Demonstrating the Benefits of Green Streets for Active Aging: Initial Findings

This project will help demonstrate how sustainable ( green ) streets contribute to the well-being of a community, including the physical and mental health of older and younger adults, along with the environment and economy. The project will collect data in Portland, OR neighborhoods to answer the following research questions: Are residents living near sustainable streets more physically active in their neighborhood? Do residents living near sustainable streets interact with neighbors more and demonstrate higher levels of neighborhood social capital? What are residents’ opinions of sustainable streets? Are there variations in responses to sustainable streets by age or other demographics? In particular, how to older adults differ from younger adults? Does the implementation process and design affect green street outcomes? Do sustainable streets affect home values? How do green streets affect stormwater flows, urban heat island, and carbon sequestration in Portland neighborhoods? The project includes a survey of residents in two neighborhoods with green street features and two control neighborhoods; an environmental assessment of the green street treatments; and an analysis of housing values using a hedonic modeling approach. The project will be guided by an Advisory council of members of various stakeholder organizations and representing different types of expertise. Members will include representatives of the city of Portland’s Bureau of the Environmental Services and Office of Transportation, Multnomah County Aging and Disability Services (the local area agency on aging), Elders in Action, (a statewide advocacy group for elders), AARP Oregon, and the neighborhood associations of the four study neighborhoods

Determinants of Recent Mover Non-work Travel Mode Choice

Active transportation modes of walking and bicycling have the potential to help mitigate environmental and health concerns ranging from growing greenhouse gas emissions to increasing rates of obesity. This dissertation investigates how new movers make decisions about active transportation, particularly non-work utilitarian walking, in the context of a new home and neighborhood. New movers are an important, yet often overlooked, population in travel behavior research because they provide an opportunity to observe behavior adoption in new contexts, but also because the roughly one-in-ten Americans who move each year are more likely to consider changes to daily routines, including travel behavior, making them prime targets for voluntary travel behavior change programs. Using data from a two-wave survey of recent movers in six U.S. cities, psychological and social mechanisms essential to the built environment travel behavior relationship. The research is divided into three stand-alone papers (chapters 4, 5 and 6). First, to isolate the built environment effect on active travel mode adoption, the relative influence of the built environment and a robust set of self-selection variables is quantified. Second, the psychological constructs that facilitate the built environment travel behavior relationship are identified. And in light of increasing market demand for housing in walkable urban neighborhoods and the observed importance of self-selection, the final paper quantifies the extent to which low-income households face are able to realize preferences for walkable housing locations. The key findings of this dissertation are that 1) the built environment plays a key role in determining recent mover adoption of utilitarian walking even after controlling for self-selection; 2) the influence of the built environment on post-move adoption of utilitarian walking largely mediated by perceived behavior control, as expected, and, unexpectedly, by descriptive social norms; and 3) low-income movers who prioritized moving to a walkable place were about half as likely as higher-income movers to be able to realize this preference. These findings have practical and theoretical implications which are discussed in each paper and in the final chapter

Affordable Housing as a Prerequisite for a Safe, Healthy, Equitable Transportation System: Evidence from a Nationwide Evaluation of Location Efficiency within the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) Program

Mountains of research over the last several decades show that how we get around and how much physical activity we get are closely linked with the built environment of the neighborhoods where we live. This means that the health, economic, and environmental benefits associated with active travel and transit are place-based and that affordable housing in walkable, location efficient places needs to be thought of as a critical component of planners’ efforts to provide safe, healthy, and equitable transportation systems. This talk will provide an overview of the links between affordable housing and transportation planning and present research findings from a new national study of location efficiency within the Low-income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) program, the largest source of new affordable housing in the United States.https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/trec_seminar/1014/thumbnail.jp