Urban Studies and Planning Commons^™

East Portland Resilient Island Vision Plan, Blair Vallie, Mary Chase, Mirna Ali, Journie Gering, Rica Perez, Allan Wilson

Master of Urban and Regional Planning Workshop Projects

To execute the East Portland Resilient Island Project, RIP City Planning has partnered with Portland’s Disaster Resilience and Recovery Action Group (DRRAG), an organization composed of representatives from Portland Bureaus of Development Services, Emergency Management, Environmental Services, Water, Planning and Sustainability, Transportation, and Parks & Recreation, as well as Portland State University’s Institute for Sustainable Solutions. DRRAG and RIP City Planning see this project as a prime opportunity to better understand and enhance the East Portland Community Center's role in fostering social connectivity and community-level disaster planning. Through abundant engagement efforts with local community groups and EPCC patrons, we aim …

Newberg Car Camping Initiative, Katie Carroll, Ryan Haight, Mary Hendricks, Scott Sharba, Anthony Tortorici, Paul Vickers

Master of Urban and Regional Planning Workshop Projects

The Newberg housing market is experiencing the effects of a rapidly growing population on a relatively static housing stock. As competition for a limited supply of housing increases, low- and moderate-income households face the choice of absorbing rising housing costs or being priced out of their homes. This pressure has shown to result in increased rates of housing instability and houselessness in comparable communities across the state. Concerns around housing affordability prompted the Newberg City Council to adopt a 5-Year Housing Work Program in 2020. The 5-Year Housing Work Program consists of 49 housing-related directives intended to address a variety …

Legalizing Mobile Dwellings : A Guide For Expanding A Unique Affordable Housing Option In Your City, Grace Coffey, Scott Goodman, Matthew Hall, Sam Huck, Andrew Oliver

Master of Urban and Regional Planning Workshop Projects

In much of the United States, housing options are limited while costs rise. The purpose of this report is to analyze the utility and functionality of mobile dwellings as an interim housing option to provide shelter and basic living needs on private residential lots. The policy context presented below for permitting mobile dwellings as part of the solution for growing issues of housing affordability focuses on Oregon and the Portland Metro region, but could be applicable in a variety of urban contexts.

While missing middle housing and ADUs have received much attention in recent years as a solution for addressing …

Envisioning An Equitable Central City, Tanja Olson, Caroline Crisp, Heidi Hinshaw, Sarah Pearlman, Laurel Priest, Jacob Storm

Master of Urban and Regional Planning Workshop Projects

This Master of Urban and Regional Planning (MURP) Workshop project working with our clients, City of Portland’s Bureau of Transportation and Bureau of Planning and Sustainability, advances the pursuit of equity within Portland’s Central City. Six MURP students acted as the consultant, under the name VF Planning, and with the guidance of Portland State University professors.

Portland’s Central City (CC) stretches from the West Hills to SE 12th Avenue and includes ten subdistricts: Lower Albina, Lloyd, and Central Eastside to the east and Pearl, Old Town/Chinatown, Goose Hollow, West End, Downtown, South Downtown/University, and South Waterfront to the west of …

Safety Interventions For Houseless Pedestrians, Peter Domine, Sean Doyle, Asif Haque, Angie Martínez Sulvarán, Nick Meusch, Meisha Whyte

Master of Urban and Regional Planning Workshop Projects

In 2016, the City of Portland adopted the Vision Zero Action Plan with the goal of eliminating traffic deaths and serious injuries on Portland’s streets. The Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT) also makes a commitment in all of its plans to create a more equitable transportation system by prioritizing areas of the city with a disproportionate number of BIPOC community members and people with lower incomes, all of whom face a greater risk from traffic violence. To achieve its Vision Zero goals, the City and PBOT have undertaken a number of actions, including redesigning streets through traffic calming and traffic …

Federal Assistance To Youngstown: Evidence From The Paycheck Protection Program, Iryna Demko, Georgina Guadalupe Figueroa,

All Maxine Goodman Levin School of Urban Affairs Publications

This presentation examines trends in federal assistance to Youngstown businesses through the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) in 2020 and 2021. During this time, the Youngstown region received 13,061 PPP loans totaling $1 billion, reaching at least one small business in every Youngstown’s zip code. Most approved loans covered employees’ wages, helping to keep 130,170 workers on payroll during the Covid-19 pandemic. In 2021, PPP loans reached smaller businesses, with an average of 5 employees per business, compared to 17 employees in 2020.

