility; and studying the impact of consolidating the Federal Transit Administration’s three specialized transportation programs.

The report is available for free download at the link below.

Poll on Walking, 2002

As policymakers and the public debate the different aspects of transportation issues, the Surface Transportation Policy Project asked Belden Russonello & Stewart to measure the public’s attitudes toward one aspect of this debate -- walking.

Preserving and Promoting Diversity Near Transit

Preserving and Promoting Diverse Transit-Oriented Neighborhoods is a report from the Center for Neighborhood Technology, Reconnecting America, and Strategic Economics -- working together as the Center for Transit-Oriented Development. The study reveals the significant diversity -- economically and racially -- currently present in transit-served neighborhoods, and suggests that additional development of mixed-income, mixed-race housing in these areas would respond to growing demand for affordable and livable communities while also providing numerous benefits to cities, regions, and the environment.

Preserving Opportunities: Saving Affordable Homes Near Transit

Preserving affordable housing near transit means more than simply saving a building -- it means preserving opportunities for low-income families and seniors to access jobs and services. Next to housing, transportation is the second highest household cost for most Americans. Affordable housing located near transit allows families and seniors to live an affordable lifestyle and access employment, education, retail, and community opportunities.

Preserving Opportunities: Saving Affordable Housing Near Transit

Reconnecting America and the National Housing Trust offer Preserving Opportunities: Saving Affordable Housing Near Transit, a report which notes the critical status of affordable housing near transit, and how rental assistance for up to 63% of the examples cited will expire within the next five years.

Promising Strategies for Healthy Eating and Active Living Environments

Promising Strategies for Creating Healthy Eating and Active Living Environments offers a comprehensive and cross-cutting review of policy, strategy, and program recommendations to realize this vision. Prevention Institute developed this document for the partnership based on over 200 interviews and conversations with diverse stakeholders and constituencies.

Promoting Public Health through Smart Growth

SmartGrowthBC offers this report that explains how our built environment shapes our transportation choices, and in turn, human health. It reviews the existing research for a range of transportation-related health impacts on seven public health outcomes: Physical Activity and Obesity, Air Quality, Traffic Safety, Noise, Water Quality, Mental Health, and Social Capital.

Protecting Water Resources with Higher Density Development

Protecting Water Resources with Higher Density Development is a new report from the U.S. EPA designed to help communities better understand the impacts of high- and low-density development on water resources.

Putting Schools on the Map: Linking Transit-Oriented Development, Families, and Schools in the San Francisco Bay Area

This new report examines the connections between Transit-Oriented Development (TOD), families, and schools, with a focus on expanding educational opportunities for all children. Taking an exploratory approach to understanding and framing these interconnections, its authors provide a rationale for the linkages at this nexus, presenting ''Ten Core Connections'' between TOD and public education, and highlight five case studies in the San Francisco Bay Area. From these, recommendations are provided for enhancing city-school collaboration in TOD for improved transit use and high-quality educational opportunities.

The report can be downloaded in PDF format from the link below, either with or without appendices.

Putting Smart Growth to Work in Rural Communities

This new report focuses on how to adapt smart growth strategies to rural communities. Funded by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of Sustainable Communities, the report examines the challenges rural communities face, including rapid growth at metropolitan edges, declining rural populations, and the loss of working lands. It highlights smart growth strategies that can help guide rural growth while preserving the unique rural character of existing communities.

The report focuses on three central goals: 1) support the rural landscape by creating an economic climate that enhances the viability of working lands and conserves natural lands; 2) help existing places to thrive by taking care of assets and investments such as downtowns, Main Streets, existing infrastructure, and places that the community values; and 3) create great new places by building vibrant, enduring neighborhoods and communities that people, especially young people, don’t want to leave. Featuring case studies from across the country, the report highlights how local governments, states, and non-profits have successfully implemented smart growth strategies to support rural lands, revitalize existing communities, and create great new places for residents and visitors.

To read the full report, visit the link below.

Putting the Pieces Together: State Actions to Encourage Smart Growth Practices in California

This report contains a set of recommendations to improve the economic and social well-being of California’s communities through better growth patterns.

Rails-with-Trails: Design, Management and Operating Characteristices of 61 Trails Along Active Rail Lines

Rails-to-Trails Conservancy. November 2000. This report covers many aspects of rails-with-trails, including the extent and growth of rails-with-trails nationwide, safety performance, liability, trail design and location issues, attitudes of railway companies, obtaining easements for trails, and funding.

Reconnecting Fort Wayne

Fort Wayne, Indiana, faces many challenges today: How to gain and retain new jobs in a changing global economy, how to make the most efficient use of limited natural resources, and how to build a prosperous city for all residents in a way that does not damage the possibility of future generations enjoying continued prosperity. Reconnecting Fort Wayne, a report from the Center for Neighborhood Technology, addresses three major areas of focus for Fort Wayne to achieve its goals: transportation, the knowledge economy, and energy.

