Social Transportation Analytic Toolbox (STAT) for Transit Networks

Webinar: Social Transportation Analytic Toolbox (STAT) for Transit Networks

 

PRESENTATION ARCHIVE

Miss the webinar or want a look back?

OVERVIEW

This webinar will present an open-source socio-transportation analytic toolbox (STAT) for public transit system planning. This webinar will consist of a demonstration of the STAT toolbox, for the primary purpose of getting feedback from transit agencies on the tool's usefulness. We are especially interested in hearing about any improvements that would aid transit agencies in implementing it.

The STAT toolbox was created in an effort to integrate social media and general transit feed specification (GTFS) data for transit agencies, to aid in evaluating and enhancing the performance of public transit systems. The toolbox enables the integration, analysis, and visualization of two major new open transportation data sources—social media and GTFS data—to support transit decision making. In this webinar, we will introduce how we...

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A bus stop with a shelter, bench, and sidewalk showing people boarding the bus

Webinar: Bus Stops: Access and Equity

 

PRESENTATION ARCHIVE

OVERVIEW

Improving bus stops by providing shelters, seating, signage, and sidewalks is relatively inexpensive and popular among riders and local officials. Making such improvements, however, is not often a priority for U.S. transit providers because of competing demands for capital funds and a perception that amenities are not tied to measurable increases in system effectiveness or efficiency. This webinar focuses on the role that bus stops play as the point of first contact between transit agencies and their potential riders, and how the quality of that contact can influence both ridership and accessibility for riders with mobility-related disabilities. The webinar will use results from recent research sponsored by NITC and the Utah Department of Transportation looking at possible impacts that bus stop improvements made by the Utah Transit Authority (UTA) have had on stop-level ridership and demand for Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) paratransit services. The results demonstrate how investments in bus stop facilities are not...

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Webinar: Is Accessibility Planning Feasible in U.S. Shrinking Cities?

For fifteen years, scholars have claimed that accessibility-based transportation planning is at the brink of becoming a new paradigm. In contrast with traditional mobility-based planning methods, which focus on the cost of transportation per mile, accessibility-based planning methods place more importance on people's ability to reach various destinations and their access to transit systems. Its use may trail behind traditional planning methods nationally, due to vague definitions, momentum of traditional performance measures, and other factors. However, this webinar argues that accessibility-based planning is demonstrably necessary in shrinking cities across the U.S., and especially among minority populations in those cities.

As shrinking cities’ need for accessibility-based planning is distinct, the challenges to accomplishing it are also distinct and rather severe. Again, this is especially true when planning for minority populations, for whom there is often a level of mistrust in the policy process itself which must be overcome. After presenting evidence of both the especial need for and the challenges inherent in accessibility-based planning in shrinking cities (and especially among minority populations), this presentation proposes potential strategies for implementation and for applying this method in those scenarios in which it is most needed.

...

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Image: Salt Lake City overview on a sunny day. Text reads: Transportation Benefits of Polycentric Urban Form, Jan 19, 2021.

Webinar: Transportation Benefits of Polycentric Urban Form

 

PRESENTATION ARCHIVE

OVERVIEW

A “polycentric” region consists of a network of compact developments connected with each other through high-quality transportation options. Rather than continuing the expanse of low-density development radiating from an urban core, investments can be concentrated on central nodes and transit connections. This development pattern is very popular in Europe and is linked to significant benefits. This presentation is aimed at exploring the academic literature and empirical evidence surrounding polycentric development, analyzing more than 120 regional transportation plans to see how they promote polycentric development, defining types of centers in a hierarchy of centers, quantifying the transportation benefits of polycentric development, examining a case study of best practices, and, finally, outlining context-specific strategies for Salt Lake County and the Wasatch Front region.

KEY LEARNING OUTCOMES

  • Regional transportation plans suffer from a lack of consistent indicators to designate centers and guide their developments.
  • On average, households living in centers tend to make fewer and shorter automobile trips, take transit more, walk more, and bike less.
  • Tours (a sequence of...
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Webinar: Is Transit-Oriented Development Affordable for Low and Moderate Income Households?

