Smart Growth Around America

A few of the record-breaking 1,700 attendees at the New Partners for Smart Growth conference in Seattle might have been pinching themselves on Thursday night after hearing three of President Obama’s cabinet secretaries emphasize the importance of smart growth, sustainability and livability as core goals shaping the work of their three massive federal agencies.

Demonstrating the Obama Administration’s commitment to making neighborhoods more livable, sustainable and affordable, Secretaries Ray Lahood and Shaun Donovan of the Department of Transportation and the Department of Housing and Urban Development came to Seattle to discuss their plans to use their giant agencies’ budgets and programs in unison to help American families in rural, suburban and urban communities have better options for affordable housing and getting where they need to go each day. Making sure that future growth in our towns and cities results in affordable homes in walkable neighborhoods close to places to work, shop or go to school means less money wasted on skyrocketing transportation costs — saving money for everyday Americans.

(Lahood and Donovan were joined by Assistant Administrator Mathy V. Stanislaus from the Environmental Protection Agency, filling in for EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, who was unable to attend due to a conflict, but sent a video message for the conference recipients to watch.)

Secretary Ray LaHood made it clear that the federal government will be a powerful supporting partner in the work that all of us are doing across the country to ensure that the neighborhoods, communities and cities we call home are great places to live for decades to come. “You guys are the dreamers; the innovators — but we are going to partner with you to do this work,” he said.

Smart Growth America applauds HUD, DOT and EPA for the powerful message delivered by cabinet secretaries flying across the country to tell 1,700 planners, local officials, advocates and ordinary citizens that they’ll be making smarter growth and livability the norm and the standard — not the exception.

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Tags: DOT, EPA, HUD

President Obama’s budget for the 2011 fiscal year, released this morning, contains more than $1 billion in programs and grants that will help create and support livable, sustainable communities and neighborhoods across the country.

“This is good news for anyone looking to cut their transportation costs, find an affordable home in a walkable neighborhood, or live in a community with a multitude of transportation options,” said SGA President Geoff Anderson.

“It’s worth noting that in such difficult economic times and in a budget with extensive cuts in other areas, the Administration is emphasizing the importance of improving sustainability and livability in our neighborhoods large and small, meeting numerous goals by saving taxpayer money and improving sustainability while enhancing the quality of life for Americans in communities across the country,“ Anderson continued.

“At its core, sustainability is about making sure that we use resources responsibly and wisely, and livability means creating communities where people can find an affordable place to live, a good job, and options for getting where they need to go each day,” he added.

“In today’s economic climate, with millions of Americans out of work, facing foreclosure or mounting transportation expenses due to rising oil prices or cuts in public transportation, it is imperative that the federal government be a strong partner for local governments, working with them to ensure that our future growth is sustainable, equitable, livable and affordable. This budget moves those important priorities forward.”

The administration blazed a path toward improving livability and sustainability with last year’s creation of the Partnership for Sustainable Communities, a joint effort between the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and the Department of Transportation. In the FY 2011 budget, that Partnership would receive more than $830 million (between the three agencies) to help American families in rural, suburban and urban communities have better options for getting where they need to go and better access to affordable housing.

DOT will also get an additional $1 billion in high-speed rail funding, in addition to $2.5 billion in the current year’s budget, and $8 billion in grants from the 2009 American Reinvestment and Recovery Act awarded last week. All told, the administration could be spending more than $11.5 billion to lay the groundwork for a national high-speed rail system over the course of just a few short years.

“Investing in our transportation system and high speed rail travel are smart bets for the future. Not only will we create jobs in the short and long term, but we will be building the kind of infrastructure that can connect the people in our metro areas, giving them more options for travel, and creating opportunity and long-term economic success from coast to coast,” said Geoff Anderson.

We will have a deeper analysis of the President’s budget coming hopefully later this week.

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Tags: Budget, DOT, EPA, Housing, HUD, President Obama, press releases

In the first ten months of the 2009 economic stimulus package, investments in public transportation created twice as many jobs per dollar as investments in highways, according to a new analysis by Smart Growth America. With the 2009 stimulus providing three times more money for highways than transit, Congress missed a chance to put more people to work - while also investing in the kind of clean, efficient transportation systems we so desperately need.

Congress has a chance to do better with the jobs bill currently in the works. If The Senate passes a jobs bill that invests equally in public transportation and highways, for example, we could produce year-round employment for nearly 6,000 more workers for the same cost as the House version of the jobs bill.

Tell your Senators: don’t miss this opportunity to create more jobs without spending more money. Let’s invest wisely and put people to work quickly creating a clean, green transportation infrastructure for the 21st Century.

