Carol Atkinson-Palombo

Comparing the Capitalisation Benefits of Light-rail Transit and Overlay Zoning for Single-family Houses and Condos by Neighbourhood Type in Metropolitan Phoenix, Arizona

Light rail transit (LRT) is increasingly accompanied by overlay zoning which specifies the density and type of future development to encourage landscapes conducive to transit use. Neighbourhood type (based on land use mix) is used to partition data and investigate how pre-existing land use, treatment with a park-and-ride (PAR) versus walk-and-ride (WAR) station and overlay zoning interrelate. Hedonic models estimate capitalisation effects of LRT-related accessibility and overlay zoning on single-family houses and condos in different neighbourhoods for the system in metropolitan Phoenix, Arizona. Impacts differ by housing and neighbourhood type. Amenity-dominated mixed-use neighbourhoods—predominantly WAR communities—experience premiums of 6 per cent for single-family houses and over 20 per cent for condos, the latter boosted an additional 37 per cent by overlay zoning. Residential neighbourhoods—predominantly PAR communities—experience no capitalisation benefits for single-family houses and a discount for condos. The results suggest that land use mix is an important variable to select comparable neighbourhoods.

Quantifying the Economic Domain of Transportation Sustainability

The lens of sustainability refocuses the perception of transportation and allows a look beyond its accustomed role of providing vehicular mobility to the broader impacts of transportation on the environment, society, and the economy. As the understanding of transportations function evolves beyond throughput and capacity, sustainability can be used as an organizing principle for transportation planning to promote livable communities. To fully understand and integrate the ideas of sustainability with transportation, the proper metrics and performance measures need to be developed and adopted. This study demonstrated how the theoretical concepts and definitions of transportation sustainability could be transformed into a practical metric for assessing the performance of the U.S. transportation system in terms of sustainability. The study focused on characterizing and measuring the economic aspect of sustainability in relation to transportation. The analysis was carried out for surface transportation at the statewide level and took into consideration the degree of urbanization of states. The final results described the relationship between urbanity, mode share, and the economic aspects of transportation sustainability. On the basis of this assessment, the best-performing states in terms of the economic aspects of transportation sustainability were more urban and had lower automobile mode shares.

Children’s asthma hospitalizations and relative risk due to nitrogen dioxide (NO2): Effect modification by race, ethnicity, and insurance status☆☆☆

BACKGROUND This study explores the role of race, ethnicity, and insurance status in modifying the effects of air pollution on childrens asthma hospitalizations in Phoenix, Arizona (US) between 2001 and 2003. While controlling for weather, interactions between nitrous dioxide (NO(2)) and race, ethnicity, and insurance status are used to predict relative risk for subgroups of children. METHODS The generalized logit regression model for nominal categorical data within a multinomial likelihood framework was used. This model is specifically suited to small counts and the reporting of 95% confidence intervals for the odds ratio of hospital admission for one group as compared to another. The odds ratio is known to approximate relative risk for rare events. RESULTS Several significant findings were found for race, ethnicity, and insurance status as modulators for the effect of NO(2) on childrens risk for asthma hospitalization: (1) children without insurance have 1.4 (95% CI: 1.1-1.8) times higher risk of asthma admissions than those with private insurance at exceedances of 0.02 parts per million (ppm) of NO(2) above the seasonal mean; the same finding holds for children without insurance as compared to those with Medicaid; (2) black children have 2.1 (95% CI: 1.3-3.3) times higher risk of hospitalization than Hispanic children at seasonal mean NO(2) levels, but this disproportionate risk shrinks to 1.7 with exceedances of 0.02 ppm of NO(2) above the seasonal mean. Specific to finding (1) among those children without health insurance, Hispanic children have 2.1 (95% CI: 1.1-3.8) times higher risk of hospitalization than white children. Among all Hispanic children, those without health insurance have 1.9 (95% CI: 1.3-3.0) times greater risk than those with private insurance; the same finding holds for Hispanic children without insurance as compared to Hispanic children with Medicaid. Specific to finding (2), among children with private insurance, the disproportionate risk of black children as compared to Hispanic children is magnified by a factor of 1.3 (95% CI: 1.0-1.8) for exceedances of 0.02 ppm of NO(2) above the seasonal mean. CONCLUSIONS Although we cannot confirm a cause-effect relationship, this analysis suggests that increasing insurance enrollment for all children, and specifically Hispanic children, may reduce their disproportionate risk from exceedances of air pollution. There are few black children in Phoenix, so further studies are needed to investigate the increasing risk of black children with private insurance as compared to Hispanics at exceedances of NO(2).

