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Populations Increasing in Many Downtowns, Census Bureau Reports
Populations Increasing in Many Downtowns, Census Bureau Reports
Source: U.S. Census Bureau
A U.S. Census Bureau report released today shows that in many of the largest cities of the most-populous metro areas, downtown is becoming a place not only to work but also to live. Between the 2000 and 2010 censuses, metro areas with 5 million or more people experienced double-digit population growth rates within their downtown areas (within a two-mile radius of their largest city’s city hall), more than double the rate of these areas overall.
Chicago experienced the largest numeric gain in its downtown area, with a net increase of 48,000 residents over 10 years. New York, Philadelphia, Salt Lake City and Washington also posted large population increases close to city hall. These downtown gains were not universal, however: New Orleans and Baltimore experienced the greatest population declines in their downtown areas (35,000 and slightly more than 10,000, respectively). Two smaller areas in Ohio — Dayton and Toledo — also saw downtown declines of more than 10,000.
These are just some of the findings in the new 2010 Census special report, Patterns of Metropolitan and Micropolitan Population Change: 2000 to 2010. The report uses 2010 Census results to examine contemporary geographic patterns (as well as changes since the 2000 Census) of population density and distribution by race, Hispanic origin, age and sex for metro and micro areas collectively as well as individually. Metro areas contain at least one urbanized area of 50,000 population or more, while micro areas contain at least one urban cluster of less than 50,000, but at least 10,000.
Near-Roadway Pollution and Childhood Asthma: Implications for Developing “Win-Win” Compact Urban Development and Clean Vehicle Strategies
Source: Environmental Health Perspectives
Background: The emerging consensus that exposure to near-roadway traffic-related pollution causes asthma has implications for compact urban development policies designed to reduce driving and greenhouse gases.
Objectives: We estimated the current burden of childhood asthma-related disease attributable to near-roadway and regional air pollution in Los Angeles County (LAC) and the potential health impact of regional pollution reduction associated with changes in population along major traffic corridors.
Methods: The burden of asthma attributable to the dual effects of near-roadway and regional air pollution was estimated, using nitrogen dioxide and ozone as markers of urban combustion-related and secondary oxidant pollution, respectively. We also estimated the impact of alternative scenarios that assumed a 20% reduction in regional pollution in combination with a 3.6% reduction or 3.6% increase in the proportion of the total population living near major roads, a proxy for near-roadway exposure.
Results: We estimated that 27,100 cases of childhood asthma (8% of total) in LAC were at
least partly attributable to pollution associated with residential location within 75m of a major
road. As a result, a substantial proportion of asthma-related morbidity is a consequence of nearroadway
pollution, even if symptoms are triggered by other factors. Benefits resulting from a
20% regional pollution reduction varied markedly depending on the associated change in nearroadway
proximity.
Conclusions: Our findings suggest that there are large and previously unappreciated public health consequences of air pollution in LAC and probably in other metropolitan areas with dense traffic corridors. To maximize health benefits, compact urban development strategies should be coupled with policies to reduce near-roadway pollution exposure.
Global forecasts of urban expansion to 2030 and direct impacts on biodiversity and carbon pools
Global forecasts of urban expansion to 2030 and direct impacts on biodiversity and carbon pools
Source: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Urban land-cover change threatens biodiversity and affects ecosystem productivity through loss of habitat, biomass, and carbon storage. However, despite projections that world urban populations will increase to nearly 5 billion by 2030, little is known about future locations, magnitudes, and rates of urban expansion. Here we develop spatially explicit probabilistic forecasts of global urban land-cover change and explore the direct impacts on biodiversity hotspots and tropical carbon biomass. If current trends in population density continue and all areas with high probabilities of urban expansion undergo change, then by 2030, urban land cover will increase by 1.2 million km2, nearly tripling the global urban land area circa 2000. This increase would result in considerable loss of habitats in key biodiversity hotspots, with the highest rates of forecasted urban growth to take place in regions that were relatively undisturbed by urban development in 2000: the Eastern Afromontane, the Guinean Forests of West Africa, and the Western Ghats and Sri Lanka hotspots. Within the pan-tropics, loss in vegetation biomass from areas with high probability of urban expansion is estimated to be 1.38 PgC (0.05 PgC yr−1), equal to ∼5% of emissions from tropical deforestation and land-use change. Although urbanization is often considered a local issue, the aggregate global impacts of projected urban expansion will require significant policy changes to affect future growth trajectories to minimize global biodiversity and vegetation carbon losses.
