Ray LaHood: Transport Transformer
Posted on June 22, 2009 under Sustainability,
This is a transformational president, and the department is following the president’s lead. People haven’t really been thinking about these things. They have been thinking about how to build roads, how to build interstates, how to build bridges. People now are thinking differently about where they want to live, how they want to live, and how they want to be able to get around their communities.
Finally, the day has come for responsible transportation planning:
What we’ve talked about is getting to a concept that we call livable communities, where people don’t have to get in a car every day. You can use light rail, you can use buses, you can use walking paths, you can use your bike.
Mr. LaHood reiterates over and over the need for a focus on walkable communities and better rail transport for our country, something that has been neglected for nearly fifty years.
And here’s something even more fantastic:
Integrated Urban Planning
In order to make that happen, LaHood’s Department of Transportation wants every metropolitan area in the country to conduct “integrated housing, transportation, and land use planning.” As the Natural Resources Defense Council’s Kaid Benfield notes on the NRDC’s blog Switchboard, this by itself is an almost revolutionary shift.
Although it sounds like a no-brainer, in reality transportation, housing policy (including affordable housing) and land use issues are rarely addressed in an integrated fashion. The results of this disjointed approach to planning can be seen in every American city.
In another groudbreaking move, a three-way partnership has been created between LaHood’s DOT, the Environmental Protection Agency and HUD, the US Department of Housing and Urban Development. The goal of the partnership is to use the three agencies’ collective influence and budgets to build more equitable and sustainable communities, with cheaper, more efficient transportation and more affordable and walkable neighborhoods.
All of this adds up to a real sea change in the way the US government deals with transportation issues.
This is a transformational president, and the department is following the president’s lead. People haven’t really been thinking about these things. They have been thinking about how to build roads, how to build interstates, how to build bridges. People now are thinking differently about where they want to live, how they want to live, and how they want to be able to get around their communities.
Finally, the day has come for responsible transportation planning:
What we’ve talked about is getting to a concept that we call livable communities, where people don’t have to get in a car every day. You can use light rail, you can use buses, you can use walking paths, you can use your bike.
Mr. LaHood reiterates over and over the need for a focus on walkable communities and better rail transport for our country, something that has been neglected for nearly fifty years.
And here’s something even more fantastic:
Integrated Urban Planning
In order to make that happen, LaHood’s Department of Transportation wants every metropolitan area in the country to conduct “integrated housing, transportation, and land use planning.” As the Natural Resources Defense Council’s Kaid Benfield notes on the NRDC’s blog Switchboard, this by itself is an almost revolutionary shift.
Although it sounds like a no-brainer, in reality transportation, housing policy (including affordable housing) and land use issues are rarely addressed in an integrated fashion. The results of this disjointed approach to planning can be seen in every American city.
In another groudbreaking move, a three-way partnership has been created between LaHood’s DOT, the Environmental Protection Agency and HUD, the US Department of Housing and Urban Development. The goal of the partnership is to use the three agencies’ collective influence and budgets to build more equitable and sustainable communities, with cheaper, more efficient transportation and more affordable and walkable neighborhoods.
All of this adds up to a real sea change in the way the US government deals with transportation issues.
