Urban Studies and Planning Commons^™

Why Doesn't Worcester Vote?, Molly B. Kazin

Sustainability and Social Justice

This research presents findings from a study of voter turnout and registration in Worcester, Massachusetts and takes steps to examine possible reasons why turnout has been consistently low in municipal elections. Specifically, it assesses educational attainment, income, race and ethnicity, and types and function of municipal government as reasons for the minimal turnout. Drawing on literature, case studies throughout the United States, and census and city clerk data, this paper will discuss reasons for voters’ lack of involvement, a comparison of seven municipalities throughout Massachusetts, and recommendations for creating a more civically engaged community in Worcester.

No. 04: Supermarkets, Wet Markets And Food Patronage In Nanjing, China, Zhenzhong Si, Steffanie Scott, Cameron Mccordic

Hungry Cities Partnership

Although supermarkets have become a dominant food outlet for urban residents in developed countries, studies of food purchasing in developing countries such as China report a persistence of traditional food outlets, despite a proliferation of supermarkets over the past two decades. Yet, little is known about urban residents’ use of various food sources in the Chinese context. Building on the debate over the rise of supermarkets and the persistence of traditional food outlets, this paper analyzes the landscape of competing food sources including supermarkets, wet markets, restaurants, online food markets, urban agriculture and others. Based on the HCP citywide survey …

Portland Public Schools Enrollment Forecasts, 2016-17 To 2030-31: Based On October 2015 Enrollments, Portland State University. Population Research Center, Charles Rynerson, Nicholas Chun

School District Enrollment Forecast Reports

This report presents the results of a demographic study conducted by the Portland State University Population Research Center (PRC) for Portland Public Schools (PPS). The study includes analysis of population, housing and enrollment trends affecting the District in recent years, estimates of the number of PPS students by housing type, and annual forecasts of enrollment for a 15 year horizon, from 2016‐17 to 2030‐31. Enrollment forecasts were prepared under high, medium, and low scenarios for the District. Forecasts for attendance areas by place of residence and for individual schools are consistent with the medium district‐wide forecast.

Black Gentrification Twice Removed: A Study Of Migration And Community Involvement In Washington, Dc, Janwin A. Zeegar-Holman

Capstone Collection

This paper is about Black people and community involvement against the backdrop of gentrification in Washington, DC, and possibility of Black-led neighborhood revitalization. My practicum in Southeast Washington DC compelled me to examine the ability of a Black person in Washington DC to sustain commitment to a community that they do not live in, and if Black people moving to gentrifying areas of Washington DC can help the predominantly Black non-gentrifying areas to gentrify on their own terms.

This paper focuses specifically on Black individuals who have spent time in DC and proposed ways that Black non-gentrifying communities can revitalize …

Beware Profit-Driven Lobbyists When It Comes To Housing Policy, Lorcan Sirr

Media

Lobbying involves trying to influence political decisions using various forms of advocacy that is targeted at policymakers, usually on behalf of amembers’ interest group, organisation or professional body. At its most benign, lobbying merely provides policymakers with information and legislative support; at its worst, it is selfserving and is self-promotion of often lucrative vested interests

Integrating High-Resolution Datasets To Target Mitigation Efforts For Improving Air Quality And Public Health In Urban Neighborhoods, Vivek Shandas, Jackson Voelkel, Meenakshi Rao, Linda A. George

Urban Studies and Planning Faculty Publications and Presentations

Reducing exposure to degraded air quality is essential for building healthy cities. Although air quality and population vary at fine spatial scales, current regulatory and public health frameworks assess human exposures using county- or city-scales. We build on a spatial analysis technique, dasymetric mapping, for allocating urban populations that, together with emerging fine-scale measurements of air pollution, addresses three objectives: (1) evaluate the role of spatial scale in estimating exposure; (2) identify urban communities that are disproportionately burdened by poor air quality; and (3) estimate reduction in mobile sources of pollutants due to local tree-planting efforts using nitrogen dioxide. Our …

The Ostroms' Commons Revisited, Roger A. Lohmann

Faculty & Staff Scholarship

Elinor and Vincent Ostrom spent most of their careers working in fields other than third sector studies. Even so, a significant amount of their work has implications for our field. Together they founded the Workshop on Political Theory and Policy at Indiana University and with students and colleagues built a large body of research and theory on a range of topics including self-governance, collaboration, co-production, polycentrism, federalism, and commons. The Ostroms, the Workshop and their networks of students and colleagues, also constitute an interesting example of one of their latest and most recent contributions, the knowledge commons. Their highly regarded …

Salem‐Keizer School District Population And Enrollment Forecast Update 2016‐17 To 2035‐36, Portland State University. Population Research Center, Charles Rynerson, Nicholas Chun

School District Enrollment Forecast Reports

The district‐wide and individual school forecasts have been updated to incorporate 2015‐16 enrollments by school and the latest birth and residential development data, and have been extended to include forecasts for 2025‐26 and 2035‐36. For more demographic information about the Salem‐Keizer School District (SKSD), see “Salem‐Keizer School District Population and Enrollment Forecasts, 2015‐16 to 2024‐25” prepared by Portland State University Population Research Center (PRC) in June 2015.

The Invisible People Of The Invisible Coast: The Resilience Of People Experiencing Homelessness To Disasters On The Alabama, Louisiana, And Mississippi Gulf Coasts, Nicole Elizabeth Callais

Master's Theses

While extensive research has been conducted on vulnerability and resilience with regard to hazards, very few studies have researched the resilience of homeless populations. The Gulf Coast region is densely populated and susceptible to natural and anthropogenic hazards. Climate change studies indicate that this region will experience an increase in severe and intense tropical cyclones[1], thereby increasing the risk of experiencing adverse impacts from future coastal hazards. While local government agencies in this region have policies in place to protect communities, these policies tend to exclude any action regarding the evacuation and safety of the homeless population.

