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Building Planner Commitment: Are California’S Sb 375 And Oregon’S Sb 1059 Models For Climate-Change Mitigation?, Keith Bartholomew, David Proffitt
Building Planner Commitment: Are California’S Sb 375 And Oregon’S Sb 1059 Models For Climate-Change Mitigation?, Keith Bartholomew, David Proffitt
TREC Final Reports
California’s Sustainable Communities and Climate Protection Act (SB 375) and the Oregon Sustainable Transportation Initiative (SB 1059) have made them the first states in the nation to try and reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions using the transportation-planning process. Evaluating how these pioneering laws have changed local planning processes – as well as plans themselves – in each state provides insight into the laws’ effectiveness at changing development patterns in a way that reduces GHG emissions, without waiting decades to see the effects in the built environment. Both states’ laws require metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs) and the municipalities that comprise them …
Using The Planning Process To Mitigate Climate Change, Keith Bartholomew
Using The Planning Process To Mitigate Climate Change, Keith Bartholomew
TREC Project Briefs
This research evaluates how Oregon’s SB 1059 and California’s SB 375 have integrated climate change mitigation strategies into local planning processes, and seeks to understand how transportation planning can help slow climate change.
Does Compact Development Increase Or Reduce Congestion?, Reid Ewing
Does Compact Development Increase Or Reduce Congestion?, Reid Ewing
TREC Project Briefs
The net effects of sprawl or compact development on area-wide traffic congestion have been a subject of debate among transportation researchers.
This project aims to settle the debate using:
- Congestion data from the Texas Transportation Institute’s Urban Mobility Scorecard database;
- Compactness/sprawl metrics developed at the University of Utah.
Compact development may help at the margin, but the greatest reduction in congestion appears to be achieved through expansion of surface streets and higher highway user fees.
Does Compact Development Increase Or Reduce Traffic Congestion?, Reid Ewing, Guang Tian, Torrey Lyons
Does Compact Development Increase Or Reduce Traffic Congestion?, Reid Ewing, Guang Tian, Torrey Lyons
TREC Final Reports
From years of research, we know that compact development that is dense, diverse, well-designed, etc. produces fewer vehicle miles traveled (VMT) than sprawling development. But compact development also concentrates origins and destinations. No one has yet determined, using credible urban form metrics and credible congestion data, the net effect of these countervailing forces on area-wide congestion. Using compactness/sprawl metrics developed for the National Institutes of Health, and congestion data from the Texas Transportation Institute’s (TTI’s) Urban Mobility Scorecard Annual Report database, this study seeks to determine which opposing point of view of sprawl and congestion is correct. It does so …
Webinar: Developing Practical Dynamic Evaluation Methods For Transportation Structures, Charles Riley
Webinar: Developing Practical Dynamic Evaluation Methods For Transportation Structures, Charles Riley
TREC Webinar Series
Deteriorating transportation infrastructure is constantly in the news. Government agencies at all levels are pursuing methods to monitor structural health, so that they can prioritize repairs. In Oregon, the Cascadia Subduction Zone megathrust earthquake looms as a significant natural hazard for which our transportation network is ill-prepared. The Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT) estimates that it will take around $2.6 billion over seven years to repair or replace many of the existing bridges in the state’s network to maintain lifeline routes after a Cascadia event. Funding for the scenarios envisioned by ODOT is not forthcoming, and the project …
Dynamic Evaluation Of Transportation Structures With Ipod-Based Data Acquisition, Charles Riley
Dynamic Evaluation Of Transportation Structures With Ipod-Based Data Acquisition, Charles Riley
TREC Final Reports
This grant supported coursework and laboratory development and expanded research capacity, promoting (a) innovative learning activities that expose students to cutting-edge methods of bridge structural health and behavior monitoring and (b) research by our growing group of graduate students using developing technologies (specifically, shake tables and iPods with on-board accelerometers). As transportation infrastructure reaches and exceeds its design life, engineering efforts are turning to evaluation, rehabilitation and repair. Accurately assessing structures to determine their future performance and remaining life is becoming a primary job function for many civil engineers.
As part of this project, graduate students worked with the PI …
Assessing State Efforts To Integrate Transportation, Land Use And Climate, Rebecca Lewis, Robert Zako
Assessing State Efforts To Integrate Transportation, Land Use And Climate, Rebecca Lewis, Robert Zako
TREC Final Reports
Climate change is increasingly recognized as a threat to life on earth. “Continued emission of greenhouse gases will cause further warming and long-lasting changes in all components of the climate system, increasing the likelihood of severe, pervasive and irreversible impacts for people and ecosystems. Limiting climate change would require substantial and sustained reductions in greenhouse gas emissions” (International Panel on Climate Change, 2014, 8).
The transportation sector accounts for almost one-third of all greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) in the United States. Reducing GHG from transportation rests on the “three-legged stool” of improving vehicle efficiency, reducing the carbon content of fuels …
State Efforts To Fight Climate Change, Rebecca Lewis, Robert Zako
State Efforts To Fight Climate Change, Rebecca Lewis, Robert Zako
TREC Project Briefs
NITC Project Brief: A research project examines efforts in four states to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions caused by the transportation sector.