Bus Transit Service in Land Development Planning (2006)

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This synthesis provides insight into the relationship between bus transit planning and land development planning. A liter- ature review was undertaken to determine the current state of the practice and was conducted using a variety of sources. An on-line search of TRIS was done that yielded many source documents. Additional searches were conducted using other on-line databases; these included the Mineta Transportation Institute, The Brookings Institution, and Northwestern Uni- versity. Internet searches also found several state and local government websites that contain interesting and pertinent information. The literature review revealed that there are very few traditional research documents available on the specific topic of coordinating bus transit planning and land devel- opment planning. There is a large body of research on transit-oriented development (TOD), joint development, urban villages, and new towns. This literature is primarily focused on development at rail stations, with very little written specifically for bus service. There are however applications of this research that can be transferred to bus transit and these applications are discussed in the report when appropriate. In addition to a general search of the relationship between bus transit and land development planning, the literature review also investigated two specific aspects of this synthe- sis effort: transit-supportive regulations and measures of suc- cess. However, there are few documents available on either of these topics. Some literature is available on regulations to reinforce transit-supportive development. For the most part, these regulations were written with rail transit in mind, although in some cases the regulations can be applied to bus service. There is a minimal amount of information available on how to measure the success of various transit-supportive actions. These two topics are discussed further later in this chapter and in the body of the report. The Bibliography at the end of this report and the refer- ences throughout this document include reports, books, and articles that can be applied to bus service, although many were written with rail service in mind. Also included in the Bibliography are websites that provide useful and relevant information. The remainder of this chapter reviews the literature in three subject areas: Bus Transit and Land Devel- opment Planning, Transit-Supportive Regulations, and Mea- surements of Success. 4 BUS TRANSIT AND LAND DEVELOPMENT PLANNING A study of transit-supportive development by Robert Cervero (1993) focused on development experiences in the suburbs of large metropolitan U.S. cities where bus transit service predominates. The study examined how recent market and regulatory factors have influenced transit-supportive design. It found few significant examples of transit-supportive sub- urban projects. The study effort also included a review of transit design guidelines. The author surveyed 165 transit properties and found that 26 had guidelines in place and an additional 12 agencies were in the process of developing guidelines. The report includes a short section on the preparation of guidelines and provides a section on “Good Practices” in the develop- ment of guidelines. Cervero concluded that the guidelines are a useful promotional and marketing tool. The production of guidelines positively raises awareness of transit-supportive development and is helpful to local planning agencies in reviewing development proposals. However, transit officials responding to Cervero’s survey were unable to identify many development projects that could be classified as transit- friendly in their design. Much has been written on the subject of TOD, joint devel- opment, new towns, and urban villages. There is excitement in many planning circles over the potential of these types of devel- opment to improve the overall quality of life by helping to man- age congestion and improve air quality, among other benefits. The literature on these types of developments is overwhelm- ingly associated with rail service. There are several reasons for this bias towards rail service. Rail service is perceived as being more “permanent” than bus service, because buses can gener- ally be easily rerouted. Rail is also perceived as having a higher level of service and therefore is more competitive with the automobile. Lastly, rail service attracts and supports higher densities of development than typical bus service. As bus rapid transit (BRT) systems increase in number, perhaps more exam- ples of TOD for BRT will be documented. Until then, although existing literature does have some application to bus systems to identify good planning practices and regulatory solutions, there is very little literature directly relevant to bus-based TOD. A good example of TOD research in the literature is TCRP Report 102: Transit-Oriented Development in the United CHAPTER TWO LITERATURE REVIEW

