Alon Bassok

Method for Evaluation of Sustainable Transportation: Toward a Comprehensive Approach

A crucial element of sustainability is the optimization of system efficiency by the maximization of existing resources and the limitation of the necessity of infrastructure expansion. Although the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design certification is an internationally recognized standard for determining sustainable architecture, no officially accepted method exists for evaluating sustainable transportation. The development of a performance evaluation method for sustainable transportation is necessary, with a focus on multimodal mobility rather than on automobility. It is crucial that current transportation projects not preclude the provision of multimodal mobility options in the future. This paper reviews the literature on operational and proposed evaluation strategies for transportation projects and proposes a sustainable transportation evaluation method. The sustainable transportation evaluation method builds on the observed beneficial qualities of the existing evaluation systems and attempts to address their shortcomings. Implementation of the sustainable transportation evaluation method relies on established multicriterion techniques that allow for quantitative and qualitative evaluation of the sustainability of transportation projects during the planning, design, and construction phases. The evaluation method proposed can augment traditional environmental analysis performed for transportation project selection. The method is designed to be flexible so that it can be easily implemented by a wide range of stakeholders who are considering diverse issues.

Smart growth and goods movement: emerging research agendas

While recent urban planning efforts have focused on the management of growth into developed areas, the research community has not examined the impacts of these development patterns on urban goods movement. Successful implementation of growth strategies has multiple environmental and social benefits but also raises the demand for intra-urban goods movement, potentially increasing conflicts between modes of travel and worsening air quality. Because urban goods movement is critical for economic vitality, understanding the relation between smart growth and goods movement is necessary in the development of appropriate policies. This paper reviews the academic literature and summarizes the results of six focus groups to identify gaps in the state of knowledge and suggest important future research topics in five sub-areas of smart growth related to goods movement: (1) access, parking, and loading zones; (2) road channelization and bicycle and pedestrian facilities; (3) land use; (4) logistics; and (5) network system management.

Measuring neighbourhood air pollution: the case of Seattle's international district

Current US regulatory air quality monitoring networks measure ambient levels of pollutants and cannot capture the effects of mobile sources at the micro-scale. Despite the fact that overall air quality has been getting better, more vulnerable populations (children, the elderly, minorities and the poor) continue to suffer from traffic-related air pollution. As development intensifies in urban areas, more people are exposed to road-related air pollution. However, the only consideration given to air quality, if any, is based on ambient measures. This paper uses an inexpensive, portable Particle Soot Absorption Photometer (PSAP) to measure Black Carbon (BC) emissions, a surrogate for diesel fuels emissions, in Seattles International District. With the aid of a GPS receiver, street-level BC data were geocoded in real space-time. It was found that pollution levels differed substantially across the study area. The results show the need for street-level air pollution monitoring, revisions in current land use and transportation policies, and air quality planning practice.

Smart Growth and Urban Goods Movement

This report identifies the interrelationships between goods movement and smart growth applications, in particular, the relationship between the transportation of goods in the urban environment and land-use patterns. The results of the research can be used by decisionmakers to more accurately understand urban goods movement demand, relevant performance metrics, and the limitations of current modeling frameworks for addressing smart growth and urban goods movement.

Beyond bodegas: affordable groceries through an innovative store format

Low‐income areas often face a “grocery gap” whereby residents lack accessible grocery stores and must spend disproportionate resources to shop outside their neighborhood or purchase food at less desirable stores. Traditional grocery stores will not locate in these neighborhoods for market‐based reasons. An alternative model appears feasible based on a literature review of current grocery industry practices and their theoretical application on a study neighborhood. The alternative store could be a satellite of a larger chain, stock a select product mix, and combine technology and customer service to provide groceries and community development. This model is promising: each part works profitably under market conditions, and planners are beginning to understand the need to work creatively with industry and communities to bring stores to underserved areas.

Quantitative Approaches for Project Prioritization

Transportation projects in major metropolitan regions can vary widely in the types of benefits that they provide and in the scales of those benefits. Travel forecasting models and related procedures can provide reasonable estimates of those benefits, and many benefits can be distilled into equivalent monetary benefits by the use of consumer surplus or other valuation approaches. In theory, those methods could also be used to prioritize projects for funding consideration. However, an approach that simply chooses projects that provide the greatest net economic benefits may not result in a mix of projects that most effectively accomplishes broad regional goals. This paper describes an approach to project prioritization that was developed to support stakeholder-based weighting of multiple goals and, for each goal, multiple measures. The approach uses the analytic hierarchy approach to develop weights for each goal and a conjoint-based method to estimate stakeholder weights for each measure. The approach was applied as part of Washington States Puget Sound Regional Councils Transportation 2040 process and achieved the goals in VISION 2040, the long-range land use plan. Weighting exercises were conducted with two stakeholder groups, and the results were applied to a set of proposed ferry, rail, highway, and local road projects. This paper describes the details of this case study and provides observations and conclusions from the work. The principal findings of the experiments were that statistically robust modeling conducted in real time during planning committee meetings can improve the transparency, equity, and collaboration of the project prioritization process.

Forecasting Tools for Analyzing Urban Land Use Patterns and Truck Movement: Case Study and Discussion of Results

Many urban planning efforts have supported development in dense, mixed-use areas, but tools are not widely available to help understand the relationship between urban form and goods movement. A review is presented on the status of urban goods movement forecasting models to account for the impacts of density and mixed land use. A description is given of a series of forecasting model runs conducted with state-of-the-practice tools available at the Puget Sound Regional Council. By comparing dense, mixed-use scenarios with different baseline and transportation network alternatives, the ability of the model to capture the relationship between goods movement and density is evaluated. The paper concludes with a discussion of the implications of the results for truck forecasting and freight planning.