Review of Transportation and Infrastructure Improvements as a Revitalization StrategyJohn-Mark Palacios

URP 6545

Urban Revitalization Strategy

Yanmei Li

19 February 2013

Palacios ii

Table of Contents

List of Figures..............................................................................................................iii

List of Tables...............................................................................................................iv

Executive Summary......................................................................................................1

Introduction.................................................................................................................2

Background and Geographical Context.............................................................................................................2

History............................................................................................................................................................................. 5

Implementation...........................................................................................................5

Success factors.............................................................................................................9

Case Studies...............................................................................................................11

Atlanta...........................................................................................................................................................................11

Fort Lauderdale........................................................................................................................................................12

Conclusion..................................................................................................................13

References.................................................................................................................14

Palacios iii

List of Figures

Figure 1. Sidewalk improvements in Duluth, GA.......................................................................11

Figure 2. Rendering of a Sistrunk Blvd. intersection with buildings.................................12

Palacios iv

List of Tables

Table 1. USDOT Performance Measures for TIGER Grants......................................................9

Table 2. Performance measures from Maine DOT's Gateway Route 1 project.............10

Palacios 1

Executive Summary

Transportation and infrastructure development is an effective strategy for urban

revitalization. Whether done prior to a redevelopment project or with the intent of

spurring redevelopment, the strategy can be a good choice for the planner trying to

improve a city, a neighborhood, or a corridor. In some cases regulations might

require capacity improvements in conjunction or prior to a new development, so

that is always a consideration. If certain transportation or utility capacity goals must

be met, the reconstruction also provides opportunity to ensure other goals, such as

livability, walkability, and sustainability, are met. The strategy has been tested in

many areas, including Atlanta, Georgia, and Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Sound overall

planning in this area should also make it easier to secure funding for pieces of a

large project.

Palacios 2

Introduction

Improving transportation and other infrastructure is often used to encourage

redevelopment in an area. Sometimes the strategy has been to beautify the public

spaces and let the private building owners be inspired to improve their properties.

Other times the transportation improvement comes first with a specific

redevelopment strategy for the surrounding land use to follow. If the improvement

also adds capacity or permanent transit features to an area, it is also likely to spur

redevelopment that takes advantage of the large influx of people into the corridor.

Transportation capacity improvements or additions to the transportation network

can spur new development in rural areas and otherwise shift general development

patterns, whether these consequences are planned or not.

This report will analyze the where, why, when, what, who, and how of the

implementation of transportation and infrastructure improvements as a

redevelopment strategy. We will look at some of the tools used to measure the

success of the outcome and look at two cases where local communities have

implemented the strategy.

Background and Geographical Context

Transportation facilities are everywhere, as without them we could not move

around and conduct our daily business. Different types of facilities are located in

different areas and tend to affect development in different ways. There are urban

facilities, which on the block scale might include local streets, on-street parking,

Palacios 3

sidewalks, bike lanes, streetcars, buses and related infrastructure. These urban

facilities also typically include other infrastructure such as water pipes, sewer pipes,

power lines, communications lines (phone, cable TV, fiber optic, etc.), gas lines.

These other infrastructure types are so common that improvements to an urban

roadway always include coordination between the designers and the utility agencies

to determine where conflicts are. SimCity, the popular city-building simulation

game, has nodded to the seeming inseparableness of transportation infrastructure

with utilities by simplifying the road network in their latest version to incorporate

water, sewer, and electric lines by default.1

Modern urbanized areas generally have multiple urban clusters, requiring

transportation and infrastructure connections between the clusters as well as

feeding the clusters from outlying areas. This type of transportation infrastructure

can include some of the same elements as urban streets, but the roadway facilities

are usually wider, including arterial and collector streets as well as freeways. The

transit facilities could include not only streetcars but also light rail, commuter rail,

and even bus rapid transit facilities. Some of the clusters are developed around train

stations in transit oriented development.

Transportation and infrastructure also connects cities and regions. The

transportation facilities include rural roadways, the interstate highway system,

intercity passenger and freight rail, and even canals and the intracoastal waterway.

