Alex Karner
Deb Niemeier1, E-mail the corresponding author
 Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of California, One Shields Ave., Davis, CA 95616, United States
 
 
 Highlights

•The law, regulatory guidance, academic research, and agency practice pertinent to equity analysis are reviewed.
•Commonly employed methods do not well-represent the travel behavior of disadvantaged populations.
•Activity-based models offer a promising path forward, but four step analyses can also be improved.
•Understandings of race and travel behavior among planners limit analytical possibilities.
•New methods focused on short-term analyses and mitigation are proposed.


Keywords
Race; Travel behavior; Planning practice; Law; Equity


Abstract
Metropolitan planning organizations typically undertake an analysis of regional transportation plan equity to comply with federal anti-discrimination law, most prominently Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. In this critical review, we examine the law, regulatory guidance, academic research, and agency practice pertinent to equity analysis. We find that recommendations are extensive but generally lack specificity and are rarely enforceable. In the absence of detailed guidance, practice has become dominated by a single method that has foundations in the spatial analysis of environmental exposures and the neighborhood effects literature. We argue that this method is not appropriate for the analysis of transportation investment benefits, in part because target populations must be defined a priori based on demographic thresholds for areal units rather than on the basis of exposure. Further, it does not represent the travel behavior of Title VI-protected populations adequately, most notably people of color. Newer travel demand modeling paradigms are capable of sidestepping methodological problems, and legacy models can be adapted and improved. However, agencies generally have not shifted from traditional methods and planners do not view race as a variable relevant to travel behavior. By relying on an analytical technique that is not likely to reflect the travel behavior of people of color, planning agencies reduce the likelihood that racially disparate outcomes will be identified and mitigated. Meaningful transportation equity analyses must include an assessment of both current and near-term conditions and provide racially specific outcomes, while seeking to mitigate inequities through programming decisions.



Article Outline
1. Introduction
2. Evidence on race and travel
3. Law and guidance for equity analysis
4. Equity analysis in practice
4.1. The traditional approach
4.2. Ecological and categorical flaws
4.3. The treatment of race

5. Towards meaningful equity analysis
5.1. Demographic thresholds and disaggregation
5.2. Analysis years and geographic scope
5.3. Definition and determination of equity

6. Conclusions
Acknowledgements
References



Figures
   

Fig. 1.

Peak-period automobile (a) and transit (b) accessibility to all jobs for the nine-county San Francisco Bay Area, 2005. Plotted values for each TAZ were calculated as a proportion of the greatest observed peak automobile accessibility. The five categories correspond to increments of 0.2 ranging from 0 (least accessible) to 1 (most accessible).