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Tags: Action Alert, Economic Stimulus, Jobs, Transit

The Onondaga Lake: one of the most polluted waterways in the country. Image by Joegrimes

Across the country, older cities struggle with outdated water-sewer systems that collect sanitary sewage and stormwater runoff in a single pipe system. When a big storm occurs, the main system gets overloaded, resulting in a disgusting combination: sewage combines with stormwater and runs into nearby lakes and rivers, causing serious water pollution and health issues.

Combatting these problems traditionally required that cities make a big investment in either building a second piping system for the whole city, or large tanks that can store water during storms. These “gray infrastructure” solutions can take years to implement, cost millions, and substantially disrupt the lives of residents. Cities are beginning to turn instead to “green” water infrastructure as a viable alternative to addressing combined sewer overflow. Green infrastructure uses plants and porous pavement — among other tools — as natural ways to filter water, increase infiltration, and reduce stormwater runoff into pipes.

Onondaga County, New York where Syracuse is located, became one of the first regions in the country in November to announce it will use this technology on a large scale. A judge approved an agreement that will allow the county to hold, infiltrate, and clean polluted runoff through vegetated basins, roof gardens, tree boxes, and rain gardens. This new agreement replaces a 1999 consent order that mandated the construction of large-scale water treatment systems to reduce pollutant levels in Onondaga Lake — widely considered one of the most polluted waterways in the country due to sewage waste and industrial dumping.

Now, the same money that would have been spent to build three concentrated industrial structures and massive pipe storage systems will go toward this mixed approach that will help beautify the city, create green jobs, and save money on construction, operation, and maintenance. It will also help position the Syracuse area as one of the nation’s leaders in green solutions to wastewater and pollution reduction.

Cities across the country that struggle with similar outdated systems will certainly be watching Syracuse carefully.

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Tags: Infrastructure, New York, Water

Smart Growth America and Transportation for America applaud repeal of rules that hampered communities seeking deserving rail and rapid bus projects

WASHINGTON, D.C. – In response to Secretary LaHood’s announcement today that funding guidelines for major transit projects will be selected based on livability benefits, including economic development and the environment, James Corless, campaign director of Transportation for America, and Geoff Anderson, president and CEO of Smart Growth America, had the following reactions:

“We applaud the Obama Administration for recognizing that smart transportation projects can have a powerful effect on the livability of communities across America,” Anderson said. “For too long federal rules have taken a blinkered approach to the cost-benefit analysis of transit projects, deliberately ignoring benefits to communities looking to provide more options, shape growth, reduce environmental impacts and spur economic development. This policy change represents a significant shift that will ensure our federal investments contribute to greater economic development, protect the environment and improve the health of the American people.”

“As discussion around the federal transportation authorization bill continues,” Corless said, “there could not be a more important moment for forward-looking, innovative approaches to transforming our existing system. The next step is to ensure our entire transportation program addresses the essential issues of economic development, the environment and public health by focusing on livability and sustainability in the selection of all transportation projects.”

“We need to complete our transportation network by devoting a greater share of funds for public transportation. We also need to give state and local leaders the option of choosing the best solutions for their communities, by equalizing both the rules and required funding matches for transit and highways. It is clear that Americans are looking for a new era of leadership to provide the safer, cleaner, and smarter transportation options that will help them save money pump even as our communities become more energy-efficient, healthy and livable.”

Cross-posted at Transportation for America

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Tags: press releases, Transit, Transportation

Future jobs bill can realize a greater return by spending more on public transportation.

An Associated Press report on the impact of transportation stimulus spending underscores the need to make the right transportation investments in Congress’s current jobs bill to produce more jobs.

“The AP report highlights an important question that data from the stimulus have already answered: where should we be spending money in Congress’ upcoming jobs bill to get the most bang for our buck? The facts on that point are crystal clear. Investing more of money in public transportation creates more jobs — nearly twice as many per dollar compared to traditional highway spending,” said Smart Growth America president Geoff Anderson.

While the AP study asked a crucial question, its attempt to answer has critical problems. The most notable shortcoming of the study — which AP has only reported on, but did not release — is that to assess the impact of transportation spending, it looked at job-creation statistics in the entire construction sector, to which highway construction contributes just five percent, according to the Associated General Contractors of America.

“We should measure the effectiveness of transportation spending,” said Anderson. “But it makes little sense to ask whether work in five percent of the construction industry can move the whole thing.” The full AP story, which wasn’t carried by all outlets, acknowledged that studies of the impact of the full stimulus on the full economy find that the stimulus is working.

Perhaps more important, the AP looked at only at road and bridge spending, and missed the thousands of jobs created by investment in public transportation.

