Michigan Urban Planning Workfolio

Investigator: Joe Grengs

Does property abandonment worsen the spatial segregation of poor people? Changes in the spatial configuration of land use can have the effect of increasing or decreasing the density of poverty. Using an innovative dasymetric mapping technique, this study produces poverty counts and rates at a much finer spatial resolution than a block group, with an explicit spatial relationship between population and surrounding neighborhood characteristics. In previous research, I found that poverty in Detroit became more concentrated in space during the 1990s, counter to reports of diminishing poverty concentration. This study uses a spatial interaction index based on a distance decay function to determine whether poor people are becoming more spatially isolated from nonpoor people in the City of Detroit.

Principal Investigator: Jonathan Levine
Co-Investigators: Joe Grengs and Lidia Kostyniuk
Sponsor: Michigan Center for Advancing Safe Transportation throughout the Lifespan (M-CASTL)

The project analyzes jointly place-based accessibility indicators and microdata contained in metropolitan household travel surveys. Household surveys represent a snapshot of population and households, enabling us to analyze and compare accessibility characteristics of older and younger travelers in different land-use and transportation environments: between metropolitan regions, in different locations within a single metropolitan region, and with varying levels of access to transportation alternatives. The study will also examine the travel behavior of individuals in these age cohorts in light of the accessibility characteristics of their locations, testing, for example, the impact of attributes of location on the propensity of older people to take trips or to engage in social and recreational activities.

Investigator: Lan Deng

This project will study neighborhood impacts generated by the Low Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) program in three case-study metropolitan areas, representing a variation in the strength of metropolitan economy and a variation in LIHTC program administration.

Central research questions include:

• Have LIHTC developments adversely affected nearby single-family property values when used to bring low-income families to quality neighborhoods?
• Have LIHTC developments contributed to neighborhood revitalization when used as a community development tool?

This research will help inform policymakers and housing practitioners of ways to improve LIHTC administration and produce the type of development that will generate positive neighborhood outcome.

Investigator: Lan Deng

This project will conduct an empirical test of the price elasticity of China’s new housing supply to see how it has changed in the ongoing housing and land market reforms. The project will collect panel data for 35 Chinese cities from 1992 to 2005, ranging from the most advanced southern coastal areas to the least developed inland areas. It will develop three types of indicators to measure local progress in the depth of housing reform, land reform, and general economic reform. Econometric models will be built to explain how China’s new housing supply has responded to price changes, the availability of development inputs, and the progress of local reforms. Given the importance of land in housing development, this study will take a particular look at the relationship between local government land control and the responsiveness of new housing supply.

Grengs, Levine and Others Awarded FHWA Grant to Develop New Indicators

The Federal Highway Administration has awarded a $118,569 grant to fund a 36 month research project led by U-M Assistant Professor of Urban Planning Joe Grengs and his co-investigators Professor and Chair of Urban Planning Jonathan Levine; Susan Zielinski, managing director of sustainable mobility and accessibility research and transformation at the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research; Carl Simon, director of the Center for the Study of Complex Systems at the University of Michigan; and Professor Qing Shen of the University of Maryland.

Titled "A National Comparison of Metropolitan Accessibility: Performance Indicators for Transportation Planning Reform" the research will "support a shift from mobility to accessibility in transportation policy by developing and estimating—for the first time—measures of accessibility that will enable a meaningful comparison between multiple metropolitan areas of the United States. An outcome of the research will be a new method—in the form of indicators that can be analyzed both within and between regions—by which to gauge the progress of policy on infrastructure and the built environment toward accessibility, which this project argues is central to sustainability in transportation and land-use policy."

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June Manning Thomas, the first Centennial Professor in Urban + Regional Planning, begins teaching at TCAUP in September 2007. Her primary area of interest is social justice, particularly as it relates to race and ethnicity. For Professor Thomas, social justice in urban planning is an article of faith as well as a lifelong goal.

Read more about Dr. Thomas and her work...

What makes a downtown district appealing? Why do people go out of their way to walk down one side of the street and not the other? These are some of the questions that recent MUP graduate Kirk Westphal tackles with his 19-minute documentary film, Insights into a Lively Downtown: An Ann Arbor, Michigan Case Study. In this audio-visual exploration of successful city streets, Insights weaves together pedestrian interviews with footage of streetscapes and sidewalk behavior to show what Ann Arbor's healthy blocks have in common.

By Kirk O. Westphal, M.U.P.'06 [kirkow(at)umich.edu]
19 minutes

In Michigan and elsewhere, common misperceptions persist, claiming that green buildings cost more than traditional ones and that there is no market for them. Some people think that green buildings will not “work” in Michigan.

This Michigan-specific handbook dispels these misperceptions and demonstrates that the cost premium for green buildings is minimal. Many green buildings cost less in the long-term and help create healthier social and natural environments. Green development has thrived in Michigan for over a decade now, as is evident from the case studies included in this handbook.