Reconnecting Schools and Neighborhoods

Reconnecting Schools and Neighborhoods: An Introduction to School-Centered Community Revitalization is a paper from Enterpise that presents the case for integrating school improvement into community development, drawing on the academic research linking school and neighborhood quality as well as early results from school-centered community revitalization projects across the country.

Redevelopment for Livable Communities ­ Conference Report. Takoma, Washington, 1997.

Using the "D" word (density) often provokes a storm of opposition among neighborhood residents and skepticism about "market demand" among developers. But showing them examples of good redevelopment can generate enthusiasm for creating more walkable compact neighborhoods, and maybe for eliminating a few parking lots.

Removing Market Barriers to Green Development

Removing Market Barriers to Green Development is a report from Northeast-Midwest Institute and the Delta Institute that examines what current market dynamics are inhibiting mass adoption of these practices, and what can and should be done to make green development the convention rather than the exception in the U.S.

Residential Construction Trends in America’s Metropolitan Regions

This report analyzes trends that are reshaping downtowns and inner city suburbs in metropolitan areas throughout the United States. “Parking lots, underutilized commercial properties, and former industrial sites are being replaced with condos, apartments and townhouses… Do such examples add up to a fundamental shift in the geography of residential construction?” The primary goal of this report is to clarify if there has been a shift toward infill redevelopment of established urban areas, and to determine in which regions the shift has been most significant.

To answer these questions, residential building permits for the 50 largest metropolitan areas were examined over an 18 year period (1990-2007) to determine the percentage of residential building permits issued by central cities and core suburban communities compared to suburban and exurban areas. This data shows that in several regions there has been a dramatic increase in the share of new construction in central cities and older suburbs. In 15 regions the central city more than doubled its share of residential construction including New York City (15 percent to 44 percent), Chicago (7 percent to 23 percent), Portland (9 percent to 22 percent), and Atlanta (4 percent to 13 percent).

In addition, the shift of residential construction inward has been particularly dramatic over the last five years. Although the housing market has slowed, the report believes that this shift will continue after the economic downturn ends. The report states that this represents a fundamental change in the real estate market as people seek homes in walkable communities closer to where they work. Demographic changes are also play a role with empty nesters and young professionals moving away from the suburbs to smaller homes in the city. This trend is most prevalent in mid-sized cities that are often thought of as being leaders in smart growth polices (Portland, Sacramento, and Denver) and large diverse cities with strong ties to the global economy (New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and Miami).

However, the report cautions that despite the increases in the number of residential permits in established urban areas, a large share of residential construction still takes place on previously undeveloped land on the urban fringe. Urban areas still account for less than half of all new residential units in most areas. The report also states that further research should be done to determine which policies have worked best to attract development into urban areas and discourage green field development.

Residential Construction Trends in America’s Metropolitan Regions

WASHINGTON – An updated U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) report shows a continuing shift in development toward urban neighborhoods in the United States, despite a slow a real estate market.

This trend, described in EPA’s 2010 report, Residential Construction Trends in America’s Metropolitan Regions, shows that redevelopment continues in many urban neighborhoods. Taking advantage of opportunities to reuse land and to redevelop underused sites is a key smart growthstrategy. It helps communities protect natural lands from being developed, strengthens the local economy, and puts new homes, stores, and jobs within easy reach of surrounding neighborhoods.

The data show that compared to the early 1990s, the share of construction in urban neighborhoods was up 28 percent in mid-sized metropolitan regions that have promoted redevelopment of underused sites and development around transit, such as Portland, Ore; Denver, Colo.; and Sacramento, Calif. For example, in 2008 Portland issued 38 percent of all the building permits within its region, compared to an average of 9 percent in the early 1990s; Denver accounted for 32 percent, up from 5 percent; and Sacramento accounted for 27 percent, up from 9 percent.

The latest report shows that an even stronger trend toward urban redevelopment in the largest metropolitan regions continued in 2008. New York City accounted for 63 percent of the building permits issued within its region. By comparison, the city averaged about 15 percent of regional building permits during the early 1990s. Similarly, Chicago now accounts for 45 percent of the building permits within its region, up from just 7 percent in the early 1990s.

The original report, issued in February 2009, examined building trends in the 50 largest metropolitan areas from 1990 to 2007. The update incorporates data for 2008, which included several months of national economic downturn.

Residential Construction Trends in America's Metropolitan Regions

Residential Construction Trends in America's Metropolitan Regions is a report from the U.S. EPA that examines urban infill projects and seeks to identify if recent emphasis on such development adds up to a fundamental shift in the geography of residential construction.

Restoring Prosperity: Report on America's Cities

The evidence is clear. On the whole, America's central cities are coming back with growing employment and increasing numbers of young people, empty-nesters, and others choosing city life over the suburbs. Unfortunately, not all cities are fully participating in this renaissance. Many cities are lagging behind their peers, especially older industrial communities that are still making the transition from manufacturing-based economies to more knowledge-oriented activities.

Safe Routes to School

The Safe Routes to School National Partnership released the report Safe Routes to School State Network Project: Final Report, 2007-2009, Making Change Through Partners and Policies. The report was prepared for the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), a primary funder of the State Network Project.