Once it gets into the detail of how states spent their current stimulus funds, the AP story gets to the heart of the question about what Congress — and state recipients of any future jobs funds—should do. As the AP noted: “…money for road construction offers little relief to most contractors who don’t work on transportation projects, a niche that requires expensive, heavy equipment that most residential and commercial builders don’t own.”

That observation backs up the findings in the recent report from Smart Growth America, the Center for Neighborhood Technology, and US PIRG. “What We Learned from the Stimulus” showed that current stimulus money spent on public transportation created twice as many jobs per dollar as traditional highway spending. Investments in public transportation work better as stimulus in large part because they spend more money on labor — and more kinds of labor. For example, the part of the current stimulus directed to public transportation built several intermodal centers. That puts the construction trades to work. (What We Learned from the Stimulus: And how to use what we learned to speed job creation in the 2010 jobs bill.)

Concluded Anderson: “As the Senate debates a bill to create jobs through targeted investments, all the evidence points to the fact that spending more of that money on public transportation will employ more people and have greater economic impact. If we are serious about creating the jobs we desperately need, members of the Senate will insist on investing a greater percentage of the transportation funds in public transportation.”

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David Crossley is a busy man. He’s on the board of Smart Growth America and serves on the National Committee of America 2050. His organization, Houston Tomorrow, a SGA coalition partner, works within the Houston region to promote livability, transit, efficient infrastructure, and planning decisions that would benefit the environment. Their ambitious motto: “To improve the quality of life in the Houston Gulf Coast region.”

So what do they mean by “improving the quality of life” for Houstonians?

Crossley was recently featured in a cover article in a local Houston magazine about his vision for the Houston of his grandchildren, and what will need to change:

“So, what does this mean for those of us living here in Houston and the Gulf Coast area?  To begin with, the latest population forecast for our region is between 11 and 12 million people by 2050.  That’s more than twice what we have now, more than Mexico City today, and approaching greater Mexico City, which is the most populous region in all the Americas.

As Crossley says, the challenge is to figure out how to absorb all these people without wrecking the place.  Right now, Houston eats massive quantities of land to accommodate the public policy of basing nearly all development on people driving cars further and further every year.  This 60-year sprawl binge has produced all manner of familiar issues including air pollution, stress, family friction, lower productivity, and financial distress of many kinds.  The clear solution, obvious everywhere in the world, is to use less land for development while providing more amenities for people in walkable, high quality neighborhoods of many sizes and character.

But Houston lags behind many large metropolitan centers in areas like mass transit, walkable neighborhoods, and sensible urban planning.  If we want growth, then we need to focus on how to make it occur in a healthy manner; we need to start making some significant changes to the way we view and implement future development.”

Just like other metro areas across the country, Crossley sees signs of a market-driven movement toward more walkable, sustainable growth patterns helping to change future development in Houston.

“In Houston,” he says, “we can expect to see huge movement toward walkable urbanism by 2013 or 2014 when we will suddenly have a very large light rail transit system with service to destinations in 65 neighborhoods.

And just like other major metros, the task will become one of breaking down the barriers and outdated regulations that make it too difficult or illegal to meet this burgeoning demand.

Kudos to David Crossley and Houston Tomorrow for the solid local ink recognizing their important work on the Gulf Coast. Download a PDF of the full article from us, or use the e-reader on the Change Magazine site.

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Tags: Coalition Members, Houston

For the past three years, Smart Growth America has worked with other state and national organizations on the Restoring Prosperity Initiative, a joint effort to develop and advance an agenda for revitalizing America’s older industrial cities. Going forward, we’ll be incorporating Restoring Prosperity content into regular posts here. - Ed.

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The Cleveland housing market is experiencing a disaster of nearly biblical proportions.  Last year, more than 13,000 foreclosure cases were filed in Cuyahoga County, which includes the greater Cleveland area.

In response, the County Commissioners assembled the Cuyahoga County Land Bank, a non-profit organization dedicated to acquiring and restoring vacant properties into productive parts of the community. Last month the land bank took a leap forward by forging a unique agreement with mortgage giant Fannie Mae that could be a game-changer for the distressed Cleveland region — and a model for other communities hit hard by the foreclosure crisis nationwide.

In the new agreement, Fannie Mae has agreed to sell foreclosed homes in its possession to the land bank for the highly-affordable price of $1, and contribute $3,500 towards demolition for each house that isn’t salvageable. The arrangement is a win-win: Fannie Mae is able to avoid ongoing maintenance costs for low-value properties and prevent them from undermining the nearby homes with Fannie Mae loans. At the same time, Cuyahoga County can ensure that a large inventory of distressed houses won’t be added to the market surplus or fall into the hands of speculators, undermining neighborhood stability.

