Urban Studies Commons^™

Katrina And The Philanthropic Landscape In New Orleans, Ludovico Feoli

New England Journal of Public Policy

This article explores the impact of Hurricane Katrina on the philanthropic landscape in New Orleans, drawing on the perspective of participants in the field—staff and board members of community, local, and national foundations and key nonprofits—who were surveyed or interviewed for this purpose. It does not offer a definitive statement about the disaster as it pertains to philanthropy; nor does it consider the crucial leadership role of the many individuals involved in the recovery process, even though that role often intercepted with the philanthropic sector. Instead, it seeks to identify general trends that emerge from a qualitative assessment of the …

The New New Orleans, Gregory Rusovich

New England Journal of Public Policy

The Business Council of New Orleans and the River Region was formed in 1985 by the iconic chairman and CEO of Freeport McMoRan, Jim Bob Moffett. The core mission of the Business Council during its thirty-four years has been to improve the region’s business climate, enhancing the quality of life for the community, working to effect principled reform, and simply striving to make New Orleans a safer and better place to live, work, and raise a family. It consists of CEOs and owners of primarily the largest businesses and employers in the city and has ranged in total membership from …

Editor’S Note, Padraig O’Malley

New England Journal of Public Policy

The lessons of Katrina are the subject of this special issue. The eighteen articles were assembled and overseen by Michael Cowan, the guest editor. Michael founded Common Good, a civil society action network, after Hurricane Katrina. He is Senior Fellow in the Centre for the Resolution of Intractable Conflict and Research Affiliate in the Centre for the Study of Social Cohesion, both in the University of Oxford. He is also a Visiting Research Associate in the Irish School of Ecumenics in Trinity College Dublin.

Reconnecting The Broken Post-Katrina New Orleans Criminal Justice System, Graymond Martin

New England Journal of Public Policy

When Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans and the levees protecting the city gave way in August 2005, an already struggling and weakened criminal justice system collapsed in spectacular fashion.

Damage within New Orleans extended far beyond the loss of physical infrastructure. The city’s population was depleted by more than half. For those who remained or returned within the first year, spirits were crushed, uncertainty abounded, and the hard work of restoration was riddled by anxiety, conflict, opportunism, and battles for precious resources.

Longtime judge Leon Cannizzaro Jr., appalled at the near-complete dysfunction of the local criminal justice system, entered and …

Slaying Two Sacred Cows: One Group’S Part In Helping New Orleans Reform, Rebuild, And Renew, Ruthie Frierson

New England Journal of Public Policy

Citizens for One Greater New Orleans was a volunteer group of women that exemplified the surge of citizen activism that flourished in New Orleans after Katrina. Alarmed by their realization that local government was too dysfunctional to direct a successful comeback, citizens mobilized and charged at two seemingly untouchable local institutions they deemed ripe for reform, the ineffectual levee board and the notoriously biased board of tax assessors. Using skills honed through years of volunteer work, they mobilized public opinion, lobbied reluctant state lawmakers, and finally achieved success through the passage of constitutional amendments in two separate statewide referendum elections. …

The Impacts Of The Bicycle Network On Bicycling Activity: A Longitudinal Multi-City Approach, Wei Shi

Dissertations and Theses

Bicycling is a promising approach to improve health, environment, and economic development of urban places. Theoretically, a bicycle network's component goes beyond lanes and paths, and would generate greater impacts than the sum of its parts. However, most previous research focused on how individual types of bicycle-related infrastructure could promote bicycling. Few empirical studies investigated how bicycle networks impact bicycling activity. This project attempts to address this question. Specifically, how to properly measure bicycle networks, and what impacts bicycle networks have on bicycling activity, e.g. bike ridership and bike mode choice, across different cities and longitudinally.

To address the first …

Webinar: When Growth Outpaces Infrastructure: A Community-Engaged Assessment Of Transportation Gaps, Jandel Crutchfield, Kate Hyun

TREC Webinar Series

This study used a community-engaged interdisciplinary approach to assess the gaps between economic growth and transportation infrastructure development, and the impact of potential gaps on access to opportunities for environmental justice populations within North Central Texas, where population growth has increased over 100% since 2000.