The Safe Routes to School National Partnership (the Partnership) launched the State Network Project in 2007 to influence state-level Safe Routes to School implementation and to leverage additional resources and build a supportive environment through other state-level policies. The 2007–2009 Report describes the approach and structure of the Partnership’s State Network and Local School Projects in 10 jurisdictions (CA, DC, GA, IL, KY, LA, NY, OK, TX and VA). The networks were selected primarily based on high levels of childhood obesity, diversity and low income communities. The new report highlights the progress achieved at state and local levels over three years, including major accomplishments, lessons learned and next steps.

The DC Local School Project took place at DC Preparatory Academy. The hallmark achievement was Walk to School Day, when parents, school staff, community volunteers, and more than 100 students collaborated to show that children can be effectively encouraged to use active transportation modes for school travel, even when home-to-school distances are lengthy. The excitement generated by this event led to park and walk ideas for students who live too far to walk from home and a precedent was set as to how parents, schools, police, and the community at large can work together to encourage safety and healthy living.

The efforts of the 10 networks have improved opportunities for safe physical activity for children on the route to school, and have contributed to the quality and public release of $199 million in Safe Routes to School and related funds. One of the hallmarks of the project was its ability to bring together the state departments of transportation, health and education to improve programs and policies through a health lens. Based on the success of the 2007-2009 State Network Project, RWJF recently provided a two-year grant of nearly $1.5 million to expand the project to 15 states during 2010 and 2011. The Safe Routes to School National Partnership is currently accepting applications from non-profit organizations in states that are interested in participating.

By making it safe, convenient, and fun for children to walk and bicycle to and from school, Safe Routes to School is helping communities find solutions to traffic concerns, poor air quality, and high rates of childhood obesity.

Congress launched the Safe Routes to School program in 2005 through the federal transportation bill and provided $612 million for state-level implementation of programs that build sidewalks, bike lanes, and pathways, while also providing funding for education, promotion and law enforcement programs. A major impetus for the creation of federal program were Congressional concerns about the rise in childhood obesity—which has more than tripled among kids ages 6 to 19 over the past 40 years—while the number of children walking and bicycling to school has plummeted. Today, more than 23 million children in the United States—nearly 33 percent—are overweight or obese.

The Safe Routes to School National Partnership, hosted by the non-profit Bikes Belong Foundation, is a network of more than 400 nonprofit organizations, government agencies, schools, and professionals working together to advance the SRTS movement in the United States. The Partnership focuses on building partnerships, changing policies, advancing legislation, and improving the built environment.

Safe Routes to School: 2007 State of the States Report

The Safe Routes to School National Partnership marked the first day of International Walk to School Month by releasing Safe Routes to School: 2007 State of the States, a national report that tracks states' progress on the implementation of the $612 million federal program.

Safe Routes to School: Putting Traffic Safety First - How Safe Routes to School Initiatives Protect Children Walking and Bicycling

This new (December 2009) report from illustrates how Safe Routes to School programs can be harnessed to keep children safe from traffic dangers while walking and bicycling to school. The report explores the approaches five different communities used through Safe Routes to School to create safer environments for children walking and bicycling.

The five communities (Santa Rosa, CA; Miami-Dade County, FL; state of ME; Springfield, MO; and Portland, OR) each demonstrate how Safe Routes to School evaluation, education, encouragement, enforcement, and engineering can address traffic safety concerns. Many of these safety improvements are made at relatively low costs to communities and schools, yet have profound effects on keeping children safe while also improving physical health and the environment.

Deb Hubsmith, Director of the Safe Routes to School National Partnership noted, ''The success stories in this report show the power and promise of Safe Routes to School to help communities all across the country to address safety risks and improve conditions for students walking and bicycling to school.''

In 2007, an estimated 14,000 children ages 14 and under were injured as pedestrians, while more than 300 children were killed while walking. In 2008, an estimated 52,000 bicyclists were injured in motor vehicle crashes, and 21 percent of those bicyclists-nearly 11,000 children-were age 14 or younger. Children walking and bicycling to school represent 11 percent of injuries and fatalities during the school commute, but just 14 percent of trips and less than two percent of miles traveled.

Congress launched the federal Safe Routes to School program in 2005 through the federal transportation bill and provided $612 million for five years of state-level implementation of programs that build sidewalks, bike lanes, and pathways, while also providing funding for education, promotion, and law enforcement. Federal Safe Routes to School funds are educating children on safe bicycle and pedestrian practices, increasing traffic enforcement to improve adherence to traffic laws and speed limits, and making infrastructure improvements to create safe places for children to walk and bicycle.

Shared Destinies: A Smart Growth Agenda for Massachusetts

The Massachusetts Smart Growth Alliance offers Shared Destinies: A Smart Growth Agenda for Massachusetts. This document lays out action steps to sustainable planning for the Commonwealth, including modernizing the way the state plans for growth, building a balanced transportation system, and ensuring that all residents can afford homes.

