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SCHOOL OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS UCLA

Geography M149/Urban Planning M150 Winter 2011

Transportation Geography

Meetings: Mondays and Wednesdays, 10:30am to 11:50 am (except for King
DayJan. 16and Presidents DayFeb. 20)

Room: Dodd 167

Instructor: Eric Morris

Office: 6265 Public Affairs Building
Mailbox: PAB third floor faculty mail room
Telephone: 818-625-3987
E-mail: eamorris@ucla.edu
Office Hours: Wed. 1:00-2:30, or by appointment

TA: Stephen Brumbaugh

Office: 6248 Public Affairs Building
Mailbox: PAB third floor student mail room
Telephone: 310-867-9548
E-mail: stephen.brumbaugh@gmail.com
Office Hours: Tu. 1-3

Website: Access through my.ucla.edu


Course Description

On average, each of us spends about an hour and twenty minutes a day traveling, making it one
of our most common activities. So it should come as no surprise that transportation geography
has tremendous implications for levels ranging from the personal (time use and activity patterns),
to the regional (urban land use and congestion), to the national (the gas tax and federal
transportation expenditures), and even to the global (greenhouse gas emissions). This course will
provide a broad overview of travel and transportation from many different perspectives: social,
economic, political, psychological, and geographical.

Has our reliance on the auto caused urban sprawl, or is it an effect of it? Can investments in
transportation projects like high-speed rail improve mobility, create jobs and foster economic
growth? What causes traffic congestion, and is there any cure for it? How do the costs and

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benefits of transportation fall on different groupsby gender, race, monetary means, and
location (suburban versus urban, state versus state, and nation versus nation)and are there
patterns of inequity which should be addressed? What factors contribute to differences in where,
why, how, and how much people travel? What is the future of transportation worldwide, and
what does it mean for the environment?

These are just a few of the questions we will explore in this course. While we will spend some
time looking at travel between cities, goods movement, and travel in other countries, the focus of
the course is on personal transportation in U.S. metropolitan areas and the central role of
transportation in shaping cities and the lives of people in them. The course is both historical and
topical; we will examine the tandem evolution of transportation systems and urban form, but will
also devote considerable time and discussion to current transportation issues such as congestion
and air quality.

The course is introductory and assumes no prior knowledge of transportation, urban planning, or
geography.

Topics Covered in Course

Specific topics covered in this course include:

The historical tandem evolution of transportation and urban form
Why freeways? The development of metropolitan highway systems
Planning for bikes and pedestrians
The powerful effects of parking policy
How does transportation shape land use and the built environment? And how is it shaped
by them?
Transportation, sprawl and smart growth
How much do we travel, where do we travel, when do we travel, how do we travel, and
why?
How do we predict the impact of transportation projects and our future transportation
needs? And do we do it right?
Why are cities so congested? And can we solve the congestion problem?
Public transit, past and present
Is high-speed rail a good idea?
Ports, airports and goods movement
Who pays for transportation, how do we pay for it, and are we doing it the best way?
Can transportation investments promote economic growth?
My fare sharetransportation, equity, and social justice
Transportation and poverty
Transportation and the environment
Transportation around the world
The future of transportation: cars, transit, and technology


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Course Requirements

There are five parts to this course: 1) class lectures and discussion, (2) readings, (3) quizzes, (4) a
group Fieldwork Paper, and (5) a Policy Analysis term paper. Each is described below.

Congrats: no final exam!

Class Lectures and Discussion: Discussion and interaction will be an important part of the
course, and participation will be one factor in determining your final grade. Thus it is important
that you do the readings and attend class. To encourage attendance and note-taking, I will not be
posting lecture powerpoints prior to the quizzes.

Readings: The required book for this course is:

Hanson, Susan and Genevieve Giuliano, Editors (2004). The Geography of Urban
Transportation, Third Edition. New York: The Guilford Press.

This book is available from the LuValle Commons bookstore or from most on-line book retailers
like Amazon.com. All the remaining required readings are available online. Many readings are
from Access magazine and can be accessed at http://www.uctc.net/access/access.asp. In cases
where I dont list a URL, simply Google Scholar the article title and go from there. For
readings that are gated, you will have to go to the UCLA library site and configure either a
proxy or a VPN (this will also be helpful when you write your papers, and in other courses as
well).

You will be expected to do the required readings prior to each class and to be ready to contribute
to class discussion.

Bi-Weekly Quizzes: To encourage you to keep up with the lectures and readings there will be a
short quiz at the end of class every other Wednesday, starting at the end of week 2.

Dates for the quizzes will be:

January 18
February 1
February 15
February 29
March 14

Each of the five weekly quizzes will cover material in all of the required readings for the
previous two weeks, plus material presented in class lectures and discussions.

The quizzes will be comprised of about 8-10 multiple choice questions and shouldnt take more
than 15 minutes. Provided another class isnt forcing its way into the room, you may take extra

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time within reason.

Of the five quizzes, scores on the top four will be used in computing your grade. That means you
can miss one quiz entirely and not have it count against you.