The interdisciplinary team, comprised of social work and civil engineering researchers, in partnership with the regional homeless coalition, measured residents’ perspectives of:

• the economic growth in the area over the past decade,
• the extent to which transportation infrastructure has matched the economic growth, and
• the implications for access to affordable quality housing, employment, quality public …

Visualizing Statewide Trips: Tools To Leverage Gps Data In Transportation Planning, Nikola Markovic

TREC Project Briefs

The University of Utah has a new data visualization service to offer to state DOTs and other agencies. Using Small Starts funding from the National Institute for Transportation and Communities (NITC), researcher Nikola Markovic and his team have developed a suite of visual analysis tools to demonstrate how GPS trajectory data can help accurately model and analyze mobility trends. These data are typically purchased from vendors, which means that transportation agencies must first understand the benefits before they decide to invest in data acquisition.

Visual Exploration Of Utah Trajectory Data And Their Applications In Transportation, Seth Miller, Zachary Vander Laan, Yinhu Wang, Nikola Markovic

TREC Final Reports

Transportation agencies have an opportunity to leverage massive GPS trajectory data to support their analyses and enhance their decision making. However, these data are typically purchased from vendors, which means that transportation agencies must understand their benefits before they decide to invest in data acquisition. To help transportation agencies better understand the tremendous value of trajectory data, the PI of the project acquired Utah GPS trajectory data from one of the leading GPS data providers and conducted visual analyses demonstrating applications of trajectory data in various areas of transportation. The analyses focused on (a) evaluating the data itself by exploring …

The Southwest Corridor Light Rail Project, Fiona Cundy, Patrick Sweeney

PSU Transportation Seminars

The Southwest Corridor Light Rail Project is an expansion of the MAX light rail system into Southwest Portland, Tigard and Tualatin. Not only will the project add 11 miles of light rail track and 13 stations to the system, it also includes new bicycle facilities, sidewalks, safer crossings, improvements to local bus service, and significant upgrades to stormwater treatment infrastructure. As a cooperative effort between regional partners, the project is seen as a catalyst to help realize broader shared goals of fostering equitable communities, ensuring healthy environments, and providing robust mobility options for all modes. Currently in the planning and …

Foot Traffic & Walkable Urbanism, Ember Smith, Mary Blankenship, Caitlin Saladino, William E. Brown

Transportation & Infrastructure

This fact sheet highlights the performance and expansion of WalkUPs (regionally significant, walkable areas) with a focus on Denver, Los Angeles, Orlando, Phoenix, and Las Vegas as detailed in Foot Traffic Ahead: Ranking Walkable Urbanism in America’s Largest Metros, a report by George Washington University.

Job Density In The Mountain West, Ember Smith, Caitlin Saladino, William E. Brown

Economic Development & Workforce

This Fact Sheet highlights the job density patterns in large metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) in the Mountain West states (Nevada, Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, and Colorado) using the findings of Where Jobs are Concentrating and Why it Matters to Cities and Regions, a report by Chad Shearer, Jennifer S. Vey, and Joanne Kim of the Brookings Institution.

The Help-Yourself City: Legitimacy And Inequality In Diy Urbanism, Gordon Douglas

University Scholar Series

When local governments neglect public services or community priorities, how do concerned citizens respond? In The Help-Yourself City: Legitimacy and Inequality in DIY Urbanism, Dr. Douglas looks closely at people who take urban planning into their own hands with homemade signs and benches, guerrilla bike lanes, and more. He explores the frustration, creativity, and technical expertise behind these interventions, but also the position of privilege from which they often come. Presenting a needed analysis of this growing trend from vacant lots to city planning offices, The Help-Yourself City tells a street-level story of people’s relationships to their urban surroundings …

Opioids In The Las Vegas Metro, Elia Del Carmen Solano-Patricio, Caitlin Saladino, William E. Brown

Health

In 2014, Nevada was one of 7 states selected to participate in a national policy coalition to reduce prescription drug abuse. As a result, the Nevada Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) and the Southern Nevada Health District (SNHD) created a data dashboard to track opioid prescriptions and opioid-involved overdose incidents. This Fact Sheet synthesizes state-level data from the Nevada Opioid Overdose Surveillance Dashboard and focuses on the Las Vegas Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA). The data track opioid prescription rates as they correlate to opioid-involved overdose deaths, emergency room visits, and hospitalizations.