PRESENTATION ARCHIVE

OVERVIEW

Transportation and land use planning, as a field, is shifting away from segregated uses connected by highways and streets to more compact, mixed-use developments connected by high-quality transit. This new paradigm has brought special attention to transit-oriented developments (TOD), which are sometimes touted as being among the most affordable, efficient places to live. But how affordable are they, and who has the power to effect change? This study examines housing costs for households living in TODs.

KEY LEARNING OUTCOMES

  • Learn how many TODs there are currently in the U.S. and what methodology was used to identify them.
  • Learn what share of housing in TODs is affordable, what are the relative shares of designated versus naturally occurring affordable units and whether the level of affordability is the same for families of different sizes.
  • Learn ...
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Empty Spaces webinar confronts parking at transit-oriented developments

Smart Growth America hosted a webinar Jan. 31 on NITC research finding that standard guidelines lead to a drastic oversupply of parking at transit-oriented developments. That restricts the supply of housing, office and retail space while driving up the price.

The webinar marks the release of Smart Growth America's lay summary of the NITC report, called "Empty Spaces," which will be available to webinar attendees.

Watch the recorded webinar here.

The research, led by Reid Ewing of the University of Utah, is one of the first comprehensive data-driven reports to estimate peak parking and vehicle trip generation rates for transit-oriented development projects, as well as one of the first to estimate travel mode shares for TODs. Ewing analyzed data on actual parking usage and total trip generation near five transit stations: Redmond, Washington; Rhode Island Row in Washington, D.C.; Fruitvale Village in Oakland, California; Englewood, Colorado; and Wilshire/Vermont in Los...

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Webinar: Planning and Development in Gateway Communities, Post COVID

PRESENTATION ARCHIVE

OVERVIEW

Gateway communities are the small towns outside of national parks, forests, scenic rivers, and ski resorts. This presentation will highlight the housing, transportation, and development challenges that these communities faced in the aftermath of the COVID 19 pandemic. Our study...

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Webinar: Modeling Freeway Traffic in a Mixed Environment: Connected and Human-Driven Vehicles - Terry Yang

Webinar: Modeling Freeway Traffic in a Mixed Environment: Connected and Human-Driven Vehicles

 

PRESENTATION ARCHIVE

Miss the webinar or want a look back?

OVERVIEW

Although connected vehicles (CVs) will soon go beyond testbeds, CVs and human-driven vehicles (HVs) will co-exist over a long period. Hence, it is critical to consider the interactions between these two types of vehicles in traffic flow modeling. In this study, we aim to develop a macroscopic model to understand how CVs would impact HVs in the traffic stream. Grounded on the second-order traffic flow model, we study the relationships among flow, density, and speed by two sets of formulations for the groups of CVs and HVs, respectively. A set of friction factors, which indicate CVs' impact to HVs, are introduced to the speed equation for accounting CV speed impacts. Then extended Kalman Filter is employed to update both model parameters and friction factors in real-time. By using CVs trajectory data as measurements, the difference between CV average speed and overall traffic mean speed will be fully accounted. The proposed model will serve as a basis for designing CV-based traffic control function,...

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UA, TDOT partner for e-scooter research projects

Webinar: The Impact of Decentralizing Homeless Services on Transportation and Mobility

PRESENTATION ARCHIVE

OVERVIEW

With findings from a mixed methods research study, this interdisciplinary webinar will present results from a historical public document analysis, a GIS spatial analyses, client surveys and interviews, and interviews with professionals and service providers. In 2019, the delivery of homeless sheltering services in Salt Lake County transitioned from a centralized emergency shelter to a scattered site model with multiple resource center locations, operated by multiple service providers. To understand the degree to which “proximity” to public transportation and other needed services was achieved, this study examined:

  1. how the decentralization of homeless services influenced transportation demand and mobility patterns for persons experiencing homelessness; and
  2. how transportation and mobility changes affected access to services.

Findings reveal that while the region’s homelessness services system changed, the...

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