Shared Prosperity, Stronger Regions

This report explores the opportunities and challenges confronting older core cities by looking closely at five of them: Baltimore, Cleveland, Detroit, Philadelphia, and Pittsburgh and answers questions about how older core cities can become economically competitive and socially inclusive places where all residents can participate and prosper.

Shrinking the Carbon Footprint of Metropolitan America

Shrinking the Carbon Footprint of Metropolitan America, from the Brookings Metropolitan Policy Program, reports on the expansion of America's carbon footprint. With a growing population and an expanding economy, America's settlement area is widening, and as it does, Americans are driving more, building more, consuming more energy, and emitting more carbon.

Smart Communities: Curbing Sprawl at its Core

This report offers examples of how community development interests and smart growth proponents can work together to achieve their goals. Examples from Chicago, Minneapolis, Oakland, Philadelphia, and Richmond, Virginia are included.

Smart Growth and Public Sector Leadership

Public Sector Leadership: The Role of Local Government in Smart Growth, from the Funders' Network for Smart Growth and Livable Communities, is designed to improve understanding of the role that local government can play regarding smart growth development patterns and highlight opportunities for partnership with philanthropy.

Smart Growth at the Frontier: Strategies and Resources for Rural Communities

Northeast-Midwest Institute has released a report, Smart Growth at the Frontier: Strategies and Resources for Rural Communities. The report illustrates promising rural growth strategies that revitalize small towns; link natural resource protection with resort and residential development; maintain farm and forest land; and coordinate regional development.

Printed copies of this report may be purchased by calling 202/544-5200; download the PDF version by clicking the link below.

Smart Growth Audits

This report describes the concept of a smart growth audit and provides methods to implement one in your community.

Smart Growth for Brownfields Redevelopment

Prepared for the City of Chicago's Department of Environment, Smart Growth for Brownfields Redevelopment is a report that presents screening tools to evaluate and identify brownfield sites that can be economically cleaned up and redeveloped as mixed-income residential and/or mixed-use communities using smart growth principles.

Smart Growth in New York State

This discussion paper from the New York State Office of the State Comptroller is intended to help stimulate a vigorous debate on smart growth in New York State by providing a general background and helping to define major issues.

Smart Growth in the San Francisco Bay Area

This report reviews recent smart growth practices that could have the greatest impact and potential for success in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Smart Growth in the States

Smart Growth in the States, a report by Keith Schneider, Writer-In-Residence at the Michigan Land Use Institute, reports on recent smart growth developments in more than a dozen states. The smart growth package -- environmental protection, transit investments, urban revitalization, curbing sprawl, collaborative planning and land conservation -- is steadily being embedded in new executive orders, legislative policy and new state law across the country.

Smart Growth is Smart Business

A new groundbreaking report called Smart Growth is Smart Business profiles how business leaders are supporting smart growth policies and projects, and puts forth five key smart growth business actions.

Southwestern Pennsylvania Citizens’ Vision for Smart Growth

Citizens’ Vision is based on expressions of concerned citizens and on past regional planning efforts. It provides policy recommendations on challenges and opportunities for the southwest Pennsylvania region.

Sprawl and Urban Growth

This essay documents ubiquitousness of sprawl and that it is continuing to expand. Using a variety of evidence, the authors argue that sprawl is not the result of explicit government policies or bad urban planning, but rather the inexorable product of car-based living.

Starting Point: Louisiana Recovery and Rebuilding

More than 650 citizens, community leaders, architects, planners, engineers, business people, and public officials gathered in New Orleans November 10–12, 2005 for the Louisiana Recovery and Rebuilding Conference, the starting point for the planning and the rebuilding of damaged parts of the state that have fallen victim to the devastation of hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

State of the Fraser Basin Report

Sustainability Snapshot 4: The Many Faces of Sustainability is the 2009 edition of the State of the Fraser Basin Report, released February 19, 2009. The report flags progress in British Columbia's Fraser River Basin towards social, economic and environmental sustainability.

State Policies and School Facilities: How States Can Support or Undermine Neighborhood Schools and Community Preservation

The existence of a good school in the middle of an old or historic neighborhood, even if the school is brand new, can, and often does, help to preserve the entire neighborhood, including its historic housing stock.

State Policies for Healthy, Active Communities

State Policies for Healthy, Active Communities, an issue brief from the National Governor's Association Center for Best Practices, examines state-level active community policies: development, land use, and transportation policies that help ensure the built environment supports physical activity.

Every state can adopt a number of strategies to modify the built environment in ways that make it easier for residents to be physically active. Many state policies that are traditionally seen as economic development or land use strategies already affect whether or not the built environment supports physical activity.

This issue brief examines Michigan's active community policies as a case study of the many tools states have at their disposal to help create communities that support and even encourage regular physical activity. Michigan's policies fall into four general categories: development, revitalization, transportation, and open space conservation policies. An important complement to Michigan's active community policies are its health education and promotion programs. Active community policies help create the places to be physically active, and health policies help motivate state residents to be active.