Written Assignments: There are two major written assignments for this course, a Fieldwork
Paper to be completed in teams of three and a Policy Analysis essay to be completed on your
own. Descriptions of each of these assignments and the topics from which you may choose are
below. The Policy Analysis will allow you to study one of the topics we cover in the course,
analyze the issues based on your reasoning and the evidence, reach your own conclusions, and
suggest policies designed to improve the functioning of the transportation system and its broader
urban context. The Fieldwork Paper will give you a chance to get out and study LAs
transportation system firsthand, analyze it, and draw conclusions about how our system functions
(or fails to function!).

These assignments should be turned into Stephens mailbox on 2/13/12 for the Fieldwork Paper
and on 3/19/12 for the Policy Analysis. Hardcopy only. Stephens box is in the mail room off the
student lounge at the end of the hall down from the Urban Planning office. The papers will be
due at 4:00 pm. This cut-off time will be strictly enforced, so please leave extra time if you plan
to get stuck in traffic, get lost wandering around the building, etc. Late papers will be
accepted, but a penalty of 1/3 grade will be applied to any papers turned in after the due date and
time. The late penalty for assignments can be waived only with a written note from a clinical
medical professional (such as a doctor).


Course Grading

Grading will be determined as follows:

4 Quizzes (8.25% each) 33 percent

Policy Analysis Term Paper 33 percent

Fieldwork Paper 33 percent
________________________________________________________________
Total 100 percent

Grades on each quiz and assignment will be curved around a B+.


Class Sessions, Topics, and Readings

TOPIC 1: Course introduction (1/9)


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No reading.


TOPIC 2: The tandem evolution of transportation systems and urban form in the U.S.
(1/11 and 1/18)

Glaeser, Edward L. and Janet E. Kohlhase (2003). Cities, Regions and the
Decline of Transport Costs. Harvard Institute of Economic Research, Discussion
Paper 2014. Pages 1-53. [located at
http://www.economics.harvard.edu/pub/hier/2003/HIER2014.pdf]

[Dont panic that theres math here! You wont be expected to follow the proofs
of the propositions, just to understand the general argument.]

Webber, Melvin (2004). Editorial: Spread-City Everywhere, Access, 24: 1.

Muller, Peter O. (2004). Transportation and Urban form: Stages in the Spatial
Evolution of the American Metropolis, in The Geography of Urban
Transportation, Third Edition, Susan Hanson and Genevieve Giuliano, Editors.
New York: The Guilford Press. Pages 59-85.


HOLIDAY: January 16 (King Day)


TOPIC 3: Planning for pedestrians and bikers (1/23)

Guest Speaker: Ryan Snyder

Grava, Sigurd (2003). Walking, in Urban Transportation Systems: Choices for
Communities. New York: McGraw-Hill. Pages 13-57. [located at
http://www.accessengineeringlibrary.com/mghpdf/0071449485_ar002.pdf]

Grava, Sigurd (2003). Bicycles, in Urban Transportation Systems: Choices for
Communities. New York: McGraw-Hill. Pages 59-103. [located at
http://www.accessengineeringlibrary.com/mghpdf/0071449485_ar002.pdf]


TOPIC 4: Parking (1/25)

Guest speaker: Donald Shoup

No reading


TOPIC 5: Transportation and land use: contemporary issues

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1/30 and 2/1

Giuliano, Genevieve (2004). Land Use Impacts of Transportation Investments:
Highway and Transit, in The Geography of Urban Transportation, Third
Edition, Susan Hanson and Genevieve Giuliano, Editors. New York: The Guilford
Press. Pages 237-273.

Ewing, Reid and Robert Cervero (2001). Travel and the Built Environment: A
Synthesis. Transportation Research Record, 1780, 87-114.

Crane, Randall (1998). Travel by Design? Access, 12: 2-7.

Levine, Jonathan (1999). Access to Choice, Access, 14: 16-19

Smart Growth America (2010). Read all items in the Issues section [located at
http://www.smartgrowthamerica.org/what-is-smart-growth] and click through to
further research on topics you find interesting.

Bertaud, Alain (2002). Clearing the Air in Atlanta: Transit and Smart Growth or
Conventional Economics? Pages 1-22. [located at http://alain-
bertaud.com/images/AB_Clearing_The_Air_in%20Atlanta_1.pdf]

Richardson, Harry and Peter Gordon (1997). Are compact cities a desirable
planning goal? Journal of the American Planning Association, 63(1), 95-106.

Ewing, Reid (1997). Is Los Angeles-style sprawl desirable? Journal of the
American Planning Association, 63(1), 107-126.


TOPIC 6: Congestion (2/6-2/8)

Taylor, Brian D. (2002). Rethinking Congestion, Access, 21: 8-16.

Downs, Anthony (2004). Why Traffic Congestion Is Here to Stay... and
Will Get Worse, Access, 25: 19-25.
Varaiya, Pravin (2005). What We've Learned About Highway Congestion,
Access, 27: 2-9.

Boarnet, Marlon (2008). Transportation Infrastructure and Sustainable
Development: New Planning Approaches for Urban Growth, Access, 33: 27-33.