State economic development programs, which traditionally target high-tech firms, may be missing 75 percent of high-growth companies
Source: Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation
Certain regions of the country continuously produce innovative, high-growth companies that have transcended the economic downturn of the last few years. Surprisingly, those regions include more than the expected locales like Boston and Silicon Valley.
"The Ascent of America’s High-Growth Companies," a report series released today by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, reveals that high numbers of fast-growing firms are concentrated in unexpected regions and industrial sectors.
"Our analysis of these fast-growing firms shows us that high-growth company founders can come from anywhere," said Dane Stangler, director of Research and Policy at the Kauffman Foundation. "Their firms can be found throughout the country and, rather than following the conventional expectation that high-growth companies are grouped into a narrow technology category, they represent exceptionally diverse industry segments. These findings offer important lessons for economic development leaders, such as to target firms that are high-growth rather than high-tech."
The study examined geographic trends of firms included in the 1982 to 2010 Inc. 500 lists to analyze for the first time how regional characteristics are associated with high-achieving companies and innovations. A survey of Inc. 500 founders from 2000 through 2008 also provided insight into the movement of these entrepreneurs from the cities of their alma maters to the locations where they founded their companies.
The first report in the series, "The Ascent of America’s High-Growth Companies: An Analysis of the Geography of Entrepreneurship," indicates that fast-growing Inc. firms encompass numerous industries beyond the sectors traditionally seen as the reserve of technology-based businesses.
While Silicon Valley, Austin, Texas, and other traditional high-tech hotbeds are well-represented among the cities that house high-growth companies, the research shows that Salt Lake City, Utah; Indianapolis, Ind.; Buffalo, N.Y., and several other Rust Belt icons also have accumulated a significant cache of Inc. 500 firms. The greatest number of Inc. firms is clustered in Washington, D.C., with nearly half of these firms operating in the government services sector.
The study also showed that spending growth in Washington, D.C., since the 1990s – regardless of which party held the White House – has fed the huge complex of fast-growing firms in the D.C. area. The growth of the private sector in the D.C. metro area, among the nation’s fastest-growing metro areas in the past two decades and the first to recover from the housing bubble in early 2009, then, ironically has deep ties to the federal government.
One In Seven: Ranking Youth Disconnection in the 25 Largest Metro Areas
One In Seven: Ranking Youth Disconnection in the 25 Largest Metro Areas
Source: Social Science Research Network (Measure of America)
An astonishing one in every seven Americans ages 16 to 24 is neither working nor in school—5.8 million young people in all. As their peers lay the foundation for a productive, fulfilling adulthood, these disconnected youth find themselves adrift at society’s margins, unmoored from the structures that confer knowledge, skills, identity, and purpose.
The cost is high for affected individuals—and for society as a whole. Lack of attachment to the anchor institutions of school or work at this stage of life can leave scars that last a lifetime, affecting everything from earnings and financial independence to physical and mental health and even marital prospects. And last year alone, youth disconnection cost taxpayers $93.7 billion in government support and lost tax revenue.
This brief ranks the country’s 25 largest metropolitan areas as well as the nation’s largest racial and ethnic groups in terms of youth disconnection. Key findings include the following:
- Big gaps separate major metro areas; in bottom-ranked Phoenix, 19 percent of young people are disconnected from the worlds of work and school, whereas in Boston, which tops the chart, only about 9 percent are.
- African American young people have the highest rate of youth disconnection, 22.5 percent nationally. In Pittsburgh, Seattle, Detroit, and Phoenix, more than one in four African American young people are disconnected.
- Young men are slightly more likely to be disconnected than young women, a reversal of the situation found in decades past. The situation varies by race and ethnicity, however. The gender gap is largest among African Americans; nationally, 26 percent of African American male youth are disconnected, compared to 19 percent of their female counterparts.
- Youth disconnection mirrors adult disconnection: household poverty rates and the employment and educational status of adults in a community are strongly associated with youth disconnection.