Available online as a PDF document (14 pages/333kb) at the resource link below.

Stimulus Funding for Biking and Walking

America Walks, a national coalition of local advocacy groups dedicated to promoting walkable communities, reports on the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) in this analysis posted on the America Walks website.

Strategies for Enhancing the Built Environment to Support Healthy Eating and Active Living

Strategies for Enhancing the Built Environment to Support Healthy Eating and Active Living is the first of a series of policy briefs authored by Prevention Institute for the Healthy Eating Active Living Convergence Partnership (Convergence Partnership), and is part of a larger strategy to identify high impact approaches that will promote healthy people and communities.

Strategy for a Sustainable Rockville

Strategy for a Sustainable Rockville, a report by the City of Rockville, Maryland's Environmental Management Division, Department of Public Works, was created to answer the 2006 call by the Mayor and Council, who committed to making Rockville a sustainability leader among Maryland communities. Since that time, the Mayor and Council and staff have been working to fulfill the ambitious vision for the City by 2020.

Sustainable Community Practices

Sustainable Community Practices from the AIA Center for Communities by Design is a draft document that offers a general overview of how-to guidelines, community indicators/benchmarks, and other similar sources as a reference starting point to understand the very broad and wide-ranging field of community sustainability.

Sustainable Philadelphia: Clean and Green by 2016

The Philadelphia Urban Sustainability Forum, a unique coalition of groups working to make Philadelphia the greenest, most livable city in America, has produced the report Sustainable Philadelphia: Clean and Green by 2016, which outlines how the city can meet sustainability goals within the next ten years.

Sustainable San Mateo Sustainable Indicators Report 2009

Sustainable San Mateo County's (SSMC's) annual Indicators Report provides fact-based information about local trends over time. SSMC has identified approximately 30 indicators that represent the foundation for a sustainable community, ranging from air quality and energy use to education and affordable housing. These indicators represent SSMC's core belief that a truly sustainable community maintains a healthy environment, social equity and a vibrant economy for the long term.

Sustainable TransForum Conference Report

On May 28 and 29, 2007, Ontario, Canada's Ministry of Transportation hosted Ontario's first Sustainable Transportation Forum, known as the TransForum. The TransForum brought together local and international transportation professionals, academics, environmentalists, industry representatives and policy makers to discuss innovations that can enhance sustainability and improve transportation.

Ten Principles for Successful Development Around Transit

What does it take to make transit stations work? The principles presented here can serve as reminders for communities, designers, and developers who may have forgotten them.

Ten Things Wrong with Sprawl

Ten Things Wrong with Sprawl is a report from the Environmental Law Institute that considers the future of America if the U.S. population continues its expected growth rate while development follows a general sprawl pattern.

The Built Environment and Health

This report from the Prevention Institute profiles eleven projects in predominantly low-income communities ''where local residents mobilized public and private resources to make changes in their physical environments to improve the health and quality of life for their citizens.''

The Case for an Integrated Mobility Strategy

The Case for an Integrated Mobility Strategy is the final report from Portland, Oregon's Blue Ribbon Committee for Trails. Appointed in April 2008 by Metro, the area's elected regional government, the Committee was charged to take the work the community has developed, evaluate where regional trails fit in the region's priorities and recommend potential strategies for expanding the region's trail network.

The Case for Mixed-Income, Transit-Oriented Development in the Denver Region

The Denver, Colorado, region is the focus of this study that reviews the demand for housing near transit; explores the benefits of mixed-income, transit-oriented neighborhoods; analyzes the barriers to creating such communities; offers an array of tools for overcoming those barriers; and applies those tools in the context of four planned transit station areas in metro Denver.

The Case for Multi-Family Housing

The Urban Land Institute's (ULI) latest policy paper, ''The Case for Multi-Family Housing'' is now available for free on the web.

The Future of Infill Housing in California

''The Future of Infill Housing in California: Opportunities, Potential, Feasibility, and Demand'' is a report prepared by a team of researchers at the Institute of Urban and Regional Development that provides the first statewide assessment of infill housing development potential for California communities.

The Hidden Health Costs of Transportation

Washington, D.C., May 19, 2010–The American Public Health Association (APHA) today released The Hidden Health Costs of Transportation, a new publication that addresses how our nation’s current transportation system contributes to today's soaring health costs and impedes progress toward improving public health.

Chief among those costs are U.S. traffic fatalities and injuries, which remain unacceptably high. In March 2010, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration revealed a statistical projection that shows that roughly 33,963 people died in traffic crashes in 2009. Furthermore, according to the American Automobile Association, traffic crashes cost an astounding $164.2 billion each year, or roughly $1,051 per person annually. Some of the more hidden costs of transportation include physical inactivity, rising asthma and obesity rates in both adults and children, and degraded air quality. All are increasing to staggering levels and negatively impacting Americans.

The report points out that transportation policies can also have a transformative effect. Increasing sustainable transportation options and improving community transportation designs could significantly improve public health by introducing walking, bicycling and transit use as convenient and cost-effective ways to integrate more physical activity into the daily habits of all transportation users. APHA supports policy that would increase access to safe sidewalks, streets and playgrounds, health services and jobs for all Americans no matter what area of the country.