TOPIC 7: Travel Demographics, Behavior, Modeling, and Well-Being (2/13-2/15)


Guest speakers: John Muggridge and Kevin Johnson of Fehr & Peers

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Pucher, John, and John L. Renne (2003). Socioeconomics of Urban Travel:
Evidence from the 2001 NHTS, Transportation Quarterly, 57: 349-377. [located
at http://nhts.ornl.gov/2001/articles/socioeconomicsOfUrbanTravel.pdf]



HOLIDAY: Monday February 20 (Presidents Day)


TOPIC 8: Public Transportation (2/22-2/27)

Pucher, John (2004). Public Transportation, in The Geography of Urban
Transportation, Third Edition, Susan Hanson and Genevieve Giuliano,
Editors. New York: The Guilford Press. Pages 199-236.

Slater, Cliff (1997). General Motors and the Demise of Streetcars,
Transportation Quarterly, 51(3): 45-66. [located in two parts at:
http://www.heartland.org/custom/semod_policybot/pdf/7667.pdf
and http://www.heartland.org/custom/semod_policybot/pdf/7668.pdf]


TOPIC 9: Ports, airports, rail, shipping and goods movement (2/29)

Guest speaker: Eric Shen of the Port of Long Beach

Leinbach, Thomas R. (2004). City Interactions, in The Geography of Urban
Transportation, Third Edition, Susan Hanson and Genevieve Giuliano, Editors.
New York: The Guilford Press. Pages 30-58.
Hummels, David (2007). Transportation Costs and International Trade in the
Second Era of Globalization, Journal of Economic Perspectives, 21(3), 131-154.

Government Accountability Office (2009). High Speed Passenger Rail: Future
Development Will Depend on Addressing Financial and Other Challenges and
Establishing a Clear Federal Role. Washington DC: Government Accountability
Office. Pages 1-57. [located at http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d09317.pdf]

California High Speed Rail Authority (2010). Frequently Asked Questions.
[located at http://www.cahighspeedrail.ca.gov/faqs.aspx]

OToole, Randal (2009). High-Speed Rail is not Interstate 2.0. Cato Institute
Briefing Paper 113. [located at
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=10505]


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Ed Glaesers series in the New York Times:

Is High-Speed Rail a Good Public Investment? July 28, 2009. [located
at: http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/28/is-high-speed-rail-a-
good-public-investment/?scp=3&sq=high+speed+rail&st=nyt]

Running the Numbers on High-Speed Trains. August 4, 2009. [located
at: http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/04/running-the-numbers-
on-high-speed-trains/?scp=6&sq=high+speed+rail&st=nyt]

How Big are the Environmental Benefits of High-Speed Rail? August
12, 2009. [located at:
http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/12/how-big-are-the-
environmental-benefits-of-high-speed-
rail/?scp=1&sq=high+speed+rail&st=nyt]

What Would High-Speed Rail do to Suburban Sprawl August 18, 2009.
[located at: http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/18/what-would-
high-speed-rail-do-to-suburban-
sprawl/?scp=2&sq=high+speed+rail&st=nyt]

California Legislative Analysts Office (2011). High-Speed Rail is at a Critical
Juncture. [located at
http://www.lao.ca.gov/reports/2011/trns/high_speed_rail/high_speed_rail_051011
.aspx]


TOPIC 10: Transportation Finance/Economics (3/5)

Taylor, Brian D. (2004). The Geography of Urban Transportation Finance, in
The Geography of Urban Transportation, Third Edition, Susan Hanson and
Genevieve Giuliano, Editors. New York: The Guilford Press. Pages 294-331.

Delucchi, Mark (2000). Should We Try to Get the Prices Right? Access, 16: 14-
21. [located at http://www.uctc.net/access/access16.pdf]

Schweitzer, Lisa and Brian D. Taylor (2010). Just Road Pricing. Access, 36: 2-
7. [located at http://www.uctc.net/access/36/access36.pdf]

T. R. Lakshmanan and Lata R. Chatterjee (2005). Economic Consequences of
Transport Improvements, Access, 26: 28-33. [located at:
http://www.uctc.net/access/26/Access%2026%20-%2006%20-
%20Economic%20Consequences%20of%20Transport%20Improvements.pdf]


TOPIC 11: Transportation and Equity/Poverty (3/7)

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Deka, Devajyoti (2004). Social and Environmental Justice Issues in
Transportation, in The Geography of Urban Transportation, Third Edition,
Susan Hanson and Genevieve Giuliano, Editors. New York: The Guilford Press.
Pages 332-355.

Ong, Paul and Douglas Houston (2002). The Access Almanac: Travel Patterns
Among Welfare Recipients, Access, 21: 40-41.

Blumenberg, Evelyn (2003). The Access Almanac: Transportation Costs and
Economic Opportunity Among the Poor, Access, 23: 40-41.

Ong, Paul (2004). The Access Almanac: Auto Insurance Redlining in the Inner
City, Access, 25: 40-41.

Glaeser, E.L., M.E. Kahn and J. Rappaport (2008). Why Do the Poor Live in
Cities? Journal of Urban Economics, 63: 1-24.
[located at: http://www.economics.harvard.edu/pub/hier/2000/HIER1891.pdf]


TOPIC 12: Global Comparisons/Transportation and the Environment (3/12)

Greene, David L. (2004). Transportation and Energy, in The Geography
of Urban Transportation, Third Edition, Susan Hanson and Genevieve
Giuliano, Editors. New York: The Guilford Press. Pages 274-293.