From City State To Medina: The Timeless Wisdom Of Aristotle’S Polis, Spencer Koehl

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Many philosophers and thinkers have considered the idea of community and what makes it strong, beneficial, and enduring. The Ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle is no exception. Aristotle wrote thoroughly on the nature of the ideal community, which he observed in Greek city-states. Called a “polis”, this ideal community, according to Aristotle, is one that provides for its residents to live a good life above all else. In doing so, it usually is small enough that all its residents share a similar lived experience while being big enough to be self-sufficient. While Aristotle wrote on this subject over 2000 years ago, …

Millonarios Y Bosteros: La Rivalidad Entre River Y Boca Desde Una Perspectiva De Desigualdad Social En La Ciudad De Buenos Aires Contemporánea, Noah Siderhurst

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Las identidades del Club Atlético Boca Juniors y del Club Atlético River Plate están fuertemente vinculadas con la desigualdad urbana y social de la ciudad de Buenos Aires. A lo largo de dos siglos, los procesos urbanos y sociales se han entrelazado, generando identidades distintas en términos de clase socioeconómica. La conexión entre territorio e identidad es clave para entender cómo los clubes se fueron forjando identidades diferentes. En la actualidad, se observa la oposición entre un norte rico y un sur pobre en Buenos Aires, la cual tiene efectos en el imaginario simbólico de cada club.

Restoring Dignity In The Gardens Of Ekhenana, Jordan Buser

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

This case study investigates the lived experiences of eKhenana, a shack settlement under the leadership of Abahlali baseMjondolo, as they attempt to navigate the increasingly unequal urban landscape. The research presented is focused on theories of urban marginality, food sovereignty, and dignity. I advocate that, in the margins, dignity can be restored through the implementation of a communal garden. Presented as a case study, this research centers the voices and experiences of the commune. The paper first depicts a brief timeline of eKhenana, and explains how they have created not just a place to live, but a community and a …

Designing Control Strategies For Connected And Automated Vehicles (Cavs) At Transportation Conflict Areas, Saeid Soleimaniamiri

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Scheduling vehicles to pass a general conflict area is a common problem in traffic operations at various facilities, such as intersections, work-zones, and merging ramps. The advent of connected automated vehicle (CAV) technology provides unique opportunities for improving the traffic system performance and riding comfort at conflict areas. With the opportunities introduced by the emerging CAV technologies, this dissertation envisions building computationally efficient and applicable CAV-based control frameworks that can optimally serve traffic streams from different approaches while simultaneously or sequentially optimize CAV trajectories at conflict areas.

In our first study, we focus on a joint vehicle trajectories and signal …

Top Boomtowns In The Mountain West, Ally M. Beckwith, Caitlin J. Saladino, William E. Brown Jr.

Cities & Metros

This fact sheet highlights data on the top boomtowns in the Mountain West region in 2019 and 2021. The original SmartAsset report includes data on the rapid economic growth and prosperity in boomtown cities through new employment opportunities and residents.

An Empirical Review Of The Paycheck Protection Program - Congressional Testimony, Iryna Demko

All Maxine Goodman Levin School of Urban Affairs Publications

Dr. Iryna Demko, Research Associate at the Center for Economic Development, testified at the hearing of the U.S. House Committee on Small Business on the Paycheck Protection Program. The Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) has been one of the largest economic stimulus programs in U.S. history. In 2020 and 2021, the SBA disbursed over $800 billion in Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans to help small businesses keep their employees on payroll during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Addressing Gendered Harassment And Women's Travel Needs, Madeline Brozen

PSU Transportation Seminars

This presentation will cover experiences, disparities, and solutions to gendered travel differences. Madeline will discuss research from a worldwide survey of harassment on public transit with specific insights from Los Angeles and research from two agency-led studies in Los Angeles. The talk will cover the large issues that make women's travel needs distinct from their male counter-parts - safety and complex travel patterns and some promising solutions for addressing these disparities.

The Role Of Spatial Configuration In Enhancing The Environmental Ambiance For Devotional Ecstasy At Temple Towns Of Braj Mandal, Sunanda Kapoor, Vandana Sehgal, Mayank Mathur

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Religious sites in Braj Mandal, India are visited by millions of pilgrims throughout the year. To meet the growing needs of pilgrims, rapid urbanisation is taking place with the result that there is change in the ancient spatial configuration. This research aims to explore the desired environmental ambiance for enhancing devotional ecstasy. The spatial configuration has been documented through physical mapping and visual preferences have been identified via a pilgrim opinion survey. Conclusions have been drawn regarding the identification of parameters of spatial configuration that enhance the environmental ambience for devotional ecstasy.

