The history of American passenger railroading has been filled with a lot of ideas and, yes, even failed attempts. Consider the futuristic Aerotrain, Talgo, and Train X, or conventional trains like the Golden Rocket, Atlantic City Express, American European Express, Louisville Auto Train and The Aces.  Ultimately they were unsuccessful and disappointments at best or in the case of the former stillborn at worst. The old adage that “timing is everything” might have a ring of truth to some of the efforts coupled with the twin challenges of finance and politics. Believing that one should not continue to hit one’s head against the wall, advocates of enhanced American intercity rail have come to accept failure, lethargy and infighting as the norm. A certain fatigue has set in, the case of the inability to resurrect a full route Sunset Limited, the Pioneer and the Montrealer comes to mind. Further insidious examples include two attempts to bring high-speed rail to Florida, and the…

TRA recently completed a market analysis and feasibility testing for a transit oriented development (TOD) overlay/zoning ordinance amendment and guidebook for the City of Albany, NY, a project lead by The Cecil Group, Boston. Interestingly, the City of Albany has one active Bus Rapid Transit Line running from downtown to Schenectady. The Capital Region Transit Authority is proposing two other BRT lines emanating roughly from the same point downtown to other points west. The first line has had great success attracting riders. The question put to the consulting team was how can the BRT lines promote development within the city?

The Lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas is located in the very southernmost region of the continental U.S.  This area is composed of three counties with 3,643 square miles which contains a population of over 1.2 million inhabitants.1 This land area is larger in square miles than two states (DE and RI), and has a population larger than eight states (WY, VT, ND, AK, SD, DE, MT, RI). If the distances weren’t enough of a problem for transit providers, there is the dispersion of the population over those 3,600 square miles. Dispersion occurs as a result of small, very poor housing communities called colonias.

(Note: This is another in our series of expert blogs on TOD highlighting work and research that experts and advocates are doing in the field. Alyssa Sherman researched residential parking policy as a student in San Jose State University’s Master of Urban Planning Program, and completed her Master’s Thesis on this topic in May of 2010.)

(Note: This is another in our series of expert blogs on TOD highlighting work and research that experts and advocates are doing in the field. Today we have Jennifer Gennari, Communications Director at Greenbelt Alliance)

[This is another in our series of expert blogs on TOD highlighting work and research that experts are doing in the field. This article by Kim Calomino of the Home Builders Association of Metro Denver and Josh Burdick of the Urban Land Conservancy summarizes the work of Dr. Elliot Eisenberg, Senior Economist of the National Association of Home Builders, surrounding the economic impact of LIHTC development along transit corridors.]