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Sprawl is how much of the US provides new housing, and so it's interesting to ask the opposite question: Which cities are actually building new housing in walkable neighborhoods? Here is a study published this week by the Terner Center for Housing Innovation at UC Berkeley that looked at exactly this. What they did was divide all US neighborhoods into five categories based on vehicle miles traveled (VMT) per resident in 2023.
The categories:
Very Low VMT - 12 miles per person per day
Low VMT - 17.3 miles per person per day
Mid VMT - 21 miles per person per day
High VMT - 25.5 miles per person per day
Very High VMT - 37.5 miles per person day
These seem like oddly specific distances, but it's what they used to sort new housing supply. Here's all of the US:
Since the 1950s, new home production in very low VMT neighborhoods has generally been declining. Most of the lower VMT stuff was built before the 1940s, which is why New York City is so walkable and its chart looks like this:
Most newer cities do not build in this way. In fact, based on this study, there are only five large metro areas in the US that have (1) built at least 15% of their total housing since 2000 (meaning, they're a younger city) and (2) built at least 40% of their homes over the last decade in lower-VMT neighborhoods (very low and low).
These metro regions are:
This is not that many cities. At the same time, is it even the right benchmark to be aspiring to? "Lower VMT" just means you don't need to drive as much as you might in other neighborhoods. But it doesn't necessarily mean that you live in an amenity-rich and walkable community. What about the new homes being built in neighborhoods where people don't need a car at all? How many of these exist?
Very few, I'm sure.
Cover photo by Jo Heubeck & Domi Pfenninger on Unsplash
I have a bias toward pedestrian-oriented cities. Being able to walk everywhere and take trains in a city like Paris or Tokyo is, in my opinion, a great luxury. But another important reason is that I have yet to find a big global city that is both designed around the car and that moves people efficiently. If any of you can prove me wrong with an example, I would welcome that. But I honestly can't imagine a world where the 40 plus million people who live in Greater Tokyo are able to move around as easily using cars as they do with trains.
It is for these reasons that when we take on new development projects in Toronto, we are looking for opportunities that will support a more pedestrian and transit-oriented future. This means saying no to sites that are unlikely to support this kind of built environment in the near term and aiming to build as little parking as possible, among other things. Put more simply, we want to build well-designed density next to transit. The two go hand in hand. Now, this may sound obvious, but keep in mind that the vast majority of the Toronto region is not built in this way; it's oriented around the car.
The Avenues Map that I blogged about yesterday depicts an urban structure that does not yet exist in Toronto, at least not in its entirety. It is a forward-looking planning document, which is what it should be. One of our goals as developers is to do our part in helping to build out this vision for the future. Because in our view, it's a better one.
Bloomberg recently interviewed the outgoing head of San Francisco's transportation agency -- Jeffrey Tumlin -- about the impact that self-driving cars have had on the city. Along with maybe Phoenix, San Francisco has the most direct experience. Robotaxis have already been operating in the city for four years.
It's an interesting interview. On the one hand, robotaxis have, according to Tumlin, gotten better than most humans at "seeing" and predicting the behaviours of pedestrians. They offer slow and steady law-abiding rides, which is arguably not how must humans drive. This is a safety improvement.
But on the other hand, robotaxis still represent a fundamentally inefficient use of roadway space. They take up just as much space as human-operated cars, but importantly, they offer a less frustrating driving experience. Meaning they tend to induce demand, much like ride-hailing platforms.
In a 2018 study by San Francisco County, they found that roughly 50% of the increase in vehicle miles traveled in the region was due to Uber and Lyft. So not surprisingly, there are important things that will need to be figured out as robotaxis continue to spread across our cities.
I also find the comparison in the interview between San Francisco and Phoenix to be particularly interesting. The former is walkable. The latter is not. And this seems to be creating a different experience with self-driving cars because robo or not, in Phoenix, traveling by car is pretty much the only option.
For the full interview, click here.
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