5States: Experiences, Challenges, and Prospects (Cervero et al. 2004). This report provides a good overview of TOD and its current state of the practice in the United States. The majority of the projects discussed are centered on train stations. How- ever, the study also reviewed bus transit TOD projects in Boul- der, Colorado; Roaring Fork Valley, Colorado; Los Angeles, California; and City Heights in San Diego, California. In Los Angeles, development activity has centered on rail- oriented TOD projects. However, future Metro Rapid BRT projects have the potential to generate development activity. Cervero et al. observed a lack of new TOD development along existing BRT lines and provided the following factors to explain why development was lagging: • Owing to lower ridership levels, BRT systems are less attractive to developers than rail systems. • Developers and investors do not view BRT systems as permanent because they do not require a high capital investment in facilities—inadequate public investment seemingly discourages private investment. • Metro Rapid BRT was originally envisioned to serve already densely developed corridors and, as a result, vacant land for new development along these corridors is unavailable. Transit agencies contemplating BRT systems should con- sider these issues early in the planning process. Such issues indicate that it may be difficult to persuade building owners and developers along the corridor to incorporate amenities for BRT. Bus TOD projects in the remaining three areas—Boulder, Roaring Fork Valley, and San Diego—are the result of pres- sures from existing land use, geography and social econom- ics. Bus transit did not have a formative role in these TOD developments. In Boulder, the open space program and the local government’s proactive stance toward compact devel- opment has positively influenced the formation of TOD proj- ects. The creation of Boulder’s unique transit system, the Community Transit Network, is an indirect outcome of the area’s growth management policies. In Roaring Fork Valley, geography and land use combined with increasing congestion generated a compelling need for transit service. With only one way in and out of the valley (State Highway 82), severe con- gestion and high travel times have become commonplace. In an attempt to solve these problems, local governments are adopting policies to support transit, in some cases in the form of operating and capital assistance. In City Heights, San Diego, the impetus behind the effort was economic redevel- opment. The City Heights Urban Village development is served by three bus routes that connect the development to downtown San Diego and job opportunities to the north. In all three of the bus TOD projects, bus transit was the obvious and most reasonable solution to existing problems; local decision makers sought out transit to alleviate a pressing problem. These situations are not typical and transit agencies generally do not enjoy such attention in the normal day-to-day opera- tion of bus transit systems. The literature provided mixed assessments on the success of TOD, joint development, new towns, and urban villages to produce the benefits associated with improved quality of life. Much of this is attributable to the difficulties associated with measuring these benefits. Still, given the recent interest in station-based TOD and the many projects that have been constructed since the mid-1990s, a stronger track record of success would be expected. If rail service has not yet pro- duced a compelling record, then the ability of bus transit to produce quality-of-life benefits will likely be harder to prove. Additional research is needed to produce valid measure- ments of success for transit-supportive land uses. TRANSIT-SUPPORTIVE REGULATIONS Regulations involving land development are written by state and local governments to guide land use and comply with written policies and plans. Some states have implemented regulations requiring developments to comply with local comprehensive plans. In most areas, local governments are responsible for the structure of land use. Zoning is the most common form of implementing local policies and meeting local goals. TriMet (Tri-County Metropolitan Transportation District of Oregon) in Portland, Oregon, produced the report, Plan- ning and Design for Transit Handbook (1993) that, although written for the Portland area, lays out general possibilities associated with transit-supportive zoning. Chapter five of that report focuses on how transit-supportive development concepts can be implemented through comprehensive plan- ning and zoning. This narrative is supplemented and sup- ported by an appendix, which provides “model regulations” for local governments to use when developing local devel- opment codes and zoning ordinances. The model regulations are organized as follows: • Transit Corridor Overlay District • Moderate–High Density Pedestrian Overlay District • Low–Moderate Density Pedestrian Overlay District • Specific Plan District for Transit Supportive Development • Urban Planned Unit Developments • Supplemental Development Standards for Transit Supportive Development • Use Classifications • Definitions. Similar to the TriMet report, the American Planning Asso- ciation has published Creating Transit-Supportive Land-Use Regulations (Morris 1996). The purpose of this report is to assist stakeholders in the development process by providing sample legislative language to implement transit-supportive goals and policies. The book is organized into four chapters

representing various aspects of implementation measures. Listed here are the four chapters and a sampling of the topics included in each chapter. • Chapter 1: Transit- and Pedestrian-Friendly Site Design – Pedestrian and bicycle pathways – Building orientation and setback – Transit stops, shelters, and benches – Landscaping and open spaces. • Chapter 2: Parking – Location – Reducing supply – Preferences for rideshare vehicles – Parking lot design, including pedestrian paths within the lot – Bicycle parking. • Chapter 3: Mixed-Use Development – Mixed-use developments in the CBD (central busi- ness district) – Commercial districts – Mixed-use within a single building – Ground floor requirements – Measures to provide amenities. • Chapter 4: Increasing Density to Support Transit – Single-family neighborhoods – Planned residential developments – Multifamily options – Establishment of minimum densities – Incentive approaches. Both of these documents provide a helpful resource for areas that are investigating regulatory methods to encourage transit-supportive development. They provide sample lan- guage that planners can use to draft new transit-supportive regulations. MEASUREMENTS OF SUCCESS Bus transit improves access to developments and increases the market area of a development by bringing more people 6 to it. Transit agency staffs intuitively understand that bus transit adds value to a development. However, it is often the case that developers and local government officials do not understand the transit/land development relationship, or do not believe that transit can be beneficial. Measurements of success are necessary to convince devel- opers and local governments that integrating transit into new land developments has value. Determining how to measure the success of this arrangement can be difficult because there are so many factors that affect the success of a development. Fur- thermore, each stakeholder in the land development process has its own way of measuring success. Transit agencies gen- erally use the number of riders as their guiding principle, whereas developers rely on economic indicators to measure the success of a project and community organizations typically measure success with quality of life considerations. NCHRP Research Results Digest 294: Transit-Oriented Development: Developing a Strategy to Measure Success (Renne et al. 2005) identified useful indicators to measure the success of TOD. These measures can be applied to most land development–bus transit coordination projects and include: • Transit ridership, • Density, • Quality of streetscape design, • Quantity of mixed-use structures, • Pedestrian activity and safety, • Increase in property value and tax revenue, • Public perception, • Number of mode connections, and • Parking configuration. Several of these indicators are difficult to measure because they require qualitative judgment (e.g., quality of streetscape design and public perception); however, these difficulties can be overcome. These indicators can be used to measure the success of integrating bus transit into any land development and provide a good starting point for identifying additional measures.