IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/transa/v42y2008i7p1008-1030.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Deconstructing development density: Quality, quantity and price effects on household non-work travel

Author

Listed:
  • Chatman, Daniel G.

Abstract

Smart growth and transit-oriented development proponents advocate increasing the density of new land development and infill redevelopment. This is partly in order to reduce auto use, by reducing distances between trip origins and destinations, creating a more enjoyable walking environment, slowing down road travel, and increasing the market for transit. But research investigating how development density influences household travel has typically been inadequate to account for this complex set of hypotheses: it has used theoretically unjustified measures, has not accounted for spatial scale very well, and has not investigated potentially important combinations of measures. Using data from a survey of metropolitan households in California, measures of development density corresponding to the main hypotheses about how density affects travel--activity density affecting distance traveled, network load density affecting the speed of auto travel, and built form density affecting the quality of walking--are tested as independent variables in models of auto trip speed and individual non-work travel. Residential network load density is highly negatively correlated with the speed of driving, and is also highly correlated with non-work travel, both singly and in combination with other measures. Activity density and built form density are not as significantly related, on their own. These results suggest that denser development will not influence travel very much unless road level-of-service standards and parking requirements are reduced or eliminated.

Suggested Citation

  • Chatman, Daniel G., 2008. "Deconstructing development density: Quality, quantity and price effects on household non-work travel," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 42(7), pages 1008-1030, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:transa:v:42:y:2008:i:7:p:1008-1030
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0965-8564(08)00065-7
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Mohring, Herbert, 1972. "Optimization and Scale Economies in Urban Bus Transportation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 62(4), pages 591-604, September.
    2. Marlon G. Boarnet & Sharon Sarmiento, 1998. "Can Land-use Policy Really Affect Travel Behaviour? A Study of the Link between Non-work Travel and Land-use Characteristics," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 35(7), pages 1155-1169, June.
    3. David M. Levinson & Ajay Kumar, 1997. "Density and the Journey to Work," Growth and Change, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(2), pages 147-172, March.
    4. Crane, Randall, 1998. "Travel By Design?," University of California Transportation Center, Working Papers qt3pc4v6jj, University of California Transportation Center.
    5. Antonio M. Bento & Maureen L. Cropper & Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak & Katja Vinha, 2005. "The Effects of Urban Spatial Structure on Travel Demand in the United States," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 87(3), pages 466-478, August.
    6. Kelvin J. Lancaster, 1966. "A New Approach to Consumer Theory," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 74(2), pages 132-132.
    7. repec:ucp:bkecon:9781884829987 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Susan Handy & Kelly Clifton, 2001. "Local shopping as a strategy for reducing automobile travel," Transportation, Springer, vol. 28(4), pages 317-346, November.
    9. Anas, Alex, 2007. "A unified theory of consumption, travel and trip chaining," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 62(2), pages 162-186, September.
    10. Kockelman, Kara Maria, 2001. "A model for time- and budget-constrained activity demand analysis," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 35(3), pages 255-269, March.
    11. Crane, Randall & Crepeau, Richard, 1998. "Does Neighborhood Design Influence Travel?: Behavioral Analysis of Travel Diary and GIS Data," University of California Transportation Center, Working Papers qt4pj4s7t8, University of California Transportation Center.
    12. Boarnet, Marlon & Crane, Randall, 2001. "The influence of land use on travel behavior: specification and estimation strategies," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 35(9), pages 823-845, November.
    13. Manville, Michael & Shoup, Donald, 2004. "People, Parking, and Cities," University of California Transportation Center, Working Papers qt6nf254fd, University of California Transportation Center.
    14. Cervero, Robert, 1989. "Jobs-Housing Balancing and Regional Mobility," University of California Transportation Center, Working Papers qt7mx3k73h, University of California Transportation Center.