Tapping Geography's Potential for Synergy with Creative Instructional Approaches

We define synergy, explain its importance within the context of rapidly changing academia, and provide examples of how geographic educators have used creative instructional approaches to create synergies. Both the content of geography and some of the instructional approaches used by geographic educators support the disciplines ability to deliver what we describe as ‘socially relevant pedagogy’ and generate synergies that create deep and transformative learning experiences and new knowledge. Synergistic activities need a supportive structure, but also the freedom to grow in fruitful directions. While many challenges exist, and the outcome is not guaranteed, possibilities exist to produce deep and transformative learning.

Peak Travel and the Decoupling of Vehicle Travel from the Economy: A Synthesis of the Literature

Decades of growth in overall and per capita automobile use led many to believe that driving-rate increases would occur indefinitely. In the mid-2000s, driving levels in the United States and other developed countries peaked and then began to decline. Referred to as “peak travel,” this international phenomenon is occurring in places with urban layouts, densities, and demographics that are quite different from one another and suggests a fundamental shift in travel behavior. Simultaneously, after 70 years of concurrent growth, the complex relationship between the economy (as measured by gross domestic product) and personal vehicle travel appears to be changing, and this change suggests a weakening connection between the two. This paper reviews the literature about the current understanding and potential causes of these revolutionary trend reversals. Although causes such as saturation of demand, aging, decline of young drivers, preference shifts, and time budget constraints all contribute to reduced automobile travel at one time or another, or in one place or another, none of these factors can explain why peak travel is occurring on multiple scales in a diversity of places. The authors conclude that although the existing literature explains the recent trend reversal in specific cities or partially explains the global phenomenon, the fundamental reasons for peak travel are still not understood. Further, the authors challenge fellow researchers to explain these phenomena for more accurate and efficient planning of the transportation infrastructure.

Investigation into Impact of Fluctuations in Gasoline Prices and Macroeconomic Conditions on Road Safety in Developed Countries

In most developed countries, the total number of road fatalities peaked in the 1970s. Although the data for road fatalities show a distinctive downward trend, a secondary signal that is more cyclical in nature is also evident. These cyclical variations closely track macroeconomic conditions (usually represented by the unemployment rate) and gasoline prices. While the relationship between transportation safety and unemployment and gasoline prices has been investigated, studies have looked at these variables in isolation from other important factors that affect traffic safety. Accordingly, the authors have developed a comprehensive conceptual model that considers a wide array of factors influencing traffic safety and uses this framework to inform an empirical model. For the study of variation across both time and location, a panel data model was employed, with observations for 16 industrialized countries between 1990 and 2010. In the panel model, the dependent variable was fatality per population, and gas price, unemployment, health index, mobility, and vehicle ownership were the independent variables. The results revealed a significant inverse relationship between gas prices and the road fatality rate after controlling for vehicle miles traveled. The elasticity analysis indicated that a 10% decrease in gasoline prices resulted in a 2.19% increase in road fatalities. Likewise, a 10% decrease in unemployment rate resulted in a 0.65% increase in road fatalities. Also, the results implied that the health index had the highest impact on road fatality rates. Overall, these results provide a better understanding of the underlying causes of periodic variations in road fatalities.