Bae, Chang-Hee Christine (2004). Transportation and the Environment,
in The Geography of Urban Transportation, Third Edition, Susan Hanson
and Genevieve Giuliano, Editors. New York: The Guilford Press. Pages
356-381.

Schipper, Lee (2009). Moving Forward With Fuel Economy Standards,Access,
34: 11-19.

Cervero, Robert (2001). Informal Transit: Learning From the Developing
World, Access, 18: 15-22.

Sperling, Daniel and Eileen Claussen (2004). Motorizing the Developing
World, Access, 24: 10-15.

TOPIC 13: The Future of Transportation/Final Thoughts (3/14)

Janelle, Donald G. (2004). Impact of Information Technologies, in The
Geography of Urban Transportation, Third Edition, Susan Hanson and
Genevieve Giuliano, Editors. New York: The Guilford Press. Pages 86-112.


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Giuliano, Genevieve, with Susan Hanson (2004). Managing the Auto,
in The Geography of Urban Transportation, Third Edition, Susan Hanson
and Genevieve Giuliano, Editors. New York: The Guilford Press. Pages
382-403.


Written Assignments

Fieldwork Paper

The Fieldwork Paper is designed to give you a chance to roll up your sleeves, get out into the
world, and learn something about transportation in the city you live in. You and two partners
must choose one of the following assignment options and write an 8-12 page memo (not
including bibliography, pictures, etc.). The paper must use double spacing, one-inch margins,
and 12-point type. Its pretty obvious when people cheat on the margins, so dont bother trying to
trick us

If you need help finding partners, post a message on the course discussion board telling others
which of the assignments you are most interested in completing. If worse comes to worst we
might be able to help you.

As with the Policy Analysis paper, it is not necessary to mechanically address every single point
raised in the assignments below, but it is strongly advised that you cover the large majority of the
suggested issues.

Option 1: Parking at UCLA

Clark Kerr, first chancellor of the UC system, once said the purpose of a university is to
provide sex for the students, sports for the alumni, and parking for the faculty. In
UCLAs case, it is arguable whether the university is getting the parking (or the sports,
for that matter) right. Despite the fact that UCLA is almost tops in the nation in terms of
having the most on-campus parking spaces, many (particularly undergraduates) are still
unhappy with the current situation. In the past, political fur has flied over the way the
school creates and allocates parking; for example, there has been widespread cheating on
parking permit applications.

For this paper, you are to analyze parking at UCLA and give recommendations for how
it is to be developed in the future. First, give a brief history of how we have dealt with
parking on campus in the past. What has been the universitys traditional strategy? How
much has it cost? Next, give a snapshot of how parking is handled today. How many
spaces are there? Who gets them? Who pays for what and how much? What are the
current plans for the future?

Next, give your analysis of the performance of the current system.


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Are there enough spaces (using your reasoned definition of enough)
Is the system economically efficient and cost-effective?
Is the current system of charging for parking equitable and effective?
Is the permit system successful?
Is the allocation of spaces fair?

In addition to examining the parking system per se, you should also consider other
alternatives that seek to manage demand for campus parking, such as BruinGo!, the
program for reduced transit fares for UCLA students which has been the subject of
considerable controversy.

In terms of research, you should examine past parking plans that have been compiled by
the university. The Daily Bruin archives might be of interest. You might want to walk a
parking structure or two, noting things like its occupancy rates, design characteristics,
distribution of spaces by permit type, or anything else you think might be of interest.
You should also interview at least one person from Parking Services about current
operations and future plans, and for a different perspective look at the work of Donald
Shoup of the urban planning department (his ideas are here
<http://shoup.bol.ucla.edu/PoliticsAndEconomicsOfCampusParking.pdf> --and he will
be speaking in class). In terms of research on BruinGo!, two studies that reach very
different conclusions (one from Parking Services, performed by Crain and Associates,
and one from Shoup and others) appear at <http://www.its.ucla.edu/research/UA>.

Finally, give your thoughts about the future. Do we have too much parking, not enough,
or just right? Should we build new structures? Should we change the way parking is
priced and allocated? Is promoting transit use instead of driving a viable alternative? Is
the system working well enough that we should just leave it alone?


Option 2: Comparing Two Modes of Travel

Imagine you are a planner for the LA Department of Transportation and have been tasked
with making transportation improvements to an area. However, your superiors are
uncertain about which travel mode to focus on. Does the area suffer from extreme auto
congestion, making improvements for auto traffic circulation necessary? Or is the area
already too slanted towards cars, making improvements in the transit, walking or biking
systems more promising?

To do this analysis, pick a neighborhood with which you and your partners are familiar,
and write a memo comparing two travel modes in your study area. First, lay out what you
think the criteria for judging an area should be. Maximizing traffic flows? Providing
choice? Promoting the economic health of the area? Helping the environment?

Next, define your neighborhood boundaries, and explain why those boundaries were
chosen. Then proceed to comparing and contrasting two modes of travel that people use

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in the neighborhood. Questions you might want to consider are how much traffic does
each mode attract? Does the physical environment and density of your area favor one
mode over the other? What about the transportation infrastructure supports or discourages
each mode? Does each mode serve area stakeholders (drivers, pedestrians, stores,
employers) well? What are some of the problems with each mode, and what are the
advantages of using each mode? Do the two modes work well together in your area?

