Healthy Regions, Healthy People: The Transportation – Land Use – Environment Connection

1. Healthy Regions, Healthy People:The Transportation – Land Use – Environment Connection October 16th – October 18th 2005 UCLA Extension Public Policy Program

2. The Waxing Focus on Public Health in Transportation, Land Use, and Environmental Policy and Planning Brian D. Taylor Symposium Co-Chair

3. Public HealthThe Transportation – Land Use – Environment Connection • Public health is a principal objective of civil society

4. Public HealthThe Transportation – Land Use – Environment Connection • Public health is a principal objective of civil society • But it can be a challenge to operationalize into public policy

5. Public HealthThe Transportation – Land Use – Environment Connection • While often congruent with other fundamental societal objectives • economic prosperity, • political stability, • environmental sustainability, • and so on

6. Public HealthThe Transportation – Land Use – Environment Connection • While often congruent with other fundamental societal objectives • economic prosperity, • political stability, • environmental sustainability, • and so on • Such objectives can collectively conflict

7. Public HealthThe Transportation – Land Use – Environment Connection • A hallmark of this symposium series has been an ongoing debate over the goals, conflicts, and congruence among three policy realms • Transportation • Land Use • Environment

8. Public HealthThe Transportation – Land Use – Environment Connection • While we have learned much over the past 15 years, I think that it would be fair to say that we do not yet have the transportation – land use – environment connection entirely worked out

9. Public HealthThe Transportation – Land Use – Environment Connection • While we have learned much over the past 15 years, I think that it would be fair to say that we do not yet have the transportation – land use – environment connection entirely worked out • The links between… • transportation policies and transportation outcomes, • or environmental policies and environmental outcomes, • remain complex and debated

10. Public HealthThe Transportation – Land Use – Environment Connection • And while many measures of public health are well-established…

11. Public HealthThe Transportation – Land Use – Environment Connection • And while many measures of public health are well-established… • I think that we can probably agree that the links between transportation, land use, and environmental policies, on the one hand, and health outcomes, on the other, are even more complex

12. Public HealthThe Transportation – Land Use – Environment Connection • But we thrive on complexity here at Lake Arrowhead • Just try finding your room at 10:30 pm tonight after a few glasses of wine

13. Public HealthThe Transportation – Land Use – Environment Connection • But we thrive on complexity here at Lake Arrowhead • Just try finding your room at 10:30 pm tonight after a few glasses of wine • Our game plan…

14. Our Game planThe Transportation – Land Use – Environment Connection • Sunday afternoon • Framing the issues for a diverse audience • Evaluating the issues in a systematic way

15. Our Game planThe Transportation – Land Use – Environment Connection • Sunday afternoon • Framing the issues for a diverse audience • Evaluating the issues in a systematic way • Sunday evening/Monday morning • Influence of transportation safety and risk on public health

16. Our Game planThe Transportation – Land Use – Environment Connection • Monday morning • Mobile sources, emissions, and health

17. Our Game planThe Transportation – Land Use – Environment Connection • Monday morning • Mobile sources, emissions, and health • Monday afternoon/evening • Urban form, travel, physical activity, and health

18. Our Game planThe Transportation – Land Use – Environment Connection • Tuesday morning • Translating ideas and research into policy and practice

19. Framing and Evaluating the IssuesThis Session • The Demographics of Public Health: Current Trends, Future Issues • Jonathan Fielding, Public Health Officer, County of Los Angeles and Professor, Health Services and Pediatrics, UCLA

20. Framing and Evaluating the IssuesThis Session • The Demographics of Public Health: Current Trends, Future Issues • Jonathan Fielding, Public Health Officer, County of Los Angeles and Professor, Health Services and Pediatrics, UCLA • Mobile Regions, Healthy People: Exploring the Transportation – Land Use – Environment – Public Health Connection • Genevieve Giuliano, Professor, School of Policy, Planning, and Development, USC

21. Framing and Evaluating the IssuesThis Afternoon • Measuring and Evaluating the Effects of Transportation Systems on Public Health • Analyzing and Measuring the Public Health Costs/Benefits of Transport and the Built Environment • Marlon Boarnet, Professor, Department of Planning, Policy, and Design, UC Irvine

22. Framing and Evaluating the IssuesThis Afternoon • Incorporating Environmental and Health Costs/Benefits into Measures of Transportation System Performance • Steve Pickrell, Senior Vice-President, Cambridge Systematics

23. Framing and Evaluating the IssuesThis Afternoon • Incorporating Environmental and Health Costs/Benefits into Measures of Transportation System Performance • Steve Pickrell, Senior Vice-President, Cambridge Systematics • The Price of Regulation: Measuring the Costs of Making Transportation Systems Cleaner and Safer • Daniel Sperling, Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering, and Director, Institute of Transportation Studies, UC Davis

24. Urban Form, Travel, Physical Activity, and Health • Let me offer an example of the kinds of linkages we will be exploring over the next three days

25. Urban Form, Travel, Physical Activity, and Health • Let me offer an example of the kinds of linkages we will be exploring over the next three days • Both research and public policies on urban form and physical activity have mushroomed in recent years • Exciting new collaborations between public health, urban design, and transportation professionals • Have policymaking and practice gotten ahead of the research?

