The built environment, activity space, and time allocation

Cities and metropolitan regions face several challenges including rising urban populations, sprawled land use patterns, and related auto dependence, energy consumption, greenhouse emissions, and human health effects. An important aspect of addressing these challenges involves understanding the connection between urban environments and spatial and temporal characteristics of individual activity-travel behavior. Advances in the research arena can inform the development of land use and transportation policies that facilitate access to local opportunities, reduce auto dependence, promote healthy travel behavior such as walking and bicycling, and generate travel time savings. Further, research efforts on this subject can help to measure the successes of existing transportation and land use planning tools in terms of their “secondary” effects on individuals’ spatial accessibility, time allocation, and quality of life. My dissertation systematically tests the connection between land use and activitytravel behavior by presenting three perspectives: one that focuses on the census block group level; another that focuses on the individual level; and one that focuses on the trip level. The analysis at the census block group level, named as the census block group level activity pattern analysis in this research, examines how the built environment of a census block-group is associated with the aggregated distribution of activities and trips occurring within the census block-group. The individual-level analysis, named as the individual activity space and time allocation analysis, links individuals’ spatial and temporal footprints to the built environment at the home location, traffic conditions at the home location, weather conditions, and individual/household characteristics. The trip-level analysis, named as the trip distance and duration analysis, demonstrates how environmental factors at the trip origin and destination and activity/trip characteristics are associated with the distance and duration of each trip. The census block group level activity pattern analysis indicates that dense developments are not necessarily positively associated with diversity in activity categories or demographic diversity of the individuals who were involved with activities in the area. Greater land use diversity is associated with higher activity density and greater activity diversity but lower alternative mode share. Grid street patterns and the presence of sidewalks are both associated with higher activity density and more alternative mode share. The individual activity space and time allocation analysis shows that small activity area size—less spatially dispersed daily activity locations—are related to dense developments, more retail stores, the presence of sidewalks, and the presence of heavy traffic in the residential neighborhood and are related to cold weather and precipitation. Most of the built environment factors show no association with time allocations to out-of-home activities or leisure activities, while they do show various associations with travel time allocations depending on the travel mode. Besides the built environment at the home location, weather conditions and traffic conditions also play an important role in both the individual spatial footprint and time allocation The trip distance and duration analysis suggests that shorter distance of non-work related trips is related to more retail stores, fewer industrial firms, and heavy traffic near the trip origin. After controlling for trip distance, the duration of driving trips is positively related to street grids, the presence of sidewalks, and dense developments at the trip origin and/or destination while the duration of walking trips is not. The analysis also suggests different activity/travel categories show dramatic differences in the sensitivity to environmental factors such as the built environment, traffic conditions, and weather. Not only do trips with different modes respond to these environmental factors in different ways, but trips related to different activity categories also show differences in the environmental sensitivity. Walking trips are more vulnerable to weather conditions than are driving trips. This research took an activity-based and time use approach to study the land usetravel connection, which fills the gap between activity modeling and land use-travel modeling in the existing literature. Evidence found in this research supports the notion that transportation problems can be ameliorated through the use of land use strategies. The research also points out that the strength of the land use-travel connection is conditional on other environmental factors such as traffic and weather conditions, as well as activity context such as activity type and time of day

Urban Public Health Emergencies and the COVID-19 Pandemic (1): Social and Spatial Inequalities in the COVID-city.

COVID-19 has had unprecedented impacts on urban life on a global scale, representing the worst pandemic in living memory. In this introduction to the first of two parts of a Special Issue on urban public health emergencies, we suggest that the COVID-19 outbreak, and associated attempts to manage the pandemic, reproduced and ultimately exacerbated the social and spatial divides that striate the contemporary city. Here, we draw on evidence from the papers in Part 1 of the Special Issue to summarise the uneven urban geographies of COVID-19 evident at the inter- and intra-urban level, emphasising the particular vulnerabilities and risks borne by racialised workers who found it difficult to practise social distancing in either their home or working life. Considering the interplay of environmental, social and biological factors that conspired to create hotspots of COVID-19 infection, and the way these are connected to the racialised capitalism that underpins contemporary urban development, this introduction suggests that reflection on public health emergencies in the city is not just essential from a policy perspective but helps enrich theoretical debates on the nature of contemporary urbanisation in its ‘planetary’ guise

Impact of light-rail implementation on labor market accessibility: A transportation equity perspective

