Steven P. French

The Influence of State Planning Mandates on Local Plan Quality

After abating somewhat in the early 1980s, state involvement in local planning has regained momentum. States are increasingly adopting new or strengthening existing growth management programs that mandate local governments to prepare and adopt comprehensive plans. This study examines the influence of state mandates on the content and quality of comprehensive plans from 139 local governments in five states. Three components of the plans are analyzed: fact basis, goals, and policies. This study indicates that state mandates have a clearly measurable effect in enhancing plan quality. The findings also suggest that the design of the mandate itself can be important in determining local plan quality.

Plan Quality and Mitigating Damage from Natural Disasters: A Case Study of the Northridge Earthquake with Planning Policy Considerations

Abstract Planners have long believed as an article of faith that land use planning can reduce damage from natural hazards. After evaluating the relationship between the seismic safety elements of comprehensive plans prepared in the Los Angeles region of California and damage caused by the 1994 North-ridge earthquake, we provide evidence that this faith is not misplaced. The State of California requires every local government to include a seismic safety element in its comprehensive land use plan. The 1994 Northridge earthquake provided an opportunity to evaluate the extent to which the quality of state-mandated, locally prepared seismic safety elements reduce earthquake damage. We found that fewer homes were damaged when local governments had developed high-quality factual bases, formulated goals for improving seismic safety, crafted regulatory policies to manage development in hazardous areas, and advanced policies that made the public aware of seismic risks. We conclude that including a high-quality seismic safety element in land use plans can reduce property damage associated with seismic events. Our work has broad implications for land use planning.

Coping With Floods: The Land Use Management Paradox

Abstract This paper examines the performance of land use management programs in protecting flood plains from urban encroachment and protecting future urban development from flood damage. A land use management paradox is illustrated: factors which stimulate the adoption of flood plain land use management programs also stimulate encroachment on the hazard area, which in turn limits program effectiveness. Nevertheless, it is shown that if local conditions—particularly the extent of existing flood plain development and relative availability of hazard-free sites for future growth—are considered in selecting land use management measures, effective programs can be devised. The implications of these findings for state and federal policy in flood-hazard management are also discussed.

Atlanta and the Olympics: A One-Year Retrospective

Abstract The 1996 Olympics provided a number of unique opportunities for the City of Atlanta. Although most cities will not have an opportunity to host the Olympics, the Atlanta experience can provide important lessons for any city considering similar large-scale events. Clearly, the Olympics stimulated the local economy in the years leading up to the Games; they also were quite successful in promoting tourism and attracting business to the region. The city acquired a new stadium and other sports facilities. The Games also were an incentive to make a number of improvements in urban design and infrastructure improvements. However, the redevelopment of inner city neighborhoods that had originally been anticipated was never achieved. Reliance on private funding and a fragmented organizational structure were key factors that limited Atlantas ability to use the Olympics as a vehicle for redevelopment.

Plans, Code Enforcement, and Damage Reduction: Evidence from the Northridge Earthquake

The State of California requires local governments to pay attention to seismic safety in formulating general plans for urban development and in permitting and inspecting new construction and remodeled existing structures. The Northridge earthquake provided an opportunity to determine whether these provisions, which have been mandatory for more than two decades, actually result in lower property damages. Using data on the number of structures damaged in the Northridge event, we show that, for suburban jurisdictions, damages were lower when local governments formulated broader goals for seismic safety, developed policies to make the public more aware of seismic risks, and expended more resources on enforcing the seismic provisions of building codes. Thus, seismic safety mandates on local governments can lead to lower property damages, and these benefits are enhanced when local governments expend more effort on their implementation.

Using Aerial Imagery and GIS in Automated Building Footprint Extraction and Shape Recognition for Earthquake Risk Assessment of Urban Inventories

Earthquakes cause massive loss of property and lives, and mitigating their potential effects requires accurate modeling and simulation of their impacts. Earthquake building damage modeling and risk assessment applications require accurate accounts of inventories at risk and their attributes such as structure type, usage, size, number of stories, shape, year built, value, etc. This paper describes the development of algorithms for automatically extracting and recognizing 2-D building shape information using integrated aerial imagery processing and Geographic Information Systems data. We use vector parcel geometries and their attributes to simplify the building extraction task by limiting the processing geography. Extraction is significantly improved by innovatively weighting the histograms. Extracted buildings are cleaned, simplified, and run through 2-D shape recognition routines that classify the footprint. We discuss reasons for successes and failures in both extraction and recognition.

