Transit Oriented Design

[Transit Slug]

Hello All,

I have a question for you. I work for the Harrisburg, PA region and we will be having a regional rail line opening within about a year and a half. Right now the major work being done is on station design and the responsibility of teaching the politicians around here about Transit Oriented Design has befallen me. Anyone out there know:

1) Good websites, articles, and books on TOD and what cities provide good examples of TOD development, and

2) Much harder, how do you present the concepts of higher density and minimal parking areas in ways that will not scare sprawling suburbia officials S**tless! :-D

Thanks!

 

[Cardinal]

Some of the suburbs in the Chicago area have done a very good job of creating "suburban" transit-oriented development. The city I grew up in, Glenview, is a good example. They have redeveloped a good part of the old downtown with higher density. A little further north, The Glen at Glenview is a redevelopment of a closed air base. It is a somewhat New Urbanist suburban TOD. Still further north, Deerfield has also done a bit of redevelopment. These are all upper-income communities, and the residents have not been scared by the changes. I would guess that a quick Google would get you some good information on any of these.

 

[mendelman]

I will extend Cardinal's suggestion and you should contact Palatine, IL. They are doing a great job of creating and developing a TOD around their METRA stop.

 

[Seabishop]

For an example of a town who's efforts at creating a TOD have been recently derailed by vocal suburbanites afraid of slum density and higher taxes contact Kingston, MA.

 

[Howard Roark]

Look for anything published by Peter Calthorpe, he is one of the leading authorities on TOD's. Somewhat of a new urbanist, but diverges for CNU in several areas.

 

[boilerplater]

Its been done, somehow

New Jersey Transit has an active TOD program where they had designers do plans for station areas. Ehrenkrantz & Eckstut recently did a design for the for a station in a suburban area near Trenton. Look on the website, njtransit.org. I was involved with a charrette for a station in Cherry Hill, NJ, but I can't recall the name of the guy from NJ Transit we worked with.

 

[Planderella]

I've been working on TOD for the past 2 years. A simple Google search will yield some pretty useful websites, but if you're hardpressed, try Denver's Regional Transportation District website. They have very good information.

 

[Michele Zone]

Hello All,
1) Good websites, articles, and books on TOD and what cities provide good examples of TOD development, and

2) Much harder, how do you present the concepts of higher density and minimal parking areas in ways that will not scare sprawling suburbia officials S**tless! :-D

Thanks!

To answer question 2: I have attended some "smart growth" and transit workshops and I no longer remember if it was a booklet I picked at one of them or exactly what, but I do remember that someone said they used pictures to demonstrate densities and that helped a lot to get across the idea of what they meant in a non-threatening way. Some examples: you can increase "density" by 10% by adding a "mother-in-law suite" or "apartment over the garage" to one in 10 houses in a neighborhood. This is not viewed by people as substantially changing the character or the neighborhood away from "suburban". Also, they took pictures of "garden apartments" that were X number of unites per acre or whatever and labeled them with the densities. The numbers can sound a lot more upsetting than pictures of nice apartment complexes, "mother-in-law suites", etc.

Here is a URL for a pdf called "Getting to Smart Growth: 100 Policies for Implementation". I used it when researching a rail plan for a school project and I know I quoted some of its comments about transportation. It might be useful. http://www.smartgrowth.org/pdf/gettosg.pdf