Development patterns often consist of cities or suburbs springing up along the

transportation lines, such as near a highway interchange or a rail station. Airports

Palacios 4

and seaports serve a similar purpose of connecting cities and regions, but their

location in or adjacent to urban areas will affect development and redevelopment

patterns in urban areas. Other infrastructure connecting cities or regions could

include long distance electric transmission lines and communications lines. These

serve a support function and may be necessary to attract a certain type of industry

such as heavy industrial or high tech within the city.

Florida also includes space as a transportation mode,2 which serves primarily to

develop and attract a growing high tech industry. In the future it could connect cities

in space with cities here. Currently the focus of these efforts has been centered

around the “Space Coast” region which includes Cape Canaveral, but with the right

transportation and infrastructure connections to this region, industries could begin

to spread to Orlando or even south towards Miami.

Additional infrastructure could include flood control structures, landfills and

recycling stations, or antenna towers.3 These tend to be spot locations that are less

tied into the road network. They all serve a crucial support function to conducting

business and living within a city or region, so planning efforts do need to account for

them. Typically the scale is larger, with water management controlled on a regional

basis by entities such as the South Florida Water Management District,4 waste

disposal facilities often run by counties or regional private enterprises, and antenna

towers often run by national or multi-state cellphone and communications

companies.

Palacios 5

In order to limit the scope of this report, we will focus on those transportation and

infrastructure facilities that affect urban development.

History

Transportation has been spurring development and redevelopment for years. In the

1800s the transcontinental railroad brought about a giant boom in westward

development for the United States. The development of the next national

transportation system, the interstate highway system, paved the way for the

development of suburbs and urban sprawl, allowing bedroom communities to

spring up far from urban business districts. Within cities, the streetcar began the

development transformation from one centered around walkability to a larger scale.

While many streetcar lines were shut down in the mid-1900s, today cities such as

Fort Lauderdale clamor to have streetcars in order to spur redevelopment of their

downtowns.5

Implementation

Transportation and infrastructure is typically implemented in public spaces,

whether in downtowns, urban clusters, or connecting these areas. Public roadways

require right-of-way owned by a government agency, whether municipal, county, or

state. Utilities are either located within these rights-of-way or in easements

purchased from private property owners, so they are still public spaces. Rail lines

also require their own rights-of-way if they do not share space with the street. , is

These are often owned by private companies who were granted eminent domain

Palacios 6

powers, although in some cases a government agency purchases the right-of-way. As

a local example, Tri-rail tracks were purchased from the CSX Corporation by the

Florida Department of Transportation in order to run their commuter rail service.

Train stations, airports, or seaports, while generally including an element of public

space, generally consist of buildings and other facilities that may be located on

private right-of-way owned by the port or rail agency. To continue the Tri-Rail

example, South Florida Regional Transportation Authority, the entity that manages

Tri-Rail, owns some station locations, while FDOT owns others.

Often the transportation and infrastructure development is directed at downtown

areas in need of redevelopment, through the plan of a Community Redevelopment

Agency or other local plan. The purpose is to encourage more economic investment

in the area, improve the quality of life of residents and workers, and of course

provide mobility and connectivity options for the area.6

Typically government agencies develop the transportation infrastructure. These

could include state departments of transportation, county government, city

government, Community Redevelopment Agencies, downtown development

authorities, transit agencies, Metropolitan Planning Organizations, and others. In

some cases the transportation infrastructure is developed by private enterprise, as

was historically the case with the railroads and streetcars. Florida East Coast

Industries owns rail tracks that helped build the entire South Florida area and now

continues to provide freight service. This company is developing passenger rail

service to connect Miami, Fort Lauderdale, West Palm Beach, and Orlando, which

Palacios 7

should encourage economic development in these areas. Since the company also

owns real estate near the stations, they are intending to stimulate development on

their own properties.7

Like any good redevelopment plan, residents, workers, and the business community

should also be involved in the development. This could be achieved through

meetings with homeowners or residents associations, or by collaboration with a

local Chamber of Commerce.

Transportation improvements often come before any other redevelopment is

implemented. The city of Oakland Park’s CRA, for example, set about redeveloping

their main street before the private development came in. Their plan called for

redevelopment of this transportation corridor that would also complement several

public-private partnerships along this street.8 The plan was approved in 2005, and

the improvements to the main street were completed by 2009.9 Over 3 years later,

the private development has not yet materialized—but the point is that the

transportation improvement was built first. Utility and other infrastructure

improvements could be built with the transportation improvements, or they could

be built independently. Hollywood CRA has proposed moving the power lines that

are currently overhead to underground as part of their redevelopment plan in order

to improve the aesthetics of their beach area.