- Where a young person lives is highly predictive of his or her likelihood of disconnection. The findings break down youth disconnection by neighborhoods within cities. The disparities between wealthy and poor communities are striking. For example, in New York, disconnection rates range from 3.7 percent in parts of Long Island to 35.6 percent in parts of the South Bronx.
The report concludes with a set of recommendations for preventing youth disconnection, including moving beyond the “college-for-all” mantra to provide meaningful support and guidance both to young people aiming for a four-year bachelor’s degree and to those whose interests and career aspirations would be better served by relevant, high-quality career and technical education certificates and associate’s degrees.
Bike Sharing in the United States: State of the Practice and Guide to Implementation
Bike Sharing in the United States: State of the Practice and Guide to Implementation (PDF)
Source: Federal Highway Administration
With the introduction of new and more advanced bike sharing programs, and the continued interest and political support for them throughout many U.S. cities, it is important to provide an objective analysis of bike share programs, and to document early lessons learned.
This guide is intended to serve as a resource for transportation planning professionals, as well as public officials considering implementation of a bike sharing program. The guide presents a snapshot of current municipal bike share systems where local jurisdictions (including cities, counties, etc.) are engaged in the funding, managing, administering and/or permitting of bike share implementing practices.
The objectives of this guide are to:
• Define bike sharing and provide an overview of the concept.
• Describe the steps a jurisdiction should take to plan, implement, and sustain a bike share program.
• Document existing models of provision, infrastructure considerations, and funding options for successfully implementing a bike sharing program.
• Describe metrics for monitoring and evaluating program success.
• Provide a baseline documentation of existing bike share programs in the United States in 2012.
Education, Job Openings, and Unemployment in Metropolitan America
Education, Job Openings, and Unemployment in Metropolitan America
Source: Brookings Institution
This paper aims to provide metro, state, and national policy makers with a better sense of the specific problems facing metropolitan labor markets. First, the analysis examines trends in the demand for educated labor and how a gap between education supply and demand is related to unemployment. Next, it attempts to distinguish between cyclical and structural effects before turning to an explanation of how an education gap might affect both by limiting job creation. It concludes with a discussion of the implications of these findings for public policy.
Where do American Cities Rank in Eighth Annual “Allstate America’s Best Drivers Report™?”
Where do American Cities Rank in Eighth Annual "Allstate America’s Best Drivers Report™?"
Source: Allstate
The Allstate Insurance Company (NYSE: ALL) today released its eighth annual "Allstate America’s Best Drivers Report™." The report, based on Allstate claims data, ranks America’s 200* largest cities in terms of car collision frequency to identify which cities have the safest drivers.
This year’s top honor of "America’s Safest Driving City" is Sioux Falls, South Dakota, the fifth time in the history of the report that the city has held the top spot. According to the report, the average driver in Sioux Falls will experience an auto collision every 13.8 years, which is 27.6 percent less likely than the national average of 10 years.
Education, Job Openings, and Unemployment in Metropolitan America
Education, Job Openings, and Unemployment in Metropolitan America
Source: Brookings Institution
This paper aims to provide metro, state, and national policy makers with a better sense of the specific problems facing metropolitan labor markets. First, the analysis examines trends in the demand for educated labor and how a gap between education supply and demand is related to unemployment. Next, it attempts to distinguish between cyclical and structural effects before turning to an explanation of how an education gap might affect both by limiting job creation. It concludes with a discussion of the implications of these findings for public policy.
Benchmarks for Blight: How much blight does New Orleans have?
Benchmarks for Blight: How much blight does New Orleans have?
Source: Greater New Orleans Community Data Center
As of March 2012, there are an estimated 35,700 blighted homes and empty lots in New Orleans, down from 43,755 in September 2010, as indicated by United States Postal Service (USPS) data. The continued reduction in blight since 2010 is attributable to a strong economy and ongoing population growth complemented by the focused efforts of city agencies to bring properties into compliance. However, the City will need to begin coordinating citywide data collection efforts to track blight going forward, as USPS data will provide less reliable indicators over time.