Assessment of Energy Production Potential from Tidal Streams in the United States

Tidal stream energy is one of the alternative energy sources that are renewable and clean. With the constantly increasing effort in promoting alternative energy, tidal streams have become one of the more promising energy sources due to their continuous, predictable and spatially-concentrated characteristics. However, the present lack of a full spatial-temporal assessment of tidal currents for the U.S. coastline down to the scale of individual devices is a barrier to the comprehensive development of tidal current energy technology. This project created a national database of tidal stream energy potential, as well as a GIS tool usable by industry in order to accelerate the market for tidal energy conversion technology. Tidal currents are numerically modeled with the Regional Ocean Modeling System and calibrated with the available measurements of tidal current speed and water level surface. The performance of the model in predicting the tidal currents and water levels is assessed with an independent validation. The geodatabase is published at a public domain via a spatial database engine and interactive tools to select, query and download the data are provided. Regions with the maximum of the average kinetic power density larger than 500 W/m2 (corresponding to a current speed of ~1 m/s), surface area larger than 0.5 km2 and depth larger than 5 m are defined as hotspots and list of hotspots along the USA coast is documented. The results of the regional assessment show that the state of Alaska (AK) contains the largest number of locations with considerably high kinetic power density, and is followed by, Maine (ME), Washington (WA), Oregon (OR), California (CA), New Hampshire (NH), Massachusetts (MA), New York (NY), New Jersey (NJ), North and South Carolina (NC, SC), Georgia (GA), and Florida (FL). The average tidal stream power density at some of these locations can be larger than 8 kW/m2 with surface areas on the order of few hundred kilometers squared, and depths larger than 100 meters. The Cook Inlet in AK is found to have a substantially large tidal stream power density sustained over a very large area.

Neighborhood commuting environment and obesity in the United States: an urban-rural stratified multilevel analysis.

OBJECTIVE Automobile dependency and longer commuting are associated with current obesity epidemic. We aimed to examine the urban-rural differential effects of neighborhood commuting environment on obesity in the US METHODS: The 1997-2005 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) were linked to 2000 US Census data to assess the effects of neighborhood commuting environment: census tract-level automobile dependency and commuting time, on individual obesity status. RESULTS Higher neighborhood automobile dependency was associated with increased obesity risk in urbanized areas (large central metro (OR 1.11[1.09, 1.12]), large fringe metro (OR 1.17[1.13, 1.22]), medium metro (OR 1.22[1.16, 1.29]), small metro (OR 1.11[1.04, 1.19]), and micropolitan (OR 1.09[1.00, 1.19])), but not in non-core rural areas (OR 1.00[0.92, 1.08]). Longer neighborhood commuting time was associated with increased obesity risk in large central metro (OR 1.09[1.04, 1.13]), and less urbanized areas (small metro (OR 1.08[1.01, 1.16]), micropolitan (OR 1.06[1.01, 1.12]), and non-core rural areas (OR 1.08[1.01, 1.17])), but not in (large fringe metro (OR 1.05[1.00, 1.11]), and medium metro (OR 1.04[0.98, 1.10])). CONCLUSION The link between commuting environment and obesity differed across the regional urbanization levels. Urban and regional planning policies may improve current commuting environment and better support healthy behaviors and healthy community development.

Measuring the Structure of U.S. Metropolitan Areas, 1970–2000: Spatial Statistical Metrics and an Application to Commuting Behavior

Problem, research strategy, and findings: Metropolitan planning organizations attempt to shape urban form at the regional and metropolitan scale, including the pattern of suburban centers. How do these efforts change behavior? Our study informs that question by way of a new family of urban form metrics summarizing the polycentric structure of U.S. metropolitan areas. Using a spatial statistical approach, these measures are sensitive to the size, amount, and location of suburban centers. The article then tests the influence of these structures on commute times nationally from 1970 to 2000. Takeaway for practice: The influence of development densities on travel in sprawling regions is more complicated than previously understood or measured. While the level of both neighborhood density and regional density explain average commuting times, density also works relatively. The spatial variation of density, the density of suburban centers relative to the region, and the spatial distribution of high-density nodes each appear to play distinct roles in influencing travel. Research support: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and Institute for Bioscience and Biomedical Engineering.

Risk Assessment, Modeling and Decision Support

Risk assessment, modeling and decision suppor , Risk assessment, modeling and decision suppor , کتابخانه دیجیتال جندی شاپور اهواز