You are expected to supplement your report with pictures and support your position with
other evidence. For example, you may conduct surveys and interviews of travelers, local
merchants, etc.; inventory parking lots, sidewalks, crosswalks, left turn lanes, bicycle
lanes, transit stops and amenities, etc.; and/or include traffic or pedestrian or bicycle
counts at various times of the day. You may also wish to use census data (we can help
you with this) to determine some characteristics of the neighborhood.

Travel in the area using both modes and compare your experiences. Though this is not
required, you may also conduct historical research on the evolution of your neighborhood
to explain the how both modes have changed, or how the physical environment may have
developed to favor one mode over another. For example, if you were to choose
Westwood as one of your neighborhoods, you may ask how transportation has shaped the
adjacent areas development and density, how the area has changed in relation to the
campus, and how travel to and from the neighborhood has changed over time.

Finally, give your opinion on which mode your area needs to focus onThe automobile?
Transit? Walking? Biking?and give some ideas about how your area could be changed
to better serve that mode.

Option 3: Major Transportation Investments and NIMBYism: The Case of the Orange
Line

A common lament of transportation planners trying to get major transportation
investments approved and built is that the benefits of transportation projects are
distributed broadly across regions, but the negative impacts are often concentrated along
the proposed transportation corridor. The result of this geographic imbalance between
costs and benefits is frequently a highly motivated group of locals opposing a project, but
no organized constituency in its favor. The localized opposition to such projects is called
Not-In-My-Back-Yard-ism, or NIMBYism.

The Orange Line busway in the San Fernando Valley north of UCLA is a recent but
classic example of this phenomenon. The Los Angeles MTA explored plans to build a
major public transportation investment along an old railroad right-of-way in the Valley
from the 1980s on. However, community opposition derailed many proposals, including
subways and light rail. However, in 1999, the MTA tried again with a proposal for a bus
rapid transit project through the corridor; bus rapid transit, or BRT, is sometimes called
light rail on rubber tires. Community opposition to this alternative was intense,

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culminating in a lawsuit against the Environmental Impact Report (EIR) for the project.
Nevertheless, the MTA prevailed in the lawsuit and the project was constructed, opening
in October 2005. The project is generally regarded as a success relative to other major
transit investments, attracting, for example, more riders than the Gold Line light rail
between downtown Los Angeles and Pasadena at one-third the cost. However, do these
regional benefits in increased transit ridership outweigh the localized impacts (noise,
traffic disruption, safety, etc.) of building a busway through the neighborhoods in this
corridor?

For this memorandum, you should investigate the complaints of local residents as
recorded in the Final EIR as well as the responses of the planners working on the project.
Why were residents opposed to the project? How did planners propose to address their
complaints? You should also do your own investigation of the situation. Travel up to the
Orange Line, ride it, and record any evidence you might find that reinforces the
arguments of the opposition or the MTA. Take pictures as necessary to back up your
arguments, and cite articles from local newspapers, including the Los Angeles Times and
the Los Angeles Daily News, that include facts about how the Orange Line has
functioned. Finally, talk to least three people, either in the neighborhood along the
Busway, amongst the organizations listed as opposing the project in the Final EIR, or at
the MTA (no more than one MTA person) about their views on whether the issues were
resolved. Have they changed their minds now that the busway has been operating for
several years? Conclude you memo by describing what you think the right balance
between local impacts and regional benefits should be. Do you think the Orange Line has
achieved that balance?


Option 4: Bicycling in Los Angeles

The experience of the bicyclist is most profoundly felt at the level of micro-geography:
the physical design of the streets, the presence or absence of parked cars, turn lanes,
potholes, stop signs or traffic lights, driveways, and bicycle paths and lanes. Elements of
the street not noticed by the motorist may be major obstacles (or aids!) to the cyclist.
Your task in this assignment will be to investigate the experience of the cyclist at this
very fine grain.

In order to do this, you should first acquaint yourself with bicycle planning practices.
Consider what steps are being taken in Los Angeles to make the city more bicycle-
friendly. What about in other municipalities, such as Santa Monica? Do all cycling
advocates agree on the right kind of street design? For example, theres an ongoing
debate between, on one hand, cyclists who favor the creation of bicycle lanes and paths,
and on the other hand proponents of vehicular cycling (sharing lanes with cars). You
should explore the realm of bicycle-friendly transportation planning by reviewing Los
Angeles (and possibly other cities) bicycle infrastructure plans (ours is called the
Backbone Bikeway Network: <http://clkrep.lacity.org/onlinedocs/2010/10-2385-
S2_MISC_07-11-2011.pdf>) and/or by interviewing bicycle planners and cycling
community leaders. You might start by giving the Bicycle Coalition (www.la-bike.org) a

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call or by simply attending one of its meetings. Also, think about what Ryan Snyder has
to say in his lecture about bicycle in pedestrian planning.

Next, you will need to survey at least 10 cyclistsand not just students cycling from the
residence halls, please! You might start by simply handing out questionnaires at bicycle
racks on campus or at a similar location. An even better method might be to interview
cyclists in small groups or individually. You should attempt to find out two things:
elements of street design that make cycling more or less enjoyable (or safe), and specific
locations in the Los Angeles transportation network that your respondents feel are
particularly bador particularly good. Ask them to comment specifically on things that
you read about in the Bicycle Plan or heard about from cycling advocates. Make sure you
get details andif possiblesome anecdotes.