By Zeb Acuff, M.U.P. '05, Aaron Harris MBA/MS '06, Larissa Larsen, assistant professor of urban planning, Bryan Magnus, MBA/MS '05, Allyson Pumphrey, MLArch '05

108 pages

Jackson, Michigan was designated a “Cool City” in June 2004, a status that provided it priority access to state grants, loans, and other resources to assist revitalization efforts. U-M’s team competed with students from Michigan State University, Harvard, MIT, Wayne State, Arizona State, CalTech, and Cleveland State for a $25,000 prize based on the best proposal for the revitalization of an eight acre site in the city’s downtown.

Cool Cities Team

• Meg Bailey, M.U.P.
• Austin Dingwall, M.Arch./M.U.P.
• Kim Dresdner, M.U.P.
• Nayana Nayak, M.U.P.
• Raju Mann, M.U.P.
• Marisa McNee, M.P.P./M.U.P.
• Erin Rhodes, M.U.P.
• Lindsay Smith, M.S./M.U.P.
• Kirk Westphal, M.U.P.
• Peter Winch, M.U.P.
• JY Yoon, M.B.A.
• Liz Jellema, M.U.P. team leader

Faculty Advisors

• Wendy Rampson-Gage, lecturer in urban planning
• Sujata Shetty, lecturer in urban planning

52 pages

This booklet summarizes many of the projects that students and faculty undertook in the eleventh year of the Detroit Community Partnership Center’s existence and the second year of the Genesee County Initiative’s programs.

28 pages

The Task Force to End Chronic Homelessness in Southwest Detroit and the Springwells Village Council aim to find lasting solutions for problems facing homeless people who reside in Southwest Detroit and to create healthy, vibrant urban neighborhoods. The plan provides an overview of the current situation in the area and details strategies to achieve the goals through enhancing public understanding of homelessness and building problem-solving capacity, managing conflicts within neighborhoods and business districts, preventing homelessness, and improving housing options.

Students: Darci Dore, Katie Gottschall, Vanessa Haight, Kourtney Rice, Alfonso Rizo, Miranda Schell, Xerses Sidhwa

Faculty: Margaret Dewar, professor of urban planning

Community Partners: Task Force to End Chronic Homelessness in Southwest Detroit, Springwells Village Council

149 pages

This plan presents a strategy for reuse of blighted, contaminated, and functionally obsolete sites—“brownfields”—in Flint and the surrounding area. The plan aims to rejuvenate formerly thriving neighborhoods, increase the number of tax-generating properties, and reduce threats to public health. The plan provides an inventory of probable brownfields, a prioritization model for selecting high priority sites, recommendations for reuse for specific high priority areas, and possible roles for the BRA to assume in leading redevelopment.

Students: N. Beck, A. Chan, B. Kalra, R. Malloy, H. McPhail, R. Schneider, D. Somers, S. Traxler, X. Wang

Faculty: Margaret Dewar, professor of urban planning; Eric Dueweke, lecturer in urban planning

Community Partner: Genesee County Brownfield Redevelopment Authority

159 pages

If current trends provide an accurate glimpse into the future, the Great Lakes MegaRegion will increase in population by almost 25% by 2050. The Regional Plan Association’s (RPA) national campaign entitled “America 2050: A National Strategy for Global Competitiveness” is an attempt to create a national strategy for increasing America’s competitiveness in the global economy and accommodating this level of growth in a planned fashion. This plan is one part of that effort.

Students: Elizabeth Delgado, David Epstein, Yoohyung Joo, Raju Mann, Sarah Moon, Cheryl Raleigh, Erin Rhodes, Daniel Rutzick

Faculty: Margaret Dewar, professor of urban planning

53 pages

This guide provides information on techniques useful for defining and analyzing MegaRegions. Documenting and sharing these methods has many benefits, including:

1. Making comparisons possible across MegaRegions;
2. Reducing startup time for new teams beginning MegaRegion planning projects;
3. Helping to increase professional rigor behind the MegaRegion concept in the United States, which may lend credibility to policy recommendations;
4. Retaining knowledge too technical or detailed for the plans themselves, including the rationale behind decisions and the evolution of ideas;
5. Facilitating communication between current students and future students who work on MegaRegion plans by providing another written record;
6. Allowing an outlet for constructive critique—including self-critique—that is helpful for advancing MegaRegion planning but not possible within the confines of a final plan that must be clear and concise;
7. Providing the basis for eventually standardizing some indicators across MegaRegions.

Students: Elizabeth Delgado, David Epstein, Yoohyung Joo, Raju Mann, Sarah Moon, Cheryl Raleigh, Erin Rhodes, Daniel Rutzick

Faculty: Margaret Dewar, professor of urban planning

75 pages

The Grand Traverse District Neighborhood Association (GTDNA) is seeking a plan for actions to stabilize and revitalize their neighborhood. The association wants to expand on their past projects to improve the neighborhood, which have included trash clean-ups, flower plantings, and neighborhood festivals. This plan is a strategy for the association members to broaden participation and take on larger projects. The plan describes the current conditions of the neighborhood, defines the association’s vision for the future, and details actions that the association can take to pursue that vision.

Students: Christopher Bryant, Jonathan Ippel, Richard Murphy, Ja-Jin Wu, Adam Zettel, Jason Zimmer, Brandon Zwagerman, Amy Zwas

Faculty: Margaret Dewar, professor of urban planning; Eric Dueweke, lecturer in urban planning

Community Partner: Grand Traverse District Neighborhood Association

82 pages