26. Some simple premises, a complicated issue • The built environment affects walking, biking, and transit use

27. Some simple premises, a complicated issue • The built environment affects walking, biking, and transit use. • The proportion of trips made by foot, bike, or bus tends to be higher in central cities than in suburbs

28. Some simple premises, a complicated issue… • The built environment affects walking, biking, and transit use. • The proportion of trips made by foot, bike, or bus tends to be higher in central cities than in suburbs. • Body weights in the U.S. are increasing and activity levels are declining (especially over the past two decades) raising important public health concerns

29. Some simple premises, a complicated issue… • The built environment affects walking, biking, and transit use. • The proportion of trips made by foot, bike, or bus tends to be higher in central cities than in suburbs. • Body weights in the U.S. are increasing and activity levels are declining (especially over the past two decades) raising important public health concerns. • Suburban developments are expanding and, therefore, contributing to obesity and public health problems

30. Some simple premises, a complicated issue… • The built environment affects walking, biking, and transit use. • The proportion of trips made by foot, bike, or bus tends to be higher in central cities than in suburbs. • Body weights in the U.S. are increasing and activity levels are declining (especially over the past two decades) raising important public health concerns. • Suburban developments are expanding and, therefore, contributing to public health problems. • A return to more compact, mixed-use development patterns may thus be justified on public health grounds

31. Lots of Premises… What Does the Research Show? • Influence of urban form on travel behavior • Lots and lots of studies, scads of them • Findings in a nutshell: compact and mixed-use development is associated with more utilitarian biking and walking

32. What Does the Research Show? • Influence of urban form on travel behavior • Of intense interest and relevance to planners who regulate land uses and manage transportation systems • Ongoing debates over: • Causality and interactions between people, environments, and behaviors • The significance (rather than the direction) of the effects

33. What Does the Research Show? • Factors influencing physical activity • A focus on access to opportunities for physical activity • A smaller, more recent literature examines the relationships between urban form and physical activities

34. What Does the Research Show? • Factors influencing physical activity • Findings in a nutshell • Positive relationship between exercise venue access and physical activity • Attractive walking environments increase both utilitarian and recreational walking • Other neighborhood characteristics not consistently associated with walking or physical activity • Individual/interpersonal factors influence physical activity more than physical environment factors

35. What is the travel-activity link?

36. What is the travel-activity link? • Defining “active travel” as “destination-oriented travel” probably reflects a transportation analyst’s perspective of the issue • An alternative way to define the terms: • Physical activity • Travel-based physical activity • Utilitarian travel • Recreational travel • Other physical activities

37. Some Observations… • Social/psychological/economic factors more important than urban form/design • Both in explaining travel behavior • And in explaining physical activity • So why all of the attention on physical activity and urban form/design?

38. Some Observations… • So why all of the attention on physical activity and urban form/design? • Influencing behavior through policy is complex, risky • Planners regulate land uses, manage transportation systems already (“To a person with a hammer…”) • Congruent with efforts of those concerned with the problems of auto dependence

39. Some Observations… • That urban form/design can increase utilitarian walking/biking appears clear… • But the link between utilitarian travel and overall physical activity appears less certain

40. Some Observations… • It’s clear that increasing access to exercise venues increases physical activity… • But beyond increasing the number of parks, recreation facilities, etc., the best ways to use urban form/design approaches to increase physical activity are still being debated

41. Some Observations… • The focus on utilitarian travel in the transportation literature reveals a significant, and in my view problematic, gap in the transportation and public health literatures

42. Some Observations… • The focus on utilitarian travel in the transportation literature reveals a significant, and in my view problematic, gap in the transportation and public health literatures • Different dependent variables • Transportation • Access to (mostly non-physical) activities • Coping with the problems associated with auto dominance • Public health • Healthy communities • Physical activity and other healthy behaviors

43. A Complex Picture:Urban Form, Utilitarian Travel, and Physical Activity Active Recreational Travel Opportunities for Physical Activities Individual Characteristics Other Physical Activities Total Physical Activity Active Travel Environmental Factors Constraints on Physical Activities Active Utilitarian Travel

44. Some Observations… • The distinction between utilitarian and recreational travel is especially relevant to active travel by children • “Recreational” travel may be utilitarian, as an important part of socialization, play, independence, and exercise

45. Some Observations… • How much walking is enough? • The vast majority of walking is not recorded in transportation data sources • Most walking is… • on-site (and not recorded in travel data) • trips to and from cars (86% of recorded trips, but relatively short and not relevant to those concerned with auto dominance)

46. Some Observations… • How much walking is enough? • Utilitarian walking for other than very short trips is often time consuming • Do the exercise benefits outweigh the opportunity costs of not engaging in other, perhaps more physical activities?

47. Some Observations… • How much biking is enough? • Anecdotal data suggest that most biking is unrecorded travel by children • a conflict with more dense, urban environments that facilitate utilitarian walking?

48. Some Observations… • We are now seeing more careful empirical tests of more fully-specified models of physical activity… • Which include, but are not limited to, access and physical environment factors • Some of which will be reported on here

49. Some Observations… • Prior to such comprehensive analyses, the enormous literature on urban form and utilitarian travel might actually have clouded the issue of urban form and physical activity more than it clarifies

50. Some Observations… • Prior to such comprehensive analyses, the enormous literature on urban form and utilitarian travel might actually have clouded the issue of urban form and physical activity more than it clarifies • These questions aside, this remains an exciting area of public policy and planning scholarship • And we will hear tomorrow from many of the most thoughtful people working in this dynamic new field