Urban Planning and Climate Change

Simultaneously solving climate change and building cities for 3 billion people, doubling the urban environment.
Failure to plan cities correctly jeopardizes climate solutions and impacts social well-being, economic vitality, and community.
Shaping cities reflects our humanity and values.

Sprawl is not just low-density development but anything that isolates people.
It segregates people economically and by land use, separating them from nature and hindering interaction.
The antidote to sprawl is crucial for this massive construction project.

A model for California compared sprawl (shopping malls, subdivisions, office parks) with compact development (walkable neighborhoods, mixed-use).
Compact development means streetcar suburbs which constitute low rise but integrated mixed use envrionments.
Results showed significant differences and co-benefits of urban form.

Sprawl almost doubles the urban footprint, concerning environmentalists, farmers, and neighborhood groups.

Compact development leads to tremendous savings due to reduced car dependence, as California's largest carbon emission source is cars.
Cities that don't depend on cars as much obviously create huge savings.

Reducing average VMT by 10,000 miles per household annually has a huge impact on air quality, carbon emissions, and household finances.
Reducing the average from mid $26,000$ per household.

Prevent pollution by promoting walking and biking through city design, rather than fixing the consequences later.

The 2008 financial crisis was partly due to selling the wrong kind of housing such as large lot, single family, and distant homes.
Reducing costs by $10,000$ is significant, considering California's median income is $50,000$ .
Affordable housing advocates find common cause with environmentalists and politicians.

Los Angeles is transforming into a transit-oriented environment.
Since 2008, $400,000,000,000$ in bonds were voted for transit versus $0$ for new highways.
Transforming LA into a city of walkers and transit users, not cars.

China faces high-density sprawl with similar problems of isolation in superblocks.
Smog results, costing 12% of China's GDP in health impacts.
Traditional Chinese cities had robust communities with local shops and walkable environments.
New superblocks have 5,000 units, gated and lacking sidewalks or ground-floor shops which results in a sterile environment.
People desire local services, even setting up illicit shops in garages.

Chongqing, a city of 30,000,000, tested alternatives to sprawl for a 4.5 million person growth area.
Walking radius around transit stations is the foundation.
Massive investment in Metro and BRT allows working within walking distance of transit.
Principles include preserving green space and ecological features.
The streets in the red area are auto free streets.
Small blocks (500 families per block) with street perimeter shops create local destinations.

If only a third of people have cars, allocate 70% of street space to pedestrians, bikes, and transit for better city function.
No matter how many ring roads they build in Beijing they just can't overcome complete gridlock.
This can be solved by geographic equity in our circulation system.
Auto-free streets with mixed-use edges and transit in the middle.

Adopted by the highest levels in the Chinese government, these principles are globally universal.

Changes are well accepted in California, the United States, and China.
Most people understand the value of great cities.
Analysis enables connecting the dots and forming political coalitions for community development.

Over-hyped; AVs may increase vehicle miles traveled and congestion.
Privately owned AVs will enable people to travel greater distances, revitalizing sprawl.
If 50% of people are not willing to share taxis, there's a 90% increase in VMT even if they share them it would still amount to 30%.
Walking, biking, and transit are superior for cities compared to private bubbles (AVs).
The image of AVs running errands without owners is concerning.