Discovering Regions of Different Functions in a City Using Human Mobility and POIs
Discovering Regions of Different Functions in a City Using Human Mobility and POIs
Source: Microsoft Research
The development of a city gradually fosters different functional regions, such as educational areas and business districts. In this paper, we propose a framework (titled DRoF) that discovers Regions of different Functions in a city using both human mobility among regions and points of interests (POIs) located in a region. Specifically, we segment a city into disjointed regions according to major roads, such as highways and urban express ways. We infer the functions of each region using a topic-based inference model, which regards a region as a document, a function as a topic, categories of POIs (e.g., restaurants and shopping malls) as metadata (like authors, affiliations, and key words), and human mobility patterns (when people reach/leave a region and where people come from and leave for) as words. As a result, a region is represented by a distribution of functions, and a function is featured by a distribution of mobility patterns. We further identify the intensity of each function in different locations. The results generated by our framework can benefit a variety of applications, including urban planning, location choosing for a business, and social recommendations. We evaluated our method using large-scale and real-world datasets, consisting of two POI datasets of Beijing (in 2010 and 2011) and two 3-month GPS trajectory datasets (representing human mobility) generated by over 12,000 taxicabs in Beijing in 2010 and 2011 respectively. The results justify the advantages of our approach over baseline methods solely using POIs or human mobility.
22 Benefits of Urban Street Trees
22 Benefits of Urban Street Trees (PDF)
U.S Forest Service facts and figures and new traffic safety studies detail many urban street tree benefits. Once seen as highly problematic for many reasons, street trees are proving to be a great value to people living, working, shopping, socializing, walking and motoring in, around and through urban places.For a planting cost of $250-600 (includes first 3 years of maintenance) a single street tree returns over $90,000 of direct benefits (not including aesthetic, social and natural) in the lifetime of the tree. Street trees (generally planted from 4 feet to 8 feet from curbs) provide many benefits to those streets they occupy. These trees provide so many benefits that they should always be considered as an urban area default street making feature. With new attentions being paid to global warming, the need for energy independence, and more urban living more is becoming known about the many negative environmental impacts of treeless urban streets. We are well on the way to recognizing the need for urban street trees to be the default design, rather than a luxury item to be tolerated by traffic engineering and budget conscious city administrators.
Ten Steps to Delivering a Successful Metro Export Plan
Ten Steps to Delivering a Successful Metro Export Plan
Source: Brookings Institution
Many leaders in states, cities, and metropolitan areas across the country are exploring ways to help their firms tap into expanding markets worldwide to grow jobs at home. This brief serves as a how-to-guide for private, nonprofit, and government leaders in metro areas who are interested in developing effective action-oriented metropolitan export plans and initiatives customized to their region’s unique assets and capacities. It builds on lessons learned from a one-year pilot (2011–2012) where the Metropolitan Policy Program at Brookings collaborated with leaders in four metro areas to develop localized export plans.
Making a Successful LRT-Based Regional Transit System: Lessons from Five New Start Cities
Making a Successful LRT-Based Regional Transit System: Lessons from Five New Start Cities (PDF)
Source: Journal of Public Transportation
This paper examines five metropolitan areas where light rail transit (LRT) lines serve as regional transit backbones. The paper defines a successful LRT-based regional transit system as one with high riding habit and productivity for all combined modes in each metropolitan area, and as also having high LRT ridership and productivity. Based on these criteria, Portland emerges as a successful LRT-based regional transit system. Our analysis reveals three characteristics that explain the Portland transit system’s strong performance: the network’s dispersed nature, the overlay of a higherspeed, high-frequency regional LRT network atop the local bus system, and the use of transfers to provide passengers easy access to a diverse array of destinations. We examine the performance of all five metropolitan areas with respect to these characteristics using a combination of agency data and insights from interviews with key informants.
World Cities Culture Report 2012
World Cities Culture Report 2012 (PDF)
Source: Mayor of London (UK)
The Mayor of London’s World Cities Culture Report 2012 is the biggest international survey of its kind. It has collected an unprecedented amount of data on the scope and impact of the cultural assets and activities that are produced and consumed in 12 major cities:
Berlin
Istanbul
Johannesburg
London
Mumbai
New York
Paris
São Paulo
Shanghai
Singapore
Sydney
Tokyo
Using 60 indicators and reports from each of the participating cities, the World Cities Culture Report 2012 shows that culture is seen as important as finance and trade and sits at the heart of public policy.
