Infra Views

Stalled Out: How Empty Parking Spaces Diminish Neighborhood Affordability

Thursday, April 7th, 2016
2-bedroom apartment vs. parking spaces

CENTER FOR NEIGHBORHOOD TECHNOLOGY
Late at night, when Chicago sleeps, apartment parking lots are at their peak usage. When CNT visited those lots and garages at 4:00 a.m., though, we found one third of the parking spaces sitting empty…This may not seem like a huge problem, but each indoor, underground parking space – one individual space – costs $37,300 to build. Multiply that by all of the spaces in the lot, and the price tag is huge. We think that wasted money and space should be allocated to housing instead.

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Greening Harlem

Tuesday, April 5th, 2016
New Harlem Lane Redesign Concept

GREEN INFRASTRUCTURE FOUNDATION
Harlem, NY is a neighborhood that has many opportunities: it is vibrant, historic, rich in art and culture, and located in the nation’s financial and cultural capital. At the same time, poverty, unemployment, displacement, and a lack of green space are all challenges that need to be met.

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Creating 21st Century Communities: Making the Economic Case for Place

Monday, April 4th, 2016
EXHIBIT 1. Relationship Between Design Characteristics and Property Values in King County, WA

MICHIGAN MUNICIPAL LEAGUE
The Michigan Municipal League (MML), through its public policy forums, research, and education, identified eight assets that Michigan’s communities need to grow and strengthen in order for our state to prosper in coming years. In 2015, MML hired Public Sector Consultants (PSC) to evaluate the relationship between these eight assets and economic growth indicators like income, employment, property values, educational attainment within the workforce, and new business starts.

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Active Transportation and Real Estate: The Next Frontier

Friday, April 1st, 2016
Four Ways Protected Bike Lanes Boost Economic Growth

URBAN LAND INSTITUTE
Active transportation was, until recently, the forgotten mode of travel. However, in recent years, investments in infrastructure that accommodates those who walk and ride bicycles have begun to reshape communities. Sometimes called “nonmotorized transportation,” active transportation involves human-powered activity, primarily walking and bicycling.

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The State of Our Schools

Wednesday, March 30th, 2016
The Nation Underinvests in Public School Facilities

21ST CENTURY SCHOOL FUND
NATIONAL COUNCIL ON SCHOOL FACILITIES
THE CENTER FOR GREEN SCHOOLS
School facilities represent the second largest sector of public infrastructure spending, after highways, and yet we have no comprehensive national data source on K–12 public school infrastructure. Even at the state level, school facilities information is often scant. The dearth of official data and standards for our nation’s public school infrastructure has left communities and states working largely on their own to plan for and provide high-quality facilities…These realities inspired our three organizations to assemble the best available state-by-state data and propose a standards-based framework by which we can benchmark the nation’s investment.

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Key Wind Energy Accomplishments

Tuesday, March 29th, 2016
Achieving 35% wind energy by 2050

UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Wind Program is committed to helping the nation secure cost-competitive sources of renewable energy through the development and deployment of innovative wind power technologies. By investing in improvements to wind plant design, technology development, and operation as well as developing tools to identify the highest quality wind resources, the Wind Program serves as a leader in making wind energy technologies more competitive with traditional sources of energy and a larger part of our nation’s renewable energy portfolio.

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Richmond, VA: Bicycle Infrastructure Report

Friday, March 25th, 2016
Total Bikeway Miles By Year

BIKE WALK RVA
THE FUTURE OF BICYCLING IN THE RICHMOND REGION LOOKS BRIGHT. New plans for building a network of bikeways in the region provide a strong foundation for connecting people of all ages and abilities who want or need to ride a bike.

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UCLA State of the Commute

Thursday, March 24th, 2016
UCLA - Table 1 Table 2 Figure 2

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES
University commuters used alternative transportation modes at a rate far higher than Los Angeles County commuters as a whole, a pattern that held true for all major modes. More than 15% of UCLA employees and more than 39% of students were pedestrians or bicycle commuters, options exercised by less than 4% of LA County commuters. Thirteen percent of UCLA employees and more than 25% of students commuted by public transit, compared to only 7% for all of LA County. Finally, more than 14% of UCLA employees commuted by carpool or vanpool, while 10% of LA County commuters used one of these modes.

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Low-Income Solar Policy Guide

Wednesday, March 23rd, 2016
solar1

GRID ALTERNATIVES
VOTE SOLAR
CENTER FOR SOCIAL INCLUSION
There are many effective policy tools for supporting solar adoption among consumers at large, and nearly all of them help expand low-income access to solar power to some extent. However, fully enabling low-income solar participation requires policies and programs that are specifically designed to address the unique barriers faced by these communities. This guide provides an overview of those barriers, as well as underlying principles for successful programs, existing policy tools that can be used to create programs, and examples of state and local models that have successfully improved access.

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Shared Mobility and the Transformation of Public Transit

Tuesday, March 22nd, 2016
SHARED MOBILITY AND THE TRANSFORMATION OF PUBLIC TRANSIT

AMERICAN PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION ASSOCIATION
This report concludes by presenting recommended actions that public entities—public transit agencies, transportation departments, and other local and regional agencies—can take to promote useful cooperation between public and private mobility providers. It also suggests regulatory enhancements, institutional realignments, and forms of public-private engagement that would allow innovation to flourish while still providing mobility as safely, broadly, and equitably as possible.

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InfrastructureUSA: Citizen Dialogue About Civil Infrastructure