Finally, pick one particular good biking location you have identified during your
survey process and one particularly bad one. Go to both, photograph them, and take
notes. (Dont attempt to ride a bike in the bad one, pleasewe know its bad for bikes!)
What makes these good and bad biking locations? What might be done to make the bad
location better?

You should provide a report detailing (1) the plans for better cycling in Los Angeles and
any bicycling community response youve read or heard; (2) the progress currently made
in completing these plans and obstacles (if any) to implementing them; (3) your cyclist
survey methods and results and; (4) a description of the good and bad locations youve
discovered and a brief proposal for making the bad location more like the good one.


Option 5: Travel Survey or Travel Journal Analysis

You are to conduct a small original study of travel behavior. You should first decide on
your topic of interest and unit of analysis. You can pick any traveler type, trip type, or
travel mode that interests you. Some examples might include: (1) travel by male and
female UCLA students, (2) shopping trips, (3) walking trips, (4) travel at night, (5) use of
public transit, (5) bicycling, (6) travel on campus, (7) bus riders, (8) recreational trips, (9)
work trips, (10) trips to and from school, or (11) travel in and around a particular
neighborhood, like Westwood, or even a comparison between two neighborhoods.

After you have decided on your topic and unit of analysis, you and your partners should
develop one or more hypotheses about what you expect to find. For example, you might
hypothesize that:

Women are more likely to do shopping travel than men
Students are more likely to use public transit than non-students
Travel behavior varies a great deal based on age
Bicyclists have very similar demographic characteristics
Minorities are more likely to ride the bus than whites

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Transit is more commonly used for work trips than other types of travel
Travelers to and in Westwood are much more likely to walk, bike, or ride transit
than those traveling to or in another LA neighborhood, like Hollywood
People with cars have much different grocery shopping patterns than those
without them

or any others that come to mind. Use existing travel behavior research, if available, to
help you formulate your hypothesis or hypotheses.

Then set out to test your hypothesis by designing a survey that asks respondents to detail
their trip making, for example including times of departure and arrival, addresses where
trips began and ended (you can then derive distances using Google Maps), travel modes
used, fares/tolls paid, stops made along the way, and so on. Also, collect some basic
background information on your subjects (things like gender, age, race, occupation,
perhaps income, etc.). And you might want to ask your respondents specific questions
that will help you test your hypothesis about how people travel and the factors that
influence travel-related decisions.

Dont overburden your respondents by asking for too much information; try to keep
things bounded, whether this is in terms of the types of travel you ask about, the time
period over which the survey must be filled out, or the information requested. Asking
people to keep track of every trip they take over a one week period and why they take
each trip is definitely too intrusive and will cause people to drop out of the study. So be
sure that what you ask about is relevant to your topic and hypotheses. You might ask
your respondents about all trips but in just one day, about a longer period of time but for
less frequent occurrences (such as trips to the doctor, the supermarket, in Westwood, etc.)
or about trips using only one particular mode.

Then get at least 30 of your friends, classmates, and/or family members to complete the
survey. Note that depending on your topic you should try to get plenty of variation: a
survey on age and travel wont yield much in the way of results if you only interview
UCLA students, and a survey on mode wont work if all you study is car drivers.

You should consider (and comment on) whether your method of recruiting survey
participants might bias your results. Provide some analysis of the demographics of your
respondents, and whether there are any biases in your sample. Do you think that your
sample population is representative of the population you wish to analyze? If so, why? If
not, why not?

Finally, clearly and concisely present the results of your survey and analyze them. Do
your survey data support or fail to support your hypotheses? Present summary data from
your survey (with clear, simple graphs, charts, and/or tables) in support of your
conclusions. In addition, supplement these conclusions with evidence from course
readings and lectures (or other material you might findwe can help you with this). If

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your conclusions differ from other researchers findings, be sure to speculate on what you
think may have caused the observed differences.


Option 6: SR 91 Express Lanes

Tolled express lanes which vary the toll according to traffic levels and permit motorists to
buy out of congestion have been popular with transportation analysts for decades.
However, they have been slow to be rolled out due in large part to antipathy from some
parts of the public. The first major value-priced lanes in America are here in Southern
California, running parallel to the SR 91 freeway for a ten mile stretch connecting Orange
County and Riverside County. Tolls vary based on day-of-week, time-of-day, and
direction-of-travel. At times they are quite steep.

Imagine you work for a Department of Transportation in another part of the country that
is interested in building tolled express lanes. You have been sent to analyze the SR 91
facility and make recommendations. Is this type of facility promising for other locations?
Why or why not?

First, do some background research on the facility. Scholar Ed Sullivan did an in-depth
report that is an excellent resource: find it at
<http://www.vta.org/expresslanes/pdf/cal_poly_exp_lanes_sr91_2.pdf>. Also, you might
search the internet, newspapers like the LA Times, the websites of the Orange County
Transportation Authority or Cofiroute (the private firm that built and manages the
facility), or other sources of information.