E-Grocery Home Delivery And The Freight & Travel Demands Of Multifamily Dwellings, Katherine Keeling, Gabby Abou-Zeid

PSU Transportation Seminars

Double Feature: E-Grocery Home Delivery and the Freight & Travel Demands of Multifamily Dwellings

E-Grocery Home Delivery Impacts on Food Access and Equity

The adoption of e-grocery home delivery (HD) has the potential to change social norms of acquiring household foods and necessities. In light of recent interest in food deserts, a case study of Portland, OR reviews the new elements of inclusion, exclusion, and value created by the service of four major e-grocery businesses: Shipt, Instacart, Walmart, and Amazon Prime Now. These e-grocers are reviewed in terms of service areas, pricing, and inventory choice, as these are key factors …

Opioids In Nevada, Peter Grema, Caitlin Saladino, William E. Brown

Health

This Fact Sheet presents data from the Washington Post’s Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) database on opioid shipments in the United States and provides information pertaining to Nevada and each of its 17 regions (16 counties and one independent city). This Fact Sheet compares the Washington Post’s opioid shipment data with opioid prescription rates relative to Nevada’s population in 2010.

Webinar: New Travel Demand Modeling For Our Evolving Mobility Landscape, Reid Ewing, Sadegh Sabouri

TREC Webinar Series

Conventional four-step travel demand models are used by nearly all metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs), state departments of transportation, and local planning agencies, as the basis for long-range transportation planning in the United States. A flaw of the four-step model is its relative insensitivity to the so-called D variables. The D variables are characteristics of the built environment that are known to affect travel behavior. The Ds are development density, land use diversity, street network design, destination accessibility, and distance to transit. In this seminar, we will explain how we developed a vehicle ownership model (car shedding model), an intrazonal travel …

Community Resilience To Climate Change: Theory, Research And Practice, Dana E. Hellman, Vivek Shandas

PDXOpen: Open Educational Resources

This reader is an Open Educational Resource, meant to accompany a graduate or higher-level undergraduate university course in climate change resilience, adaptation, and/or planning. While the material is geared toward students in urban and regional planning, it may also be of interest to students of urban studies, public health, geography, political science, sociology, risk management, and others.

Each section of this volume includes (1) an introductory summary, (2) a reading list with full text articles, (3) student exercises meant to enhance understanding and facilitate in-class discussion, and (4) additional discussion prompts or activities for instructors to use in class. The …

The Role Of Building Characteristics, Demographics, And Urban Heat Islands In Shaping Residential Energy Use, Chrissi Argyro Antonopoulos, Alec Trusty, Vivek Shandas

Urban Studies and Planning Faculty Publications and Presentations

As global temperatures continue to rise, questions about infrastructure capacity to keep up with energy demand are increasingly germane. Energy demand is mediated by several structural and environmental conditions, though we have a limited understanding about the role of differences in local ambient temperatures as a predictor for energy demand. This study assesses the effects of residential building structure, socio-demographics, and ambient temperature conditions of a neighborhood to overall energy expenditures of a household. Using annual utility billing and demographic data, existing tax-lot records, and an unusually high-resolution description of ambient temperatures, we ask two research questions: (1) What role …

Promoting Environmental Justice Populations’ Access To Opportunities With Suburban Boomtowns: An Interdisciplinary Mixed-Methods Approach To Addressing Infrastructure Needs, Jandel Crutchfield, Courtney Cronley, Kate Hyun, Erin Findley, Mehrdad Arabi

TREC Final Reports

This study used a community-engaged interdisciplinary approach to assess the gaps between economic growth and transportation infrastructure development, and the impact of potential gaps on access to opportunities for environmental justice populations within North Central Texas, where population growth has increased over 100% since 2000. The interdisciplinary team, comprised of social work and civil engineering researchers, in partnership with the regional homeless coalition, measured residents’ perspectives of the economic growth in the area over the past decade, the extent to which transportation infrastructure has matched the economic growth, and the implications for access to affordable quality housing, employment, quality public …