Bridging the Gap between the New Urbanist Ideas and Transportation Planning Practice

Metropolitan planning organizations have become increasingly interested in urban design solutions to transportation problems. Many design ideas under the umbrella of new urbanism appear promising, yet in practice are not often fully implemented in standard transportation planning procedures, in part because of remaining skepticism about the role that the built environment plays in influencing travel and in part because of technical, institutional, and political issues. This paper sets a twofold objective. First, it contributes to the continuing debate on the urban form–travel connection by adding further empirical evidence from the Austin, Texas, region. Unlike most existing empirical work, the paper studies and reports evidence in metrics commonly used by transportation planners and engineers for travel demand analysis. Second, the paper demonstrates ways to integrate urban design variables in transportation demand analysis. The study identified 42 mixed-use districts (MXDs) in the Austin region and then analyzed the following aspects of travel behavior in MXDs and non-MXDs: trip production rates, trip duration and length distribution, internal rate of capture, departure time, and travel mode choice; these correspond to the first three of the four-step planning models. The study contributes to transportation planning and policy making in Central Texas by providing local empirical evidence on the urban form–travel connection. The study's method and process can be of interest to a broad audience in academia and practice.