This is the first time Fannie Mae (or any other large-scale owner of foreclosed properties) has agreed to contribute to demolition costs on an ongoing basis, but the corporation plans to strike similar agreements with other communities if this pilot effort goes well. Advocates are hopeful that other lenders will follow suit.

In the meantime, Cuyahoga County’s agreement is moving forward: the first 25 properties were transferred to the land bank in December. “We are very well cranked up and ready to go,” said county land bank president Gus Frangos.

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Tags: Cleveland, Ohio, Restoring Prosperity, Vacant Property

Photo by Flickr user zpeckler

In August, I wrote about a successful program that brought a supermarket into a Philadelphia “food desert” where numerous chains had previously refused to locate — an area “redlined” by supermarkets and banks. Food deserts are locations in urban or rural areas where fresh food is hard to come by; residents have to make an unpalatable choice between settling for unhealthy food and long, inconvenient, and potentially costly trips to get fresh food.

Now, a bipartisan group in the House of Representatives is trying to bring Pennsylvania’s program to the entire country with the introduction of the National Fresh Food Financing Initiative.

According to PolicyLink,

With 27 million Americans without access to fresh, affordable food – and poor and minority communities getting the worst of the problem – a national effort to expand and build grocery stores, farmers markets, and other healthy food retail in needy communities could be just the kind of bi-partisan, triple-bottom-line solution we need.

In just the past five years, the Pennsylvania public-private partnership has turned $30 million of state investment into 4,800 jobs, 78 new or expanded fresh-food markets, more than $150 million in additional private investment, and 400,000 people with improved access to fresh, healthy food.

Read more about the Pennsylvania Fresh Food Financing Initiative, or show your support for this innovative, exciting piece of legislation.

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Tags: Food and Farms

In the first ten months of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), investments in public transportation have created twice as many jobs per dollar as investments in highways.

A new analysis by the Center for Neighborhood Technology, Smart Growth America, and U.S. PIRG shows that by mimicking funding levels for transportation set out in ARRA, the Jobs for Main Street Act passed by the U.S. House of Representatives in December missed an opportunity to create additional jobs where they are needed most. If the Senate version invests equally in public transportation and highways, we could produce 71,415 additional job-months, equivalent to year-round employment for 5,951 more workers, without spending a dime more than the House bill.

Read more on the report, “What we learned from the Stimulus, and how to use what we learned to speed job creation in the 2010 jobs bill,” or download the pdf.

→View all Smart Growth America stimulus resources.

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Tags: Economic Stimulus, Jobs, New Reports, SGA Programs

Lessons Learned from Recovery Act Show Superior Job Creation
from Spending on Public Transportation

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A new analysis by the Center for Neighborhood Technology, Smart Growth America, and U.S. PIRG shows that in the first ten months of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), investments in public transportation have created twice as many jobs per dollar as investments in highways. The new report shows that by mimicking funding levels for transportation set out in ARRA, the Jobs for Main Street Act (H.R. 2847), passed by the U.S. House of Representatives in December, missed an opportunity to create additional jobs where they are needed most.

The report, “What we learned from the Stimulus, and how to use what we learned to speed job creation in the 2010 jobs bill”, is available here: www.smartgrowthamerica.org/stimulus2009.html

The Jobs for Main Street Act provides $27.1 billion for the Surface Transportation Program (STP) versus just $8.4 billion for Public Transportation even though public transportation investments under ARRA created twice as many jobs per dollar of investment. The Senate plans to take up its version of the jobs bill early in 2010, and the report shows that if the Senate version ensures funds are invested equally in public transportation and highways, the same level of overall investment would produce 71,415 additional job-months, equivalent to year-round employment for 5,951 more workers than from the House bill.

“This is a no-brainer. The Senate can ensure that more jobs are created across the country building the transportation system we need for the 21st century,” said Geoff Anderson, President of Smart Growth America. “If we are serious about creating jobs and bringing about the economic recovery our nation desperately needs, members of the Senate will insist on investing a greater percentage of the transportation funds in public transportation. Who is against more jobs?”

The data compiled by the states shows that every billion dollars spent on public transportation produced 16,419 job-months, compared to 8,781 job-months for every billion spent on highway infrastructure.   Public transportation projects create more jobs than road projects because they spend less money on land and more on labor, and because projects are often more complex, whether laying rack or manufacturing vehicles.