Additionally, policies that improve traffic safety and support healthy communities can help to reduce childhood obesity and increase physical activity across diverse populations; while these policies are critically important they unfortunately remain underfunded.

''Our country depends on a robust transportation system that facilitates easy, safe commutes and promotes physical activity in order to reduce the burden of death and disease and improve health outcomes of all communities,'' said Georges C. Benjamin, MD, FACP, FACEP (E), executive director of the American Public Health Association. ''Millions of Americans are counting on elected officials to support meaningful policy initiatives that would make the country’s transportation system more efficient in areas of the country that need it the most.''

Given the anticipated reauthorization of the federal surface transportation bill, The Hidden Health Costs of Transportation will serve as the premier resource for recommendations for future transportation policy and investment.

Intended to educate decision-makers, health policy professionals and the broader public, the report will greatly benefit public health and transportation professionals interested in health evaluation and cost assessments in national transportation policy.

The National Bicycling and Walking Study: 15-Year Status Report

This report is the third status update to the National Bicycling and Walking Study, originally published in 1994 as an assessment of bicycling and walking as transportation modes in the United States. Following the 5-year status report (1999) and 10-year status report (2004), the 15-year update measures the progress made toward the original goals of lowering the number of fatalities while increasing the percentage of trips made by bicycling and walking. Injury and fatality statistics are presented to measure this progress, as well as results from surveys related to travel habits.

The 15-year report, unlike its two predecessors, examines a range of efforts to increase bicycling and walking in the United States. Programs at the Federal, State, and local levels are included, as well as case studies on best practices.

Finally, the report makes recommendations for research, policy, and other measures that can be taken to meet the goals of the original study.

The New American City

The Noisette Company, designers of the Noisette 3,000 acre city-within-a-city in North Charleston, South Carolina, is now making plans for the ''New American City'' available through its website free of charge.

The Path to Healthy Communities

The Path to Healthy Communities: Mapping California's Priorities is a report by California's Having Our Say Coalition that calls on the state to prioritize improving the health of central valley communities.

The Plan for Harvard in Allston

This draft report from January 2007 provides a view at the Plan for Harvard in Allston -- a long-term vision that will see the existing Cambridge campus expand into 200 acres of adjacent Allston.

The Returning City: Historic Preservation and Transit in the age of Civic Revival

The Returning City examines how historic preservation efforts have shifted over the past decade to focus more on the livability and mobility of city centers and residential areas.

The State of the Commonwealth: Is PA Moving Toward a Sustainable Future?

This report by the Pennsylvania Consortium for Interdisciplinary Environmental Policy identifies positive trends toward sustainability in Pennsylvania in a few areas, but also recognizes some trends that indicate the state is experiencing a decrease in the resilience of its environment, economy, and communities.

The Sustainable Sites Initiative

Standards and Guidelines is a preliminary report from the Sustainable Sites Initiative, an interdisciplinary partnership to develop national, voluntary standards and guidelines for sustainable land development and management practices as well as metrics to assess site performance and a rating system to recognize achievement.

Top Ten Green Schools

The Green Guide has released its 2006 list of Top 10 Green Schools in the United States. More than 2,500 schools were invited to participate in the 2006 green schools survey, and the detailed responses from the most environmentally-committed K-12 schools in the U.S. were used to create this report.

Towards Lifetime Neighborhoods

This report from the International Longevity Centre UK and Communities and Local Government broadens the topic of aging in place beyond housing to entire neighborhoods -- progressing from ''lifetime homes'' to ''lifetime neighborhoods.''

Trails & Greenways: Advancing the Smart Growth Agenda

Washington, DC: Rails to Trails Conservancy, September 2002. This paper provides comprehensive documentation of the benefits green infrastructure can bring to a community and a region, and the impacts trails and greenways have on advancing smart growth objectives.

Trails and Greenways: Advancing the Smart Growth Agenda

Trails & Greenways: Advancing the Smart Growth Agenda. Americans have designed and built an environment over the last half-century that, through land-use patterns and transportation facilities, makes non-automobile travel difficult.

Transportation for America

Transportation for America is leading a call for the nation's leaders to commit to building a 21st Century transportation system. The organization has formed a broad coalition of housing, environmental, public health, urban planning, transportation and other organizations seeking to align national, state, and local transportation policies with an array of issues like economic opportunity, climate change, energy security, health, housing and community development.

Transportation Performance in the Twin Cities

In the Executive Summary to Transportation Performance in the Twin Cities, a new report from Transit for Livable Communities, the Surface Transportation Policy Project, and Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy, transportation is described as ''a means to other ends, not an end in itself.'' This report assesses the work of the Minnesota Department of Transportation (Mn/DOT) and the Metropolitan Council, which are responsible for planning and investing in the regional transportation system.