U.S. Metro Economies: Outlook – Gross Metropolitan Product, and Critical Role of Transportation Infrastructure
U.S. Metro Economies: Outlook – Gross Metropolitan Product, and Critical Role of Transportation Infrastructure
Source: U.S. Conference of Mayors
From press release (PDF):
A new report released today by The U.S. Conference of Mayors (USCM) shows that the nation’s cities and their metro areas continue to make steady progress toward economic recovery, while sounding a warning alarm that failure to dramatically increase investment in transportation infrastructure could cause skyrocketing costs to families, commuters and businesses, potentially doubling over the next decade.
The report examines the impact that population increases, employment growth, export expansion and economic output will have on metropolitan areas.
The report forecasts that by the end of 2012, 300 of the nation’s 363 metro areas will experience real economic growth (gross metro product), and predicts that over the remainder of the year the nation’s economy will see 1.4 percent increase in employment and a real GDP growth of 2.0 percent. Prepared by IHS Global Insight, the report also projects that household budgets will receive a boost from falling gas prices that are expected to decline to $3.11/gallon by the fall.
America’s Racially Diverse Suburbs: Opportunities and Challenges
America’s Racially Diverse Suburbs: Opportunities and Challenges (PDF)
Source: Institute on Metropolitan Opportunity (University of Minnesota)
From press release:
Racially diverse suburbs are growing faster than white suburbs, but resegregation threatens their prosperity and stability, according to a study entitled, "America’s Racially Diverse Suburbs: Opportunities and Challenges," released this week by the Institute on Metropolitan Opportunity at the University of Minnesota Law School.
Long perceived as predominantly prosperous white enclaves, suburbs are now at the cutting edge of racial, ethnic and political change in America. The study finds the number of racially diverse suburbs, municipalities ranging from 20-60 percent non-white, increased from 1,006 to 1,376 between 2000 and 2010 in the 50 largest U.S. metropolitan areas (a 37 percent increase). Fully 44 percent of suburban residents in these areas now live in racially diverse communities, up from 38 percent in 2000. Moreover, racially diverse suburbs are growing faster than white suburbs, and the number of diverse neighborhoods in suburbs is now more than twice the number found in central cities.
"Diverse suburbs represent some of the nation’s greatest hopes and its gravest challenges," says study co-author Myron Orfield, director of the Institute on Metropolitan Opportunity. "The rapidly growing diversity of suburban communities suggests a degree of declining racial bias and at least the partial success of fair housing laws. But the fragile demographic stability in these newly diverse suburbs presents serious challenges for local, state and federal governments."
The Search for Skills: Demand for H-1B Immigrant Workers in U.S. Metropolitan Areas
The Search for Skills: Demand for H-1B Immigrant Workers in U.S. Metropolitan Areas
Source: Brookings Institution
An analysis of the geography of H-1B visa requests — particularly in the metropolitan areas with the highest demand between 2001 and 2011 — reveals that:
Demand for H-1B workers has fluctuated with economic and political cycles over the last decade and reflects a wide range of employers’ needs for high-skilled temporary workers.
Employer requests have exceeded the number of visas issued every year except from 2001 to 2003 when the annual cap was temporarily raised from 65,000 to 195,000. Employers requesting the most H-1B visas are large companies subject to the cap specializing in information technology, consulting, and electronics manufacturing. Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) occupations account for almost two-thirds of requests for H-1B workers; healthcare, finance, business, and life sciences occupations are also in high demand. Over the last decade the federal government has distributed about $1 billion from H-1B visa fees to fund programs to address skills shortages in the U.S. workforce.
One hundred and six metropolitan areas had at least 250 requests for H-1B workers in the 2010–2011 period, accounting for 91 percent of all requests but only 67 percent of the national workforce.
Considerable variation exists among these metro areas in the number of workers requested and the ratio of requests to the size of the total metro workforce. On average, there were 3.3 requests for H-1Bs per 1,000 workers in these 106 metro areas, compared to 2.4 for the nation as a whole.
Metropolitan areas vary by the number of employers using the H-1B program and the cap status of the employers.