    15. John Gliebe & Frank Koppelman, 2002. "A model of joint activity participation between household members," Transportation, Springer, vol. 29(1), pages 49-72, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Lara Engelfriet & Eric Koomen, 2018. "The impact of urban form on commuting in large Chinese cities," Transportation, Springer, vol. 45(5), pages 1269-1295, September.
    2. Safirova, Elena A. & Houde, Sébastien & Harrington, Winston, 2007. "Spatial Development and Energy Consumption," RFF Working Paper Series dp-07-51, Resources for the Future.
    3. Tae-Hyoung Gim, 2012. "A meta-analysis of the relationship between density and travel behavior," Transportation, Springer, vol. 39(3), pages 491-519, May.
    4. Cao, Xinyu, 2006. "The Causal Relationship between the Built Environment and Personal Travel Choice: Evidence from Northern California," University of California Transportation Center, Working Papers qt07q5p340, University of California Transportation Center.
    5. Bento, Antonio M. & Cropper, Maureen L. & Mobarak, Ahmed Mushfiq & Vinha, Katja, 2003. "The impact of urban spatial structure on travel demand in the United States," Policy Research Working Paper Series 3007, The World Bank.
    6. Cao, XinYu, 2007. "The Causal Relationship between the Built Environment and Personal Travel Choice: Evidence from Northern California," Institute of Transportation Studies, Working Paper Series qt1n90z8h8, Institute of Transportation Studies, UC Davis.
    7. Cao, Xinyu (Jason) & Mokhtarian, Patricia L. & Handy, Susan L., 2009. "The relationship between the built environment and nonwork travel: A case study of Northern California," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 43(5), pages 548-559, June.
    8. Javier Asensio, 2002. "Transport Mode Choice by Commuters to Barcelona's CBD," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 39(10), pages 1881-1895, September.
    9. Tae‐Hyoung Tommy Gim, 2021. "Quantile regression on the nonlinear relationship between land use and trip time," Papers in Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 100(4), pages 1055-1077, August.
    10. Cao, Xinyu & Mokhtarian, Patricia & Handy, Susan, 2008. "Examining The Impacts of Residential Self-Selection on Travel Behavior: Methodologies and Empirical Findings," Institute of Transportation Studies, Working Paper Series qt08x1k476, Institute of Transportation Studies, UC Davis.
    11. Byunghak Min & Gunwon Lee & Seiyong Kim, 2021. "Effects of Land-Use Characteristics on Transport Mode Choices by Purpose of Travel in Seoul, South Korea, Based on Spatial Regression Analysis," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(4), pages 1-21, February.
    12. Khattak, Asad J. & Rodriguez, Daniel, 2005. "Travel behavior in neo-traditional neighborhood developments: A case study in USA," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 39(6), pages 481-500, July.
    13. Kim, Jinwon, 2012. "Endogenous vehicle-type choices in a monocentric city," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(4), pages 749-760.
    14. Andrew Perumal & David Timmons, 2017. "Contextual Density and US Automotive CO2 Emissions across the Rural–Urban Continuum," International Regional Science Review, , vol. 40(6), pages 590-615, November.
    15. Cynthia Chen & Hongmian Gong & Robert Paaswell, 2008. "Role of the built environment on mode choice decisions: additional evidence on the impact of density," Transportation, Springer, vol. 35(3), pages 285-299, May.
    16. Faizeh Hatami & Jean-Claude Thill, 2022. "Spatiotemporal Evaluation of the Built Environment’s Impact on Commuting Duration," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(12), pages 1-19, June.
    17. Xinyu Cao & Patricia L. Mokhtarian, 2012. "The connections among accessibility, self- selection and walking behaviour: a case study of Northern California residents," Chapters, in: Karst T. Geurs & Kevin J. Krizek & Aura Reggiani (ed.), Accessibility Analysis and Transport Planning, chapter 5, pages 73-95, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    18. Tomás Ruiz & Rosa Arroyo & Lidón Mars & Daniel Casquero, 2018. "Effects of a Travel Behaviour Change Program on Sustainable Travel," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(12), pages 1-22, December.
    19. Louis Merlin, 2015. "Can the built environment influence nonwork activity participation? An analysis with national data," Transportation, Springer, vol. 42(2), pages 369-387, March.
    20. Reilly, Michael & Landis, John, 2003. "The Influence of Built-Form and Land Use on Mode Choice," University of California Transportation Center, Working Papers qt46r3k871, University of California Transportation Center.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:transa:v:42:y:2008:i:7:p:1008-1030. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/547/description#description .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.