Recent and Current Projects on Transportation and Built Environment Interactions

 

Below are some recent relevant projects.  Related projects can also be found under research in transportation finance and transportation energy use and greenhouse gas emissions.

 

Strategic Options for Integrating Transportation Innovations and Urban Revitalization

 

Undertaken as part of the MIT Portugal Program, this project seeks to leverage the interactions between transportation innovations and the built environment to promote desirable urban development patterns and travel outcomes.  Project details and working papers can be found here.

 

MIT students involved: Angelo Guevara (PhD Candidate, Transportation, CEE), Lisa Rayle (MCP/MST10), Andres Sevtsuk (PhD Candidate, DUSP), Weifeng Li (PhD Candidate, DUSP), Grafton Daniels (UROP, EECS), Christos Samolis (UROP, EECS), Robert Powell (MSRP 2009), Laura Viña Arias (MSRP 2009)

 

Faculty collaborators: António P. Antunes (FCTUC, Portugal), Joseph Ferreira (MIT-DUSP), Rosário Macário (IST, Portugal), José M. Viegas (IST, Portugal)

 

 

Travel Behavior of the Aging Boomers: Evidence from Age-Restricted Communities

 

Undertaken with support from the New England UTC, this project aims to improve our understanding of baby boomers’ travel behavior and residential preferences, via a focus on age restricted communities in suburban Boston.  The project included focus groups in four different urban edge communities (see working paper), development and implementation – in Spring 2008 – of a mail-back survey of residential preferences, attitudes, and travel behavior, and subsequent behavioral modeling.  We are currently continuing the survey analysis and plan to extend the research scope to compare boomers’ in suburban age-restricted communities to their counterparts in denser urban areas, particularly naturally occurring retirement communities (NORCs).  A resulting thesis can be found here.

 

MIT students involved: Frank Hebbert (MCP08), Cha-Ly Koh (MCP09), Jae Seung Lee (PhD Student, DUSP), Victoria Ruiz (MSRP 2007), Lamont Cobb (MSRP 2008)

 

Faculty collaborators: Eran Ben-Joseph (MIT-DUSP)

 

 

Gated Communities and Travel Behavior: Evidence from a Latin American Metropolis

 

Undertaken with support from a MIT Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences (HASS) Fund grant, this research explores the influence of gated communities on household travel behavior in Santiago de Chile.  The work includes design and implementation of a small-scale household travel and residential preferences survey in the comuna of Puente Alto.  Data analysis and behavioral modeling are ongoing.

 

MIT students involved: Catherine Seaborn (MCP/MST08), Rodrigo Diaz (MCP08)

 

 

The Accessibility and Development Impacts of New Transit Infrastructure:
The Circle Line in Chicago

 

Undertaken as part of the MIT/Transit Professional Development Program’s ongoing collaboration with the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA), this work developed and demonstrated a framework and methodology for quantifying the accessibility and development impacts of a transit infrastructure project, the proposed Circle Line, providing an example of how to improve the current Federal Transit Agency (FTA) evaluation methodology.  Resulting thesis can be found here.

 

MIT students involved: Ritesh Warade (MCP/MST07)

 

Faculty collaborators: Mikel Murga (CEE-MIT)

 

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