In …

The Road To Gentrification

DePaul Magazine

Recent development in Logan Square have certainly bettered the general quality of life. But to others, including residents and housing market experts, such as the Geoff Smith, executive director of the Institute for Housing Studies (IHS) at DePaul, and Winifred Curran, gentrification expert and associate professor in the Department of Geography and the sustainable urban development master’s program, the influx of young, mostly white professionals is a warning sign of gentrification. It’s happening around the country—areas of disrepair are renewed and rebuilt, and people of higher socioeconomic status move in, driving up housing prices and rent rates and, perhaps unintentionally, …

Eastern Ohio Shale & Housing Dashboard - Quarters 1&2, 2016, Kathryn W. Hexter, Iryna Lendel, Charlie Post, Nick Downer, Sydney Martis

All Maxine Goodman Levin School of Urban Affairs Publications

No abstract provided.

Housing Impact Of Shale Development In Eastern Ohio, Kathryn W. Hexter, Iryna Lendel, Charlie Post, Nick Downer, Sydney Martis

All Maxine Goodman Levin School of Urban Affairs Publications

This report and the accompanying Eastern Ohio Shale and Housing Dashboard (http://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/urban_facpub/1383/) were prepared by a team of researchers from Cleveland State University’s Levin College of Urban Affairs (CSU) for the Ohio Housing Finance Agency (OHFA) to monitor the impact of the Utica shale development industry on housing affordability and availability in eight counties of eastern Ohio. The eight counties (Belmont, Carroll, Columbiana, Guernsey, Harrison, Jefferson, Monroe, and Noble) are home to the largest concentrations of shale activity in the state.

The research team developed three indicators related to shale development (well count, potential employment, and oil price) and five …

Masters Of Science In Environmental Science And Policy Portfolio, Annalise B. Kukor

Sustainability and Social Justice

Through my work as a Master’s student in Environmental Science and Policy at Clark University I have acquired a wide variety of knowledge and skills which will be showcased in this document. The breadth of courses and sub disciplines that I have taken has expanded my awareness and understanding of the current state of Environmental Science and Policy. My undergraduate degree from Clark University in Environmental Science focusing on Earth Systems Science focused primarily on comprehension of the Earth’s physical processes with applications for Global Climate Change. This master’s work has expanded upon those quantitative skills as well as deepened …

Utilizing Egocentric Video And Sensors To Conduct Naturalistic Bicycling Studies, Feng Liu, Miguel A. Figliozzi

TREC Final Reports

Existing data collection methods are mostly designed for videos captured by stationary cameras and are not designed to follow cyclists along a route or to integrate other sensor data. The goals of this research are: a) to develop a platform to collect naturalistic video bicycling data, b) to develop a methodology to integrate video data with other sensors that measure cyclists’ position and comfort levels, and c) to apply the platform and data collection methodology to a real-world route. This research effort has successfully integrated video and sensor data to describe cyclists’ comfort levels along a route. It was found …

Improving Pathways To Transit For Persons With Disabilities, Stephanie Dipetrillo, Andrea Lubin, Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris, Carla Salehian, Stephen Gibson, Kristen William, Theodore Trent Green

Mineta Transportation Institute

Persons with disabilities can achieve a greater degree of freedom when they have full access to a variety of transit modes, but this can only be achieved when the pathways to transit – the infrastructure and conditions in the built environment – allow full access to transit stops, stations, and vehicles. Since passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) in 1990, many transit agencies and governmental jurisdictions have made significant progress in this area. Policy initiatives, incremental enhancements, modifications, and other measures undertaken by transit agencies and their partners have significantly improved access to transit for persons with disabilities, …

We Must Count On Policy Change To Halt Obsolete Housing Rate, Lorcan Sirr

Media

The recent preliminary findings of this year’s census have thrown up some curious housing results. A little numbercrunching shows that we’ve not been adding as many houses each year as headline figures would suggest. Official completion numbers tell us that between 2011 and 2016, just 18,981 additional houses—or 0.94%—were added to the state’s overall housing stock, or an average of 3,796 a year. For comparison, at the 2006 census we had added 21%, and in 2011 it was 13%. We have effectively not increased our national housing stock in the past six years.

The Challenge Of Creating An Integrated Approach To Green Growth, Randall W. Eberts

Presentations

No abstract provided.

To Tackle The Housing Crisis, We Need To Talk About Ownership, Lorcan Sirr

Media

The rights and obligations that go with property ownership are important issues in any country trying to control its housing stock, resolve a housing crisis or create a functioning system. The concept of ownership is not clear cut: there is common ownership, as seen on the pampas and prairies, and in the outback; shared ownership, in India and China; temporal ownership, in medieval France and now Catalonia; and subservient ownership, where the Earth belongs only to its creator.

Periodic Atlas Of The Of The Metroscape: The Geography Of Publicly Subsidized Affordable Housing, Meg Merrick

Metroscape

Meg Merrick maps publicly subsidized affordable housing units across the region, discusses their geography, and describes their location in relation to two important amenities: schools and libraries.

Civil Society And The Governance Of Urban Food Systems In Sub-Saharan Africa, Daniel N. Warshawsky

Geography Faculty Publications

Rapid urbanization of the planet has placed pressure on humanity to build sustainable, healthy, and socially just cities. In particular, key challenges associated with food access threaten the livability of the urban environment. For this reason, research on urban food systems has increased significantly, as scholars have studied the production, distribution, acquisition, consumption, and waste of food. However, key research gaps persist, as it remains unclear how urban food systems are governed and the roles that different institutions play to ensure that cities are livable. In particular, while food civil society organizations (FCSOs) have emerged as important players in urban …