Demand in corporate metro areas (such as Columbus, IN and Seattle, WA) comes predominantly from private employers subject to the annual visa cap, while in research metro areas (such as Durham, NC and Ann Arbor, MI), the demand is driven by universities and other research institutions exempted from the cap. In mixed metro areas (such as Atlanta, GA and Trenton, NJ), a variety of employers are demanding temporary highskilled foreign workers.In 92 of the 106 high demand metropolitan areas, STEM occupations accounted for more than half of all requests.
Computer occupations were the most highly requested occupation group in all but 11 metros of the 106 high-demand metros, where engineering, healthcare practitioners, and postsecondary teachers were more requested. Metropolitan areas also vary on occupational concentration, ranging from 74 occupation groups requested in the New York metro area, to 15 groups requested in Bloomington, IL.H-1B visa fees designated for skills training and STEM education have not been proportionately distributed to metro areas requesting the highest number of H-1B workers.
Metropolitan areas with a high demand for H-1B workers are only receiving $3.09 on average per working age person 16 years or older of the technical skills training grants compared to $15.26 for metros that have a lower demand for H-1Bs from 2001-2011. STEM education funds are similarly distributed with the high H-1B metros receiving only $1.00 per working age person 16 years or older compared to $14.10 in the low H-1B metros.
Traffic Forecasts Ignoring Induced Demand: a Shaky Fundament for Cost-Benefit Analyses
Traffic Forecasts Ignoring Induced Demand: a Shaky Fundament for Cost-Benefit Analyses
Source: European Journal of Transport and Infrastructure Research
Although the phenomenon of induced traffic has been theorized for more than 60 years and is now widely accepted among transport researchers, the traffic-generating effects of road capacity expansion are still often neglected in transport modelling. Such omission can lead to serious bias in the assessments of environmental impacts as well as the economic viability of proposed road projects, especially in situations where there is a latent demand for more road capacity. This has been illustrated in the present paper by an assessment of travel time savings, environmental impacts and the economic performance of a proposed road project in Copenhagen with and without short-term induced traffic included in the transport model. The available transport model was not able to include long-term induced traffic resulting from changes in land use and in the level of service of public transport. Even though the model calculations included only a part of the induced traffic, the difference in cost-benefit results compared to the model excluding all induced traffic was substantial. The results show lower travel time savings, more adverse environmental impacts and a considerably lower benefit-cost ratio when induced traffic is partly accounted for than when it is ignored. By exaggerating the economic benefits of road capacity increase and underestimating its negative effects, omission of induced traffic can result in over-allocation of public money on road construction and correspondingly less focus on other ways of dealing with congestion and environmental problems in urban areas.
See: Study of the Day: Planners Miscalculate Benefits of New Roads (The Atlantic: Cities)
Climate Change and Infrastructure, Urban Systems, and Vulnterabilities: Technical Report to the U.S. Department of Energy in Support of the National Climate Assessment
Climate Change and Infrastructure, Urban Systems, and Vulnterabilities: Technical Report to the U.S. Department of Energy in Support of the National Climate Assessment (PDF)
Source: Oak Ridge National Laboratory
This Technical Report on “Climate Change and Infrastructure, Urban Systems, and Vulnerabilities” has been prepared for the U.S. Department of Energy by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in support of the U.S. National Climate Assessment (NCA). Prepared on an accelerated schedule to fit time requirements for the NCA, it is a summary of the currently existing knowledge base on its topic, nested within a broader framing of issues and questions that need further attention in the longer run.
The report arrives at a number of “assessment findings,” each associated with an evaluation of the level of consensus on that issue within the expert community, the volume of evidence available to support that judgment, and the section of the report that provides an explanation for the finding.
Cross-sectoral issues related to infrastructures and urban systems have not received a great deal of attention to date in research literatures in general and climate change assessments in particular. As a result, this technical report is breaking new ground as a component of climate change vulnerability and impact assessments in the U.S., which means that some of its assessment findings are rather speculative, more in the nature of propositions for further study than specific conclusions that are offered with a high level of confidence and research support. But it is a start in addressing questions that are of interest to many policymakers and stakeholders.
A central theme of the report is that vulnerabilities and impacts are issues beyond physical infrastructures themselves. The concern is with the value of services provided by infrastructures, where the true consequences of impacts and disruptions involve not only the costs associated with the clean-up, repair, and/or replacement of affected infrastructures but also economic, social, and environmental effects as supply chains are disrupted, e
