FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
New Study Identifies Top 15 Metro Regions Leading in Transportation Innovation
NRDC’s Smarter Cities Project Reveals How Cities Across the U.S. are Raising the Bar for Affordable and Accessible Public Transit
New York, NY (February 23, 2011) – Today Natural Resources Defense Council’s Smarter Cities project released a transportation study identifying 15 metropolitan regions with the nation’s leading transportation policies and practices. The study, created in collaboration with the Center for Neighborhood Technology (CNT) — the organization which launched I-GO Car Sharing in 2002 — compares and profiles U.S. regions based on public transit availability, use and cost; household automobile ownership and use; and innovative, sustainable transportation programs.
“Innovative transit policies not only benefit the environment, but they also add richness to urban life by making city attractions and neighborhoods more accessible,” said Paul McRandle, Senior Editor of NRDC’s Smarter Cities Project. “By enhancing regional transportation programs we can improve our quality of life, boost our local economies, reduce air pollution and even benefit public health by making biking and walking safer and more enjoyable for commuters.”
The 15 metro regions identified as ‘Smarter Cities’ for transportation include:
- Seven large regions (> 1 million people): Boston; Chicago; Philadelphia; Portland, Oregon; New York, San Francisco, and Washington D.C.
- Four medium regions (250,000-1 million people): Boulder-Longmont, Colorado; Honolulu, Hawaii; Jersey City, New Jersey; and New Haven, Connecticut.
- Four small regions (< 250,000 people): Champaign-Urbana, Illinois; Bremerton, Washington; Lincoln, Nebraska; and Yolo, California.
The transportation study is the second to be released by NRDC’s Smarter Cities project, which aims to inspire cities, municipalities and regions nationwide by recognizing and profiling what leading metropolitan regions are doing to make themselves more efficient, sustainable, and livable. The data underlying the 15 cities’ transportation profiles was drawn from the U.S. Census and CNT’s H+T® Affordability Index that quantifies household transportation costs by location.
“By and large, ‘location efficient’ places – with essential services that are nearby or accessible by many transportation modes – lower transportation costs for residents,” said Scott Bernstein, president of CNT. “Cities and regions that foster compact, walkable, transit-rich communities can reduce reliance on automobiles and help lower at least one expense for households struggling to get by in the current economy.”
Highlights from the study include:
- About 98 percent of Jersey City, New Jersey residents live within a half mile of public transit access; only 60 percent own or have access to a car.
- In downtown Boston, around 65 percent of trips during peak hours are non-motorized due in large part to the city’s Complete Streets initiative, launched in 2009, to create streets that integrate pedestrians, cyclists and public transit with motorists.
- Philadelphia has selectively expanded the city’s public transit system in certain neighborhoods to increase residents’ access to fresh food.
- Boulder, Colorado, has built paved pathways along Boulder Creek that allow walkers and bikers to travel up to 52 miles without ever having to cross traffic.
- Washington, D.C.’s Capital Bikeshare program has made more than 1,100 bikes available for pick up at solar-powered docking stations throughout the city and Arlington County.
The full study, with individual city profiles, can be found at: http://smartercities.nrdc.org/topic/transportation/americas-smartest-regions-transportation
ABOUT
The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) is an international nonprofit environmental organization with more than 1.3 million members and online activists. Since 1970, its lawyers, scientists, and other environmental specialists have worked to protect the world’s natural resources, public health, and the environment. NRDC has offices in New York City, Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Livingston, Montana, and Beijing.
Smarter Cities, an NRDC project, aims to be an online resource for and about cities striving to make themselves “smarter” – more efficient, sustainable, equitable and livable. NDRC provides for all those with a stake in their city’s future—from students to policy makers and city planners, from business leaders to community groups and urban dwellers—in-depth analyses of what leader cities are doing, as well as extensive toolkits to the best practices, model policies and programs, incentives and innovations that they are piloting.
Founded in 1978, CNT, which launched I-GO Car Sharing in 2002, is a Chicago-based think-and-do tank that works nationally to advance urban sustainability by researching, inventing and testing strategies that use resources more efficiently and equitably. Its programs focus on climate, energy, natural resources, transportation, and community development.
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