Effects of Parking Provision on Automobile Use in Cities: Inferring Causality

Many cities include minimum parking requirements in their zoning codes and provide ample parking for public use. However, parking is costly to provide and encourages automobile use, according to many site-specific studies. At the city scale, higher automobile use is linked to traffic congestion, environmental degradation, and negative health and safety impacts, but there is a lack of compelling, consolidated evidence that large-scale parking increases cause automobile use to rise. In this study, the Bradford Hill criteria, adopted from the field of epidemiology, were applied to determine whether increases in parking should be considered a likely cause of citywide increases in automobile use. Prior research and original data from nine U.S. cities dating to 1960 were relied on. It was found that an increase in parking provision from 0.1 to 0.5 parking space per person was associated with an increase in automobile mode share of roughly 30 percentage points. It was also demonstrated that a majority of the Bradford Hill criteria could be satisfied by using the available data; this finding offers compelling evidence that parking provision is a cause of citywide automobile use. Given the costs associated with parking and its apparent effects on automobile use, these findings warrant policies to restrict and reduce parking capacity in cities.

Progress towards zero, an international comparison: Improvements in traffic fatality from 1990 to 2010 for different age groups in the USA and 15 of its peers

INTRODUCTION In January 2015, the United States Department of Transportation (USDOT) announced that the official target of the federal government transportation safety policy was zero deaths. Having a better understanding of traffic fatality trends of various age cohorts-and to what extent the US is lagging other countries-is a crucial first step to identifying policies that may help the USDOT achieve its goal. METHOD In this paper we analyze fatality rates for different age cohorts in developed countries to better understand how road traffic fatality patterns vary across countries by age cohort. Using benchmarking analysis and comparative index analysis based on panel data modelling and data for selected years between 1990 and 2010, we compare changes in the rate of road traffic fatality over time, as well as the absolute level of road traffic fatality for six age groups in the US, with 15 other developed countries. RESULTS-CONCLUSIONS Our findings illustrate tremendous variations in road fatality rates (both in terms of the absolute values and the rates of improvement over time) among different age cohorts in all of the 16 countries. Looking specifically at the US, our analysis shows that safety improvements for Youngsters (15-17 years old) was much better than for other age groups, and closely tracked peer countries. In sharp contrast, Children (0-14 years old) and Seniors (+65 years old) in the US, fare very poorly when compared to peer countries. For example, in 2010, Children in the US were a stunning five times more likely to experience a road traffic fatality than Children in the UK. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS This startling statistic suggests an immediate need to explore further the causes and potential solutions to these disparities. This is especially important if countries, including the US, are to achieve the ambitious goals set out in Zero Vision initiatives.

Assessing the determinants of changes in traffic fatalities in developed countries

Road safety is a considerable public health concern around the world. National and local governments regularly introduce legislation or strengthen enforcement of existing laws to make roads safer. Although road fatalities in almost all developed countries have decreased over the past four decades, the rate of change has varied tremendously from country to country. The goal of this study was to provide a better understanding of the relative rate of improvement in road fatalities in different developed countries over the past four decades. Observations from 16 industrialized countries in a series of panel data models were used to create two indexes to compare how well the countries were doing with traffic fatalities at different points in time: the overall traffic fatality index, which was based on raw data but adjusted to control for structural factors that affect all countries over time, and the adjusted traffic fatality index (ATFI), which had additional controls for gasoline price, socioeconomic factors...

Parking in Urban Centers

Most U.S. cities specify minimum parking requirements in local zoning codes, even in areas served by a variety of travel options. Little work has been done to understand how aggregate parking supplies compare with requirements in urban areas or to evaluate the potential impacts of parking requirements met in such places. The research reported here tracked changes in parking supplies and the built environment in six urban business districts between 1960 and 2000. The work also summarized parking requirements in each city and compared those requirements with actual supplies. This research demonstrated that parking requirements could be met only through a combination of costly parking infrastructure and considerable commitments of land. In half of the cities studied (i.e., those with the more stringent parking requirements) off-street parking supply ratios increased by 150% to 300%; the increase required comparable amounts of land but still fell short of areawide parking requirements. Through quantification of existing parking supplies in urban areas and evaluation of the potential impacts of increases in those supplies, this work offers guidance and justification for the establishment of parking standards that conform to long-term transportation and development goals.