Interview at least one official from the OCTA or Cofiroute about important issues facing
the facility. You might also want to talk to other stakeholders, for example somebody
from AAA or (if you can find one or more) a motorist(s) who travels in the corridor.
Finally, drive the SR 91. You wont be able to use the managed lanes without a
transponder, but you will be able to use the free lanes. Note whether the tolled lanes do
have an advantage over the free lanes. It would be especially interesting if you drive at a
time when there is some congestion, time your trip in the free lanes, calculate the time
savings that the tolled lanes offer over the free ones (assuming free flow in the tolled
lanes), and decide if the time savings is worth the toll for that day, time, and direction.

Factors you might include in your analysis might be:

Economics (does the facility cover the costs of its construction and operation?)
The expansion of traveler choice
Time savings (including thoughts on how the value of these can vary from person
to person and minute to minute)
Possible environmental benefits
Travel time reliability

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Replicability (will this facility work with different kinds of roads in different
places?)
Politics (hint: there was a major political problem several years ago that befell the
facilityyou will read about this in your research, including an Access article
from Marlon Boarnet in issue 25)
Public opinionare users and other SR 91 drivers happy with the lanes?
Equityis it fair that rich drivers can use these Lexus Lanes while others might
not be able to?

Conclude by giving a recommendation to your bosses about whether these types of tolled lanes
should be pursued, why or why not, how, and if there are any changes to the SR 91 model you
would make in future incarnations of this project.


Policy Analysis

The second major writing assignment is a Policy Analysis essay. The Policy Analysis will be
completed individually. The purpose of the essay is to give you a chance to delve more deeply
into a transportation topic that is of interest to you, bring your intellect to bear on the issues, and
give your two cents on where we should go with transportation policy in America.

You should produce a document with 8 to 12 pages of body text (i.e. excluding cover page,
references, tables illustrations, etc.). As with the Fieldwork Paper, the paper must use double
spacing, one-inch margins, and 12-point type. You should edit your work carefully and cite all of
your sources. Ill be distributing a memo with tips on writing effectively. Where appropriate, use
graphs, tables, and/or pictures to make key points. Include a bibliography, and put supporting
data or other materials in appendices.

First, you are called on to analyze the topic using multiple sources of information from multiple
perspectives, using the required readings, information from lectures, and materials you find as
part of your own research. Note that I am extremely happy when you show initiative in terms of
adding outside research that I dont have to provide you.

Using these sources and information, you are called on to produce a paper with three conceptual
parts.

First, lay out the issue. In terms of your topic, what is the current state of affairs? How did we get
where we are? What are the problems with the status quo? Are they serious, or overblown? What
are the causes of the problems? What will the implications be if the problems are not addressed?

Next, lay out the various solutions that have been proposed, or that you yourself can devise.
What are these solutions? How and why (or why not) would they be effective? How difficult or
costly would they be to implement? Are they politically feasible? Why havent they been
implemented yet?


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Finally, present your proposed policy course(s), supporting your position with evidence. In
addition to presenting your own prescriptions, and outlining how and why they would be
effective, if there are popular proposed solutions you do not endorse outline why you think
theyre bad ideas not worthy of being pursued.

The paper doesnt need to take this exact form, but this framework gives you a reasonable
roadmap to success.

Keep in mind that I want your reasoned analysis and opinion, but it is crucial that that opinion be
supported. So be sure to cite sources (for both facts and expert opinion) when necessary. As I
noted, in addition to course materials bring in at least some outside information. Thanks to
Google and Google Scholar, it should not be hard for you to do additional outside research on
your topic, particularly given the fact that all of the topics are the subject of spirited public
debate.

You can choose from a number of topics, all of which are the subject of a unit we will study in
class.

One final note: please dont plagiarize! In addition to the fact that it is a pretty sad admission you
arent bright or hard-working enough to write a simple term paper, you would be surprised how
often people who do this get caught. Its easier for an instructor to detect this than you might
think, and I know of at least four people who have been caught since Ive been at UCLA. When
this happens, the code of conduct I have to follow as mandated by the university gives me zero
leeway; I have no choice but to immediately turn the offender over to the authorities. Their
punishments are extremely harsh; the less you learn about them the better. Putting something in
quotes and citing it properly seems like a far easier option.

The topics are below. Note that I am not going to count to be sure every single point I raise for
each is addressed, and you dont have to tackle issues in the order I list them, but I strongly
recommend responding to most of the points I suggest.

Option 1: Transit Policy

Transit in the United States faces multiple challenges. Despite decades of rising spending,
ridership has remained stubbornly low, with market share steadily dropping over time.
Moreover, the industry faces serious financial difficulties which require heavy subsidies.
On the other hand, many believe that transit has the potential to help us deal with many of
the serious transportation problems we face, including congestion, emissions, sprawl, oil
dependence, and quality of life. In this essay, your job is first to discuss the general
importance of transit. What do you feel are the positives of transit, and what are the
negatives? Should we care about promoting transit or not? Next, outline the key issues
and problems facing transit. How did we get here, and why do we face these current
problems? Next, lay out a case for future transit policy based on these issues. Are the key
problems facing transit insurmountable? If so, why? If not, how might the challenges
facing transit be addressed? Should spending levels be increased, decreased, or held

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constant? What about fares and fare structure? What might be done in terms of labor
relations or operations? Does land use play a role, and if so what complimentary land use
policies might be appropriate? What about bus vs. rail, and questions of equity?
Ultimately, do you feel transit has the potential and justification to play a larger role in
the U.S. transportation system, and if so what should that role be and how do you feel this
can be brought about?