Travel and Environmental Implications of School Siting

Travel and Environmental Implications of School Siting is the first study to empirically examine the relationship between school locations, the built environment around schools, how kids get to school, and the impact on air emissions of those travel choices.

Understanding Climate Change: An Equitable Framework

As the world grapples with the massive effects of climate change and global warming, the need to understand the embedded issues associated with these complex ecological transformations becomes clear. PolicyLink commissioned Understanding Climate Change: An Equitable Framework to contribute to a deeper understanding of the issues and to encourage everyone to participate in the discussion and to weigh in on proposed solutions.

Understanding the Relationship Between Public Health and the Built Environment

Understanding the Relationship Between Public Health and the Built Environment is a new report that comprehensively summarizes the state of the practice on the relationship between public health and the built environment. The report was prepared for the U.S. Green Building Council, the Congress for the New Urbanism, and the Natural Resources Defense Council to help prepare of a rating system for neighborhoods called LEED-ND (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design for Neighborhood Development).

Urban Institute Releases Neighborhood Change in Urban America Report

The Urban Institute, a nonpartisan economic and social policy research organization, provides fresh perspectives and research of record on vital national issues. Neighborhood Change in Urban America is part of a growing series of papers that advance knowledge about neighborhood change in America's urban areas.

Urban Residential Environments and Senior Citizens’ Longevity in Megacity Areas: the importance of walkable green spaces

This Japanese study concludes that living in areas with walkable green spaces positively influenced the longevity of urban senior citizens and that greenery filled public areas that are nearby and easy to walk in should be further emphasised in urban planning.

Vacant Properties: The True Costs to Communities

Vacant Properties: The True Costs to Communities from the National Vacant Properties Campaign, summarizes research on the costs that vacant and abandoned properties impose upon communities. It also highlights local programs successfully recapturing the value in these properties.

Value of Urban Design

The Value of Urban Design, a new publication from the Ministry for the Environment of New Zealand, aims to establish whether there is a persuasive case for urban design -- the design of the buildings, places, spaces and networks (both public and private) that make up our towns and cities, and the ways people use them.

Valuing Sustainable Urbanism

Valuing Sustainable Urbanism is a report from The Prince's Foundation, a British educational charity which exists to improve the quality of people's lives by teaching and practising timeless and ecological ways of planning, designing and building. This document looks at a series of government-directed urban developments and how they can create walkable communities that retain local character and a sense of identity.

Walking the Walk: How Walkability Raises Home Values in U.S. Cities

''Walking the Walk: How Walkability Raises Home Values in U.S. Cities,'' a report from CEOs for Cities, explores the connection between home values and walkability.

Walking to Public Transit

A study published in the November 2005 American Journal of Preventative Medicine analyzes results from the 2001 National Household Travel Survey and finds that walking to and from public transportation can help physically inactive populations -- especially low-income and minority groups -- attain the recommended level of daily physical activity.

What We Learned From the Stimulus

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A new analysis by the Center for Neighborhood Technology, Smart Growth America, and U.S. PIRG shows that in the first ten months of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), investments in public transportation have created twice as many jobs per dollar as investments in highways. The new report, What we learned from the Stimulus and how to use what we learned to speed job creation in the 2010 jobs bill, shows that by mimicking funding levels for transportation set out in ARRA, the Jobs for Main Street Act (H.R. 2847), passed by the U.S. House of Representatives in December, missed an opportunity to create additional jobs where they are needed most.

The Jobs for Main Street Act provides $27.1 billion for the Surface Transportation Program (STP) versus just $8.4 billion for Public Transportation even though public transportation investments under ARRA created twice as many jobs per dollar of investment. The Senate plans to take up its version of the jobs bill early in 2010, and the report shows that if the Senate version ensures funds are invested equally in public transportation and highways, the same level of overall investment would produce 71,415 additional job-months, equivalent to year-round employment for 5,951 more workers than from the House bill.

''This is a no-brainer. The Senate can ensure that more jobs are created across the country building the transportation system we need for the 21st century,'' said Geoff Anderson, President of Smart Growth America. ''If we are serious about creating jobs and bringing about the economic recovery our nation desperately needs, members of the Senate will insist on investing a greater percentage of the transportation funds in public transportation. Who is against more jobs?''

The data compiled by the states shows that every billion dollars spent on public transportation produced 16,419 job-months, compared to 8,781 job-months for every billion spent on highway infrastructure. Public transportation projects create more jobs than road projects because they spend less money on land and more on labor, and because projects are often more complex, whether laying rack or manufacturing vehicles.

The report also uses the data from ARRA to refute the idea that public transportation projects are not as “shovel-ready” or able to be launched as quickly as highway projects. Nationally, public transportation and highway infrastructure projects are spending money at about the same rate. But because public transportation projects spend more of those dollars on more labor, equivalent spend rates produce more and faster jobs from public transportation.

