Effects of Sub-Urban Transit-Oriented Developments on Residential Property Values
Project Number: 2609
Research Project:The proposed study aims to empirically estimate the impact of several suburban Transit-Oriented Developments (TODs) along the San Francisco Bay Area’s BART line on residential single family property values. If the study finds that suburban TODs have positively impacted prices of existing housing, then it will go a long way in educating people about the positive impacts of TODs. The study will also highlight and objectively measure the benefit of transit capital improvements.
Principal Investigator: Dr. Shishir Mathur, Assistant Professor, Urban and Regional Planning Department, SJSU/ MTI Research Associate
Team Member: Dr. Christopher Ferrell
Institution:
Mineta Transportation Institute
Telephone Number:
(408) 924-7560
Email Address: mti@mti.sjsu.edu
Project Objective:The goal of this study is to objectively examine the effects of transit-oriented development on the property values of single family swellings near those TODs.
Project Abstract:The Federal government, through ISTEA, TEA-21 and most recently, SAFETEA, has reinforced the need to integrate land use and transportation planning, and provide public transit. Other federal programs like the “Livable Communities Program” and the “New Starts Program” have given additional impetus to the development of public transit. At the state and regional level, too, the last three decades have seen increased provision of rail-based public transit. These rail transit systems are primarily of three kinds. Heavy rail system (for example, Bay Area Rapid Transit-BART), commuter rail system (for example, METRA in the Chicago area) and light rail transit (for example, Santa Clara VTA, and Portland TRI-MET).
Pubic transit systems are most effective in the presence of high volume of potential ridership. This ridership generally requires high density development at the ends of the system and along transit corridors. The development of TODs is increasingly being used to increase transit ridership. TOD, apart from providing the transit ridership, has also gained popularity as a “smart growth” tool that addresses the problems of traffic congestion, pollution, and other ills of auto-oriented, sprawl-like development.
While the development of TOD is a desirable planning goal, the development of successful TODs often encounters several barriers. These barriers include: lack of inter-jurisdictional cooperation; auto-oriented design that favors park-and-ride lot over ridership generating uses, and community opposition.. Like any new high-density development, TODs are likely to face community opposition. This opposition may be more vocal in suburban areas where residents of predominantly single-family neighborhoods may feel that the proposed high-density, mixed-use development will bring noise, air pollution, increased congestion and crime into their area. Community opposition has been instrumental in stopping many TOD projects in the San Francisco Bay Area, including plans for Rockridge, Ashby, North Berkeley, and Pleasant Hill Stations of BART. While the community opposition to TODs has been very pronounced, very little research exists that indicates whether this opposition is well-founded. Economic theory suggests that if a TOD has a negative effect on the surrounding residential neighborhoods, then that effect should lower the housing prices in these neighborhoods. Similarly, an increase in the housing prices would mean a positive effect of TOD on the surrounding neighborhoods.
Milestones Dates:
Task 1: Literature Review
Review literature to: a) identify possible case study TODs; b) summarize the theoretical and empirical literature on this and closely related areas of research and policy; c) build the theoretical and empirical model; d) identify the data sources; and e) put the findings of the study in the larger policy context.
Task 2: Data Collection
Includes: a) collection of housing related data from the proprietary sources and the assessor’s office; b) collect neighborhood and jurisdiction level data from the U.S. Census, and the local, planning and housing departments; c) collect regional, state and national housing supply and demand data from the relevant entities; and d) collect GIS data.
Task 3: Data Processing and Analysis
Clean and join the proprietary and assessor’s housing related data. Join other information collected from U.S. Census, and other sources to this database to prepare a consolidated database for building the empirical model.
Task 4: Model Development
Use hedonic regression method to develop a series of empirical models. Effect of each suburban TOD on its surrounding residential neighborhoods would be separately estimated.
Task 5: Draft Report
Final completion date
Total Budget: $73,730 (Include $6,450 for MTI’s costs in both above amounts)
Student Involvement:
Student Research Assistant, San Jose State University TBA
Technology Transfer Activities:
Upon publication, pdf and html versions will be available on the Mineta Transportation Institute web site. The project experience and data will be available for community meetings. Authors are encouraged to submit articles based on the research to relevant journals and to present the information to end-users at conferences.Potential Benefits of the Project:
While there are several studies that examine the effect upon property values relative to proximity to transit lines or stations, there are no corresponding studies regarding TODs’ effect on single-family dwellings. The proposed study aims to answer the question regarding the effect of TOD on single-family residential properties.
TRB Keywords:
Economic benefits; Property values; Real estate development; Real estate industry; Value analysis
Primary Subject:
Transportation/Land Use/ Planning
Goals:
To increase the understanding of the effect of transit-oriented development on the real estate values of single-family dwellings
Enabling Research:
Case study; Data collection and statistical analysis
Modal Orientation:
Urban planning, smart growth, rail, bus |