JTLU vol 5, no 3, pp 28-39 (2012)This study seeks to examine transit’s role in promoting social equity by assessing the before-after impacts of recent transit changes in the Twin Cities, including the opening of the Hiawatha light-rail line, on job accessibility among workers of different wage categories. Geospatial, descriptive, and regression analyses find that proximity to light-rail stations and bus stops offering direct rail connections are associated with large, statistically significant gains in accessibility to low-wage jobs. These gains stand out from changes in accessibility for the transit system as a whole. Implications of the study results for informing more equitable transit polices are discussed

Urban public health emergencies and the COVID-19 pandemic. Part 2: Infrastructures, urban governance and civil society

COVID-19 had sudden and dramatic impacts on the organisation and governance of urban life. In Part 2 of this Special Issue on public health emergencies we question the extent to which the pandemic ushered in fundamentally new understandings of urban public health, noting that ideas of urban pathology and the relation of dirt, disease and danger in cities, have long informed practices of planning. Emphasising important continuities in the way pandemics are associated with minoritised and vulnerable groups, past and present, we note that public health initiatives can often exacerbate existing health divides, and actually deepen health crises. Against this, we document the emergence of participatory, community-led responses to the pandemic that offered the promise of more inclusive urban policy, often characterised by self-organisation. While we argue that any public health policy needs to be mindful of local contingencies, the promise of inclusive policies is that they will lead to healthier cities for all, not simply protect the health of the wealthy few

Those Who Need It Most: Maximizing Transit Accessibility and Removing Barriers to Employment in Areas of Concentrated Poverty

This research assesses the transportation assets and challenges faced by residents of Areas of Concentrated Poverty (ACPs), paying special attention to ACP50s—ACPs in which people of color comprise more than 50% of the population. The authors develop a graphically-facilitated survey blending multiple choice, free response, cognitive mapping and discussion questions to capture unmet transportation needs and user experience information difficult to gather in traditional travel behavior surveys. They find that participants’ activity spaces vary significantly based on car availability and local built form and that pedestrian environments around stops affect the experience of using transit in ACPs more strongly than transit service itself, leading to the conclusion that transit- and pedestrian-oriented community design is a significant equity issue

Atenção Domiciliar em Saúde: caracterização do Programa Melhor em Casa no estado de Santa Catarina

TCC (Graduação) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina. Centro Socioeconômico. Serviço Social.O presente Trabalho de Conclusão de Curso (TCC) discute o tema da atenção domiciliar no Sistema Único de Saúde (SUS), sendo este um modelo de atendimento à saúde em expansão, que vem sendo utilizada sob o respaldo de defesa da convivência familiar, melhora da qualidade de vida e redução dos custos do Estado com internações hospitalares. Neste modelo substitutivo ao cuidado hospitalar, são as famílias dos usuários que passam a realizar o cuidado em saúde no ambiente domiciliar. O objetivo geral deste estudo é analisar a implantação do Programa Melhor em Casa no estado de Santa Catarina, a partir de uma perspectiva crítica, percebendo as repercussões do cuidado geradas às famílias. A metodologia utilizada para o desenvolvimento da pesquisa foi revisão bibliográfica sobre as principais questões teóricas que envolvem o tema: o histórico da atenção domiciliar no Brasil, os conceitos envolvendo a atenção domiciliar e as repercussões desta atenção para as famílias e a caracterização dos municípios que implantaram o Programa em Santa Catarina. Na sequência, analisaram-se as entrevistas semiestruturadas realizadas com os informantes-chaves dos Programas sobre as características da implantação dos serviços de atenção domiciliar. Como principais resultados alcançados, tem-se a expansão do Programa Melhor em Casa em Santa Catarina a partir de 2014 e o aumento das internações domiciliares justificadas pela perspectiva de atendimento humanizado, mas travestida pela necessidade de redução dos gastos do Estado com hospitalizações. Por consequência dessa situação ocorre a responsabilização da família dos usuários que são acompanhados em domicílio para que esta realize os cuidados necessários para manutenção e recuperação da saúde do usuário internado domiciliarmente

Advancing Transportation Equity: Research and Practice

Yingling Fan is the corresponding author: [email protected] contributes to many societal outcomes, including employment, health, and wealth. However, disparities and inequities in transportation systems, services, and decision-making processes disproportionately impact underserved and underrepresented communities. This study seeks to create a better understanding of current research and practice and recommend future research and practice that can advance transportation equity in Minnesota. To that end, the research team conducted a literature review that summarizes recent developments in the field of transportation equity, reviewed existing equity-focused programs within and beyond the transportation sector, and engaged multiple stakeholder groups, including a project advisory group with experts in addressing disparities and inequities, a group of transportation users and equity stakeholders, and community members. The study presents a working definition of transportation equity, recommends action steps for MnDOT and its partners to consider in advancing transportation equity, and identifies directions for future research and practice that can advance transportation equity in the state of Minnesota