The Future Of Transportation Funding, Steve E. Morello

Purdue Road School

Among the many collaterals impacts of vehicle electrification is a reduction in funding for government agencies who rely heavily on fuel taxation—over 75B annually—for transportation needs. States and the federal government are actively exploring user-based funding alternatives to pay for the next generation of roads that will be used by the next generation of vehicles.

The Rise Of Southern Nevada As A Cluster For Metropolitan Transit Technology Innovations, Arthur C. Nelson

Policy Briefs and Reports

Southern Nevada is emerging as the nation’s leader in private sector-driven innovations in transportation technologies. From the humble beginnings of a monorail system serving a portion of major hotel and gaming venues along the Las Vegas Strip, now supplemented by an array of people movers, Southern Nevada continues to attract transit innovations in tunneling, Hyperloop, and driverless vehicle delivery technologies. The region may soon anchor a high-speed rail system connecting Southern Nevada to Los Angeles. The purpose of this briefing paper is to frame the nature of this emerging transportation cluster and the opportunities this creates for Southern Nevada to …

“Fast Policy” And “Rule By Aesthetics”: A Preliminary Study Of Water Street Tampa –The “Worlding” Of An Aspiring “Icon Project”, Nousheen Rahman

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In the age of “global urbanism” (Sheppard et al 2015; Chen and Kanna 2013), we are witnessing a markedly increased preference for mega-gentrification policies and projects by public officials seeking to revitalize deindustrialized and abandoned landscapes within their cities. The goal of this study is to describe how neoliberal public and private actors and institutions in the City of Tampa, specifically along the newly minted “Water Street” near the old Channel District of downtown, have adopted the discourses and practices of “fast policy” (Peck and Theodore 2015), “rule by aesthetics” (Ghertner 2010) and “worlding” (Ong and Roy 2011). To that …

Exploring Data Fusion Techniques To Estimate Network-Wide Bicycle Volumes, Sirisha Kothuri, Joseph Broach, Nathan Mcneil, Kate Hyun, Stephen Mattingly, Md. Mintu Miah, Krista Nordback, Frank Proulx

TREC Final Reports

This research developed a method for evaluating and integrating emerging sources (Strava, StreetLight, and Bikeshare) of bicycle activity data with conventional demand data (permanent counts, short-duration counts) using traditional (Poisson) and advanced machine learning techniques. First, a literature review was conducted, along with cataloging and evaluating available third-party data sources and existing applications. Next, six sites (Boulder, Charlotte, Dallas, Portland, Bend, and Eugene) that represented a variety of contexts (urban, suburban) and geographical diversity were selected. Of these, Boulder, Charlotte and Dallas constituted the basic sites, where one year of data (i.e., 2019) was used for modeling. Portland, Bend, and …

Developing A Hydrogen Economy In Ohio: Challenges And Opportunities, Mark Henning, Andrew R. Thomas, Peter Psarras, Michael Triozzi

All Maxine Goodman Levin School of Urban Affairs Publications

Ohio is positioned to be a leader in the developing hydrogen economy in the coming years. Ohio is already a national leader in industrial and transportation hydrogen markets, and power generation markets for hydrogen are developing. Ohio projects to need between 2-3 million metric tons of hydrogen per year by 2050. To meet this demand, low cost natural gas from nearby Appalachian shale fields will likely be the principal source of hydrogen generation for the next 30 years. This would be true even if Ohio were to repurpose half of its carbon-free power generation to making hydrogen -- which it …

Congestion Costs And Scheduling Preferences Of Car Commuters In California: Estimates Using Big Data, Jinwon Kim, Jucheol Moon

Mineta Transportation Institute

On average, California car commuters waste 4–5 minutes per morning commute due to congestion. Multiplied across all California car commuters, those few minutes entail a yearly total of approximately 2.3 billion hours of time wasted, costing 6 billion dollars. The objective of this study is to quantify congestion costs and determine how commuters adapt to the level of congestion they face (i.e., commuters’ scheduling utility functions). To that end, this research developed a model of trip scheduling under congestion to construct California commuters’ travel-time profiles, i.e., the menu of travel times that each individual would likely face according to alternate …