Actually the LA Times wrote one article where they went to one TOD location and counted cars during two morning periods. That isn’t exactly scientific. More academically rigorous articles look at TOD in the context of supportive city policies and have found there is a reduction in car use over time. OVER TIME is the key point.

“Livability”, overall, is a sociological measure of several factors in a community. Donald Appleyard deployed several varieties of survey in the bay area in the 1960′s and 1970′s to establish a working definition of this term.

In survey of area residents, those in more “livable” areas report that they have more friends on their block (as compared to areas with higher car traffic volumes and speeds); that they are more likely to let their kids play in front of their homes or in the streets (which are markedly safer than less-livable streets); and a bunch of other important things that are currently un-measured in America.

Your appraisal of TOD based solely on car traffic is indicative of the myopia that afflicts many Americans. You do not have the vernacular, nor the perspective, nor the information, to properly assess the situation (and neither do our politicians) and so your judgment is rendered by passing by in an automobile.

I do not hope that our nation and the world continue down the path towards failure resulting from resource depletion. I recommend reading the book Collapse by Jared Diamond. We do not have time to fiddle around with things that are easy when that isn’t good enough, especially if they are not effective no matter how much we are wed to the idea.

In respons to ubray,
Part I: Zoning
“you need to look at it as a business and affect the bottom line of those engaging in that business.” Exactly. Someone zoned R4 gets to go to R20 (plus density bonus) is going to make the owner of the land filthy rich without adding real value, other than processing a subdivision map.

This upzoning is happening across California in the name of smart growth (and government regulated “affordable” housing). None of us are critically evalating what is ACTUALLY happening. We are more interested in the rhetoric and group think.

The trick is that after the upzoning in the “transit oriented” neighborhoods that you end up with MORE people driving cars in that neighborhood than when you started, in most cases. The LA times has covered this phenom. Hum…. everyone is happy because they don’t care about actual measurable results, they only care about happy talk.

It is time to bring data to the table. Does our rhetoric and logic actually result in reaching the objectives?

Can anyone give me an example of where smart growth was instituted in a city that was already built out (like LA) and it resulted in suburban neighborhoods being converted BACK to open space or turning the outskirts into ghost towns? How about, is there anywhere where the upzoning is balanced against the purchase of raw residential land that is converted to open spaced zoned property? I’ll even settle for examples where sprawl slowed down.

Given that a lot of people enjoy the benefits of living IN more open space and lower density, with a smaller town atmosphere they will continue to buy at the periphery of metropolitan areas. Many people are willing to commute an hour+ because they like that so much.

Part II: Objectives
First, usage doesn’t equal waste. People get really confused about that. For instance, I use a lot of water, but I efficiently grow A LOT of my own food with that water. Am I wasting that water?

Second, if the planning approach being proposed is for the objective of air quality and the livability of our cities, please describe how “livability” is defined and can be measured? Whenever I press people on this they usually end up describing features of small town life (if they even know). So, what do you mean?

As for air quality, I’m glad you brought that up. The atmosphere does not care how much pollution each of us individually puts into the air. It only cares about the total amount emitted. Thus, if you and I cut our emissions by half we are back to where we started when the population doubles.

This brings us to the “other inconvenient truth”. Even if we cut CO2 emissions to net zero, we still have major resource problems ahead of us. We must reduce our long-term population size. We must reduce fertility rates, and implement a sustainable immigration level. This can be achieved with sound and ethical policies. Pigginton has that part right.

Part I: Zoning
“you need to look at it as a business and affect the bottom line of those engaging in that business.” EXACTLY! Someone zoned R4 gets to go to R20 plus density bonus is going to make the owner of the land filthy rich without adding real value, other than processing a subdivision map.

This upzoning happening across California in the name of smart growth (and government regulated “affordable” housing). The trick is that after the upzoning in the “transit oriented” neighborhoods, that you end up with MORE people driving cars in that neighborhood than when you started, in most cases. Hum…. everyone is happy because they don’t care about actual measurable results, they only care about happy talk.