Typical improvements in an urban area include sidewalk improvements to make the

area more walkable. This could include widening the sidewalk to allow sidewalk

cafes, more space to walk, and a buffer between the pedestrian space and the traffic

Palacios 8

space. This buffer space, the “furniture zone,” might include street trees to provide

shade, beauty, and clean air; benches to provide relaxation, bus shelters to improve

transit access, lighting to improve nighttime safety, bike racks or even bike sharing

stations to allow better access by bicycle, public art, and utility or signal cabinets.

Improvements might also include bicycle facilities such as on-road bike lanes,

shared use paths, or separated cycle tracks. For the automobile portion of the

roadway, investment could include on-street parking, reduction in the number of

lanes, switching to or from a one-way street, an increase in the number of lanes, or a

conversion to a pedestrian-only street.

Transit improvements besides shelters could include dedicated bus lanes, bus rapid

transit infrastructure, streetcar or light rail tracks and stations, or subway or

elevated rail stations. Pretty much any fixed guideway transit would offer a sense of

permanence, add economic development, and provide an incentive for

redevelopment.

Infrastructure improvements could include the already mentioned undergrounding

of utilities for beautification purposes or to reduce storm vulnerability, but it could

also include adding capacity in order to support new uses or additional density.

High rises might need a larger water main and sewer system on the adjacent street,

high tech companies would need a fiber optic communications cable to provide

sufficient internet bandwith, and industry would need high voltage power lines to

run machinery. These would be planned accordingly depending on the specific goals

for an area or a street.

Palacios 9

Success factors

With recent government grants such as

TIGER for transportation improvements,

performance has been a clear expectation.

Table 1 shows some performance

measures used by the US Department of

Transportation in the TIGER grants that

have been issued. For any projects that

add capacity, whether to transportation or

for utilities, the measures are quite simple.

Planned development will generate so

many trips, require so many gallons per minute of water, or require so many volts of

electricity. If you have met the projected development capacity you have achieved

success.

Capacity is not the only performance measure, however. The performance measures

in Table 1 are all transportation related more than economic related, but the USDOT

also claims that “Livability and Sustainability are at the heart of TIGER’s selection

criteria.”11 The criteria do not appear to be widely available, however. While criteria

such as Automobile Level of Service or traffic counts have been around for years,

determining livability criteria for transportation improvements is a fairly new area

for transportation professionals. USDOT published the “Livability in Transportation

Guidebook” that has some discussion of the concepts, but does not spell out hard

Table 1. USDOT Performance Measures for TIGER Grants.10

Palacios 10

and fast guidelines. The guidebook analyzed some case studies, however, which had

some performance measures determined by the agency. Table 2 shows the

performance measures developed by Maine DOT for a corridor visioning project.

Performance area

Mobility Accessibility Jobs-housing balance

Rural Lands and Habitat

Community Character

Specific measures

Vehicle-miles traveled (VMT)

Transit ridership

Accessibility to jobs

Acres conserved

Viewshed Impact

Traffic volumes

Walkability Accessibility to retail

Habitat Impacts

Commercial Strip Impacts

Level of Service (LOS)

Bikeability Emergency medical response

Housing in core growth areas

Jobs in core growth areas

Table 2. Performance measures from Maine DOT's Gateway Route 1 project.12

These are some measures that could be used, but there is a lot of flexibility in this

area. If a project is pursuing a grant, planners will undoubtedly endeavor to tailor it

to any performance measures that are included in that grant. With the shifting trend

at the national level away from pure capacity measures towards a measure of

economic benefits and livability improvements, we should see better projects in the

future.

Palacios 11

Case Studies

Atlanta

The metropolitan area of

Atlanta, Georgia, has issues

with congestion on its

roadways to the point where

a typical resident has one of

the longest commutes to

work in the nation. Low

density development has

also contributed to a rapid

loss of green spaces in the area. The Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC) established

a grant program called the Livable Centers Initiative in 1999 in order to improve the

quality of life by addressing these areas. This program sought to connect businesses

and residences, improve walkability, and add transit and housing options

throughout the region.