Option 2: Transportation and the Environment

In this era of global warming, the relationship between transportation and the
environment is very much in the public consciousness. Most agree that the prospect of
two billion cars worldwide, if they have todays fuel efficiency and are driven at the
levels of contemporary U.S. drivers, will be difficult to sustain. Is there hope for the
future? This paper calls on you to succinctly lay out how transportation affects the
environment, how the environment affects transportation, what the particularly acute
environmental challenges posed by the current transportation system are, and what you
think the picture will look like in the future. Most importantly, the topic asks for your
opinion and analysis of the appropriate policy responses to our current challenges. Do we
have to fundamentally change the frequencies, modes, distances, and ways in which we
travel? Or are there other possible solutions which might allow high levels of mobility
and environmental cleanliness simultaneously? What role do governments have to play
here, in terms of taxes, subsidies, regulations, etc.? Will the market alone fix things? If
you were a policymaker, what steps would you implement to safeguard the environment
and why? After laying out your proposed policy course, what do you think are the
prospects for it being adopted by world governments in the near future? Is there hope we
can address these problems?


Option 3: Transportation and Land Use

Many critics decry the suburbanization of America, maintaining it wastes resources,
promotes social isolation, is aesthetically displeasing, etc. For others, suburbanization
reflects the wishes of the American people and offers space, privacy, comfort, etc.
Whether for good or ill, many commentators believe that transportation is an important
part of the land use equation. In this paper, frame the issue, outlining the ways in which
land use affects transportation and vice versa, in both a historical and a contemporary
context. Next, discuss what you see as the positives and negatives of our current land use
patterns. If you believe land use patterns need to be substantially changed, lay out your
reasoning for why, and for how transportation would fit in to your proposed policy
framework. Suggest some transportation policies you feel would be appropriate to either
complement our current land use patterns or try to change them entirely. Should we fight
sprawl, and if so how should transportation policy be employed to do this? And will it
work?


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The book The Limitless City will help you here: it will be on reserve at the library, or you
may wish to purchase it online.


Option 4: High-Speed Rail

Although momentum seems to have slowed recently, the Obama administration has made
the creation of a high-speed rail network in America one of its top transportation
priorities. Supporters of such a system maintain that it will have myriad benefits,
including saving traveler time, reducing the need to build costly road and air
infrastructure, cleaning the environment, creating jobs, and much else. They point to
HSRs success in other nations as evidence of its efficacy. Detractors maintain that HSR
will be an enormously costly boondoggle that will fail to attract riders, require massive
subsidies, and possibly harm the environment more than it helps it. Using course
materials and other resources you can find (this topic has been much-discussed by the
media, government, and think tanks, so you should have no trouble finding evidence),
briefly lay out the arguments for both sides, critically contrast and analyze them, and
outline your well-supported opinions on whether or not we should build HSR, and, if so,
how we should go about doing it (for example, which proposed routes and types of
services to prioritize and why, who should pay for it, etc.).


Option 5: Congestion

As a resident of Los Angeles, it should come as no surprise to you that traffic congestion
is an irritant, perhaps a serious one. Yet despite the fact that many believe congestion is a
major problem that is worsening over time, we have thus far had limited success in
taming it. Many policies for addressing congestion have been broached, including but not
limited to building more roads, investing more in mass transit, creating jobs/housing
balance, building at higher densities, improving incident management, congestion tolling,
and many others. In this paper, briefly lay out the nature of the congestion problem. Why
does congestion occur? Is it a severe problem necessitating radical solutions? What does
congestion cost our society? Next, discuss what the major proposed solutions are, giving
your analysis of the pros and cons of each. Finally offer your proposed solutions to the
congestion problem and why you think they are politically feasible and would be
effective.

Anthony Downs excellent book Still Stuck in Traffic will be an important resource if you
intend to tackle this topic; I will place a copy on reserve at the library but again to save
time and hassle Id consider ordering it online as soon as possible if this topic appeals to
you. You should also look at the Texas Transportation Institutes annual Urban Mobility
Report.


Option 6: Transportation Finance


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The transportation financing system is at a crossroads. With the purchasing power of the
gas tax waning, some action will have to be taken in order reform our financing system to
place the transportation system on a solid fiscal foundation. This paper calls on you to
recommend a course for this. First, briefly trace the history of transportation finance from
the years just prior to the introduction of the auto to the present day. Next, discuss the
difficulties the current system finds itself in and lay out why this is the case. Next,
consider the primary financing options that are currently in policymakers toolkits,
including the gas tax, local option sales taxes, transit fares, bonding, tolling, a VMT fee,
etc. Discuss the plusses and minuses of each, in terms of things like practicality, political
acceptability, equity, and revenue-raising ability. Finally, lay out the course you
recommend for meeting our fiscal challenges in the future, and speculate about what the
impacts of that course would be both in terms of finance and other impacts such as travel
behavior.

In addition to class materials on this topic, I will post a document I co-wrote for
CALTRANS about the subject

Thats it! Let us know if you have any questions, and good luck!