The report also uses the data from ARRA to refute the idea that public transportation projects are not as “shovel-ready” or able to be launched as quickly as highway projects. Nationally, public transportation and highway infrastructure projects are spending money at about the same rate. But because public transportation projects spend more of those dollars on more labor, equivalent spend rates produce more and faster jobs from public transportation.

“As the Senate prepares to take up a jobs bill, lawmakers should learn the lessons of the Recovery Act,” said Phineas Baxandall, Senior Analyst for U.S. PIRG. “We cannot afford to keep doing the same thing over and over again and expect different results. The fact is investments in public transportation will produce more jobs quicker and will address billions of dollars of unmet needs.”

“Public transportation is a lifeline for communities big and small across the country” said Scott Bernstein of the Center for Neighborhood Technology. “Too many people could not get to their jobs without public transit.  But even as demand for service is up, systems everywhere face budget shortfalls forcing layoffs, reduced service and fare hikes. Increased local reinvestment is essential to preventing these cuts that will cripple our workforce and increase expenses for working Americans. In passing the Jobs for Main Street bill to tackle the continuing crisis, Congress can learn from the ARRA experience, putting the money where it will do the most good, and leaving no job, no family and no community-in-need behind.”

→View all Smart Growth America stimulus resources.

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Tags: Economic Stimulus, Jobs, Transit

Transportation generates roughly a third of the greenhouse gases produced in the United States.

The solution for cutting those emissions lies not just in the hope that technology will one day magically cure our cars of their emissions. Nor does it rest with only layering greener ways of getting around —like transit, walking, or biking — over the current landscape in our cities, towns, and rural areas. If we want things to change, we need to change the types of places we build to make cleaner transportation possible and convenient — or even the norm.

Smart Growth America coalition member TransForm has developed a certification program called GreenTRIP to encourage building the kinds of places we need to reduce our carbon emissions. The certification program rewards developers and municipalities that reduce traffic and greenhouse gas emissions from transportation. It acts as a complement to the LEED for Neighborhood Development program (LEED-ND), one that focuses specifically on the place transportation occupies in sustainable land use.

Matthew Roth of Streetsblog San Fransisco wrote,

“Developments must have one or more of the following: unbundled parking, free car-share membership, and provide at least one 50-percent discounted transit pass per unit for the life of the project. These thresholds to reduce driving must result in no more than 35 VMT per unit per day in less dense areas, and no more than 25 VMT in dense areas. Bay Area average VMT is 50 miles per day. Likewise, parking ratios cannot be higher than 1.5 spaces per unit in less dense areas, or .75:1 in dense areas [PDF].

“By really focusing on this elemen — how much traffic [developments] generate — we think this tool is a huge complement to existing LEED and will serve an important function that LEED doesn’t get to,” said Stuart Cohen, TransForm’s Executive Director. “The best thing is the reaction from cities and developers: they are hungry for this.”

You can read more about the program, including the five successful pilot projects, at the TransForm website.

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Tags: California, Climate, Transportation

A few weeks ago, we asked what you loved about your communities.  As promised, we’re highlighting some of the best or most engaging answers – though not chosen through any rigorous process.  There are plenty of really interesting comments about interesting places all over the country.  If you haven’t done so, check out all the other comments, or leave one yourself!

Leo Barak writes,

“I love Detroit and my neighborhood, West Village, because it is so unique, diverse, and fun. West Village, an historic district, is a vibrant community where the neighbors all know each other and we have gatherings regularly.

West Village is located across from Belle Isle, the largest island park in the country, and minutes from Downtown Detroit, where there is music galore. I have all types of people living in my neighborhood and I can bike everywhere. Plus, there are so many wonderful creative people that inspire me every day.”

Reynaldo Hernandez of Indiana writes,

“After crossing only one busy street less than a block from my house, I am in a great walking area by the river. enjoying great sunrises in the morning and great sunsets over the city skyline in the evening, and relishing the surprise of rarely seen waterfowl, such as coots, loons, and hooded mergansers (ducks). Walking my dog there often promotes my health.”

Joni Carley writes,

“I love that Media, PA is the first Fair Trade Town in America. Takes a special demographic to earn that title and I love that no matter what business I walk into, there’s an underlying ethic that’s deeply good and that we’ve had the political will to do well by doing good.”

Liz Johnson writes,

“I live in Trenton, NJ. I love that I live in the city and the country at the same time. Trenton is an old, historic city on the Delaware River. We have old cobbled streets and bald eagles in the same 7.5 square miles.”

And I had to laugh at this anonymous comment:

“I love being able to walk to a subway station in just 10 minutes . . . in LA!”

Happy holidays from Smart Growth America!

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Tags: Detroit, Indiana, Los Angeles, New Jersey, Pennsylvania