From 2000 to 2011, 93 planning studies were funded. The ARC measured success by

sending a survey to local government staff. The vast majority of respondents had not only

adopted the Livable Centers Initiative, but also incorporated them into their

comprehensive plan.13

Figure 1. Sidewalk improvements in Duluth, GA.13

Palacios 12

Fort Lauderdale

Fort Lauderdale, Florida, has a neighborhood that has often been viewed as run-

down, crime-ridden, with drug lords cruising the streets. This neighborhood, located

on the wrong side of the CSX tracks (west) and just to the north of the downtown,

has a high population of people with low incomes with 41% below the poverty level,

and 83% of housing occupied by renters. The city decided to redevelop one of the

main east-west roads running through this neighborhood, Sistrunk Blvd. This

reconstruction involved reducing the number of lanes on Sistrunk and providing

significant pedestrian improvements, including artistic lighting.14 No bike facilities

were included on the project. Some rumors I have heard from FDOT staff are that

they were not included because the police didn’t want to encourage drug dealers,

who often rode their bicycles. According to Renee Cross at the city of Fort

Lauderdale, no bike lanes were installed due to lack of coordination between the

Public Works department doing the project and the other city planning offices.15

Despite one issue with

the plan, most of the

project intent was

good. Since Sistrunk

was a county owned

road, there was some

disagreement between

the city and county, Figure 2. Rendering of a Sistrunk Blvd. intersection with buildings.14

Palacios 13

who wanted to continue using the road to move traffic.16 The differences were

resolved and the reconstruction project is now complete. The eventual development

plans are shown in Figure 2.

Conclusion

This is an effective redevelopment strategy that has been tried and tested in many

places. The federal government is embracing it as a strategy and beginning to

incorporate some of the performance measures into its grant programs, so the

opportunity is ripe for improving transportation and other infrastructure in order

to spur redevelopment or to complement planned redevelopment.

Palacios 14

References

1 Price, D. (2013). We built this city… the SimCity legacy: Past, present and future – preview. Retrieved 2/19, 2013, from http://www.shanethegamer.com/?p=2809 2 FDOT aviation - space programs. Retrieved 2/19, 2013, from http://www.dot.state.fl.us/aviation/space.shtm 3 Forman, M. B., & Mooney, J. (1999). Learning to lead: A primer on economic development strategies (pp. 26). Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt Pub.4 SFWMD about us. Retrieved 2/19, 2013, from http://www.sfwmd.gov/portal/page/portal/xweb about us/sfwmd about us 5 Palacios, J. (2008). Wave rolls on. Retrieved 2/19, 2013, from http://www.transitmiami.com/transit/wave-rolls-on 6 Forman, M. B., & Mooney, J. (1999). Learning to lead: A primer on economic development strategies (pp. 27). Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt Pub.7 Viglucci, A. (2012). Passenger trains to run from miami to orlando. Retrieved 2/19, 2013, from http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/08/09/2943014/trains-to-run-from-miami-to-orlando.html#storylink=misearch 8 COMMUNITY REDEVELOPMENT AREA (CRA) PLAN. (2005). Retrieved 2/19, 2013, from http://www.oaklandparkfl.org/news/cra/cra_plan.cfm 9 Himelberger, P. (2009). CITY UPDATE. Retrieved 2/19, 2013, from http://www.oaklandparkmainstreet.com/enews/12-09/ 11 U.S. Department of Transportation. (2011). TIGER discretionary grant program: Livability and sustainability. Retrieved 2/19, 2013, from http://www.dot.gov/sites/dot.dev/files/docs/TIGER_LIVABILITY_SUSTAINABILITY.pdf 13 Biton, A. (2012). Atlanta regional commission’s livable centers Initiative—Supporting plans for a better quality of life. Retrieved 2/19, 2013, from http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/livability/case_studies/atlanta/index.cfm 14 Urban Design Associates. (2008). Northwest/progresso/flagler heights implementation plan. Retrieved 2/19, 2013, from http://www.yumpu.com/en/document/fullscreen/4426631/urbandesignassociates-city-of-fort-lauderdale/18 15 Cross, R. (2013). 16 Wyman, S. (2010, 10/12/10). Work on sistrunk boulevard facelift to begin next month. The Sun Sentinel