It is time to bring data to the table. Does our rhetoric and logic actually result in reaching the objectives?

Can anyone give me an example of where smart growth was instituted in a city that was already built out (like LA) and it resulted in suburban neighborhoods being converted BACK to open space or turning the outskirts into ghost towns? How about, is there anywhere where the upzoning is balanced against the purchase of raw residential land that is converted to open spaced zoned property? I’ll even settle for examples where sprawl slowed down.

Given that a lot of people enjoy the benefits of living IN more open space and lower density, smaller town atmospheres they will continue to buy at the periphery of metropolitan areas. Many people are willing to commute an hour+ because they like that so much.

Part II: Objectives
First, usage doesn’t equal waste. People get really confused about that. For instance, I use a lot of water, but I efficiently grow A LOT of my own food with that water. Am I wasting that water?

Second, if the planning approach being proposed is for the objective of air quality and the livability of our cities, please describe how “livability” is defined and can be measured? Whenever I press people on this they usually end up describing features of small town life (if they even know). So, what do you mean?

As for air quality, I’m glad you brought that up. The atmosphere does not care how much pollution each of us individually puts into the air. It only cares about the total amount emitted. Thus, if you and I cut our emissions by half we are back to where we started when the population doubles.

This brings us to the other inconvenient truth. Even if we cut CO2 emissions to net zero, we still have major resource problems ahead of us. We must reduce our long-term population size. We must reduce fertility rates, and implement a sustainable immigration level. This can be achieved with sound and ethical policies.

“The developers” is such a joke. I worked for a developer, and the way you’ve framed the issue totally cripples you from making a rational decision about land use and transportation. If you want to affect the business of building buildings and selling them/renting them, you need to look at it as a business and affect the bottom line of those engaging in that business. End of story.

What sort of moronic jihad would you employ to continue the 20th century’s profligacy and waste while somehow improving air quality and the livability of our cities?

People are dreaming if they think we can get half the people out of their cars. Many people don’t want to live in high density areas where you can have a good transit grid. Worse, our cities are already laid out and built out. The smart growth concept works on NEW development. Smart Growth as practiced NEVER rolls up current suburban areas and turns them into open space. Smart Growth as practiced is SPRAWL plus some high density along arteries. Hey, sounds like Santa Monica Blvd!

Don’t forget that C02 is a world wide problem. Every gallon we save here is gallon that goes to china, india, and eventually africa (when the get things together). If you want to end oil usage we have to take over the Middle East and Indonesia.

Smart Growth is swallowed by the religiously blind and manipulated by developers. Developer make a killing off all the upzoning. If you don’t know what upzoning is, its time you figured how that makes big developers superwealthy.

I know, I know, it would all work out fine if we just had better bike routes.

In LA, we have some incredibly stupid methods of planning, designing and measuring our roadways for cars only. We intrinsically ignore other modes of transportation and other uses of the public right of way for anything other than automobile throughput.

Further, whether the former councilman realizes it or not, “cyclists” are the only modal group in CA measured based on the measure’s perceived purpose of the cyclists’ trip. If a cyclist is riding on a road for recreation, they are not counted as a “cyclist” as per state law. Whereas, in the case of an RV these vehicles have a full vote according to state law, and do not suffer from this bizarre “perceived use” bias.

It would be easier to plan for bikes if we had better roadway standards and measurements (and procedures). Further it would be easier to plan for bikes if the standards we have didn’t exclude a fat portion of those that use this mode!

Whaddup with this situation? We get hand-waving and vague enviro-speak from the left, and yet “nothing changes” because their toothless proposals continually fall flat and threaten business. We need policy that makes a low-capital and low-energy input economy thrive, end of story. Instead, we get these stupid laws written by people who will fight like a cornered bobcat to preserve the high-capital, high-energy, input economy we have today! Witness what happened with the recent AB 766 bill.