''As the Senate prepares to take up a jobs bill, lawmakers should learn the lessons of the Recovery Act,'' said Phineas Baxandall, Senior Analyst for U.S. PIRG. ''We cannot afford to keep doing the same thing over and over again and expect different results. The fact is investments in public transportation will produce more jobs quicker and will address billions of dollars of unmet needs.'' ''Public transportation is a lifeline for communities big and small across the country'' said Scott Bernstein of the Center for Neighborhood Technology. ''Too many people could not get to their jobs without public transit. But even as demand for service is up, systems everywhere face budget shortfalls forcing layoffs, reduced service and fare hikes. Increased local reinvestment is essential to preventing these cuts that will cripple our workforce and increase expenses for working Americans. In passing the Jobs for Main Street bill to tackle the continuing crisis, Congress can learn from the ARRA experience, putting the money where it will do the most good, and leaving no job, no family and no community-in-need behind.''

In the first ten months of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), investments in public transportation have created twice as many jobs per dollar as investments in highways.

This new analysis by the Center for Neighborhood Technology, Smart Growth America, and U.S. PIRG shows that by mimicking funding levels for transportation set out in ARRA, the Jobs for Main Street Act passed by the U.S. House of Representatives in December missed an opportunity to create additional jobs where they are needed most. If the Senate version invests equally in public transportation and highways, we could produce 71,415 additional job-months, equivalent to year-round employment for 5,951 more workers, without spending a dime more than the House bill.

When Investors Buy Up the Neighborhood: Strategies to Prevent Investor Ownership from Causing Neighborhood Decline

In response to the growing trend of investor ownership in neighborhoods with high foreclosure rates in the Twin Cities and across the country, PolicyLink, Northwest Area Foundation and Family Housing Fund has issued When Investors Buy Up the Neighborhood: Strategies to Prevent Investor Ownership from Causing Neighborhood Decline, a research report aimed at helping communities hit first and worst by the foreclosure crisis.

Based on dozens of interviews in the Twin Cities and secondary research, the report describes three dozen strategies communities can use to reclaim foreclosed properties, encourage positive reinvestment, and stabilize their neighborhoods. The study also details how many of these approaches are already at work in Minnesota and across the country.

The report recommends three major approaches:

• Encouraging homeowners and responsible investors to buy, rehab and maintain foreclosed properties;
• Strategically gaining control of foreclosed properties; and
• Holding property owners accountable for property conditions.

Many homes in African-American and Latino communities previously targeted by predatory lenders, and now suffering from increased foreclosures due to the recession, are now being bought up by investors. While some investors contribute to local neighborhood stabilization efforts, others rent to unsuspecting tenants and become slumlords – or abandon the properties completely. Such scenarios result in the displacement of entire families and severely destabilize local neighborhoods.

''While the housing and mortgage crisis has been far-reaching, it has quickly become an urgent equity issue for low-income people and communities of color,'' said Kalima Rose, Director of the PolicyLink Center for Infrastructure Equity. ''Through strengthened regulations and vital resources like the Twin Cities Community Land Bank and First Look program of the National Community Stabilization Trust, the Twin Cities has already taken swift action to drive out predatory investors and help residents reclaim their neighborhoods. We must continue to build upon these efforts and encourage positive investment in low-income, high-foreclosure communities.”

The means by which cities can incentivize home buyers and responsible investors to purchase, rehab and maintain properties continue to expand. Arizona, for example, provides forgivable, zero-interest loans to homeowners buying foreclosed properties; Portland offers free landlord training; St. Louis charges vacant property owners a $200 fee every six months; and Chicago requires vacant property owners to maintain liability insurance coverage of at least $300,000.

Using the research study and these successful examples as a guide, other cities can develop their own action plans and successfully remove neighborhood blight, stabilize homes, and return economic prosperity to their communities.

''The current foreclosure crisis has plunged hundreds of families into even deeper poverty,'' said Gary Cunningham, Northwest Area Foundation Chief Program Officer and vice president of programs. ''This report does more than provide a stark picture of the financial and social hurt that result from irresponsible practices. It illustrates, through real-life examples, how public policy can help a neighborhood and a city halt the downward spiral,'' he said. “I have great hope that policymakers will use the data and practical strategies within this report to shape public policies that safeguard low-income families against predatory practices, and encourage other cities to do the same.''

''All families, regardless of race or income, deserve equal access to quality, safe and affordable housing options,'' said Tom Fulton, President of Family Housing Fund. ''By speaking out against predatory practices and advocating for positive investments in low-income areas, we are helping to create stable, healthy home environments for children and families to thrive.''

Who Lives Downtown

The Brookings Institution has released Who Lives Downtown, a report that analyzes downtown population, household, and income trends in a selection of 44 cities, from 1970 to 2000.

Workforce Development and Smart Growth

Workforce Development and Smart Growth: Opportunities for Linking Movements from the Funders' Network for Smart Growth and Livable Communities describes why funders who support working families can further their objectives by joining the movement calling for smart growth policies and practices.

Yellow School Bus Blues

Yellow School Bus Blues from 1000 Friends of Maryland documents one hidden cost of Maryland's recent development patterns -- the rapidly increasing school bus budget. Since 1992 statewide expenditures for school bus transportation have more than doubled, to $438 million.

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