IMPACTS OF INCREASED
TRANSPORTATION CAPACITY ON LAND USE
- David Orr
GENERAL PATTERNS OF GROWTH
As stated previously, the major concern for most people is not the
distance of their homes from their place of employment, but the time
it takes them to travel that distance. Investment in highway capacity
gives anyone with access to an automobile a wider geographic area
to choose from for residential and employment location.
The wider the geographic area that becomes accessible, with no corresponding
increase in travel time, the more likely it is that the middle-income
population or businesses of a metropolitan area will move their home
or business farther out. Moreover, the low mortage rates and fuel
costs over the last fifteen to twenty years have allowed this expansion
without an excessive increase in overall costs. Therefore, the general
patterns of growth in the last fifty years has been one of widening
circles of development around, but farther away from, the central
core.
As shown in Section Two, the suburbanization of the Northeast Ohio
area has begun and is projected to continue for the future. However,
the mode of transportation advanced in the region can play a large
role in determining where future development will take place and how
it will look.
Continued emphasis on highway expansions will require reliance on
the automobile for transportation. Development designed around the
car and a complicated road network allows for single-use, low-density
development of residential, commercial and industrial areas. This
type of development in turn intensifies the dependency on the automobile.
Studies of areas with integrated transit services (bus, rapid, light
rail or commuter rail) show that development into outlying areas,
although not eliminated, takes on a different character. Mixed-use
and high-density development tends to occur around areas with transit
services. In addition, the following characteristics of transit-oriented
development were found by the Federal Transit Administration in its
1996 Report:
- Residents spend less time getting places;
- Have more socially cohesive neighborhoods;
- Have high property values;
- Generate fewer vehicles miles of travel;
- Emit less air pollution; and
- Save an average of $250 per month in household costs.
Transportation is of vital importance to the 80 million Americans
who do not drive: the elderly, those under age sixteen, the disabled,
and the economically disadvantaged who cannot afford to buy a car.
Continued investment in roadway expansions and its corresponding development
removes from this population any sense of control that they have over
their lives. They are unable to get to the required services they
need: school, jobs, banks, health care facilities, etc. These needs
then become an added expense to the communities that have developed
in a low-density, car-oriented manner.
The purpose of this section is to:
- Describe the impacts on land use resulting from increased development;
- Determine future community service needs based on this development;
- Review the environmental effects that have occurred or may occur;
- Show the minority and low-income populations in the region that could
be adversely affected; and
- Define the impacts in areas experiencing growth and decline.
| 
