Day: 2021-06-22

Elements of Access — Now with Video

| David Levinson

We are pleased to report that Elements of Access: Transport Planning for Engineers, Transport Engineering for Planners by David M. Levinson, Wes Marshall, Kay Axhausen is now on YouTube.

About the Book

Nothing in cities makes sense except in the light of accessibility. 

Transport cannot be understood without reference to the location of activities (land use), and vice versa. To understand one requires understanding the other. However, for a variety of historical reasons, transport and land use are quite divorced in practice. Typical transport engineers only touch land use planning courses once at most, and only then if they attend graduate school. Land use planners understand transport the way everyone does, from the perspective of the traveler, not of the system, and are seldom exposed to transport aside from, at best, a lone course in graduate school. This text aims to bridge the chasm, helping engineers understand the elements of access that are associated not only with traffic, but also with human behavior and activity location, and helping planners understand the technology underlying transport engineering, the processes, equations, and logic that make up the transport half of the accessibility measure. It aims to help both communicate accessibility to the public.

We now have an audio/video book version of Elements of Access, organised by chapter, linked to below at [Video] links.

Video of Chapter 1 of Elements of Access.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

FOREWORD [VIDEO]

I INTRODUCTION

1 ELEMENTAL ACCESSIBILITY [VIDEO]
1.1  Isochrone
1.2  Rings of Opportunity
1.3  Metropolitan Average Accessibility

II THE PEOPLE

2 MODELING PEOPLE [VIDEO]
2.1  Stages, Trips, Journeys, and Tours
2.2  The Daily Schedule
2.3  Coordination
2.4  Diurnal Curve
2.5  Travel Time
2.6  Travel Time Distribution
2.7  Social Interactions
2.8  Activity Space
2.9  Space-time Prism
2.10  Choice
2.11  Principle of Least Effort
2.12  Capability
2.13  Observation Paradox
2.14  Capacity is Relative
2.15  Time Perception
2.16  Time, Space, & Happiness
2.17  Risk Compensation

III THE PLACES

3 THE TRANSECT [VIDEO]
3.1  Residential Density
3.2  Urban Population Densities
3.3  Pedestrian City
3.4  Neighborhood Unit
3.5  Bicycle City
3.6  Bicycle Networks
3.7  Transit City
3.8  Walkshed
3.9  Automobile City

4 MARKETS AND NETWORKS [VIDEO]
4.1  Serendipity and Interaction
4.2  The Value of Interaction
4.3  Firm-Firm Interactions
4.4  Labor Markets and Labor Networks
4.5  Wasteful Commute
4.6  Job/Worker Balance
4.7  Spatial Mismatch

IV THE PLEXUS

5 QUEUEING [VIDEO]
5.1  Deterministic Queues
5.2  Stochastic Queues
5.3  Platooning
5.4  Incidents
5.5  Just-in-time

6 TRAFFIC [VIDEO]
6.1  Flow
6.2  Flow Maps
6.3  Flux
6.4  Traffic Density
6.5  Level of Service
6.6  Speed
6.7  Shockwaves
6.8  Ramp Metering
6.9  Highway Capacity
6.10  High-Occupancy
6.11  Snow Business
6.12  Macroscopic Fundamental Diagram
6.13  Metropolitan Fundamental Diagram

7 STREETS AND HIGHWAYS [VIDEO]
7.1  Highways
7.2  Boulevards
7.3  Street Furniture
7.4  Signs, Signals, and Markings
7.5  Junctions
7.6  Conflicts
7.7  Conflict Points
7.8  Roundabouts
7.9  Complete Streets
7.10  Dedicated Spaces
7.11  Shared Space
7.12  Spontaneous Priority
7.13  Directionality
7.14  Lanes
7.15  Vertical Separations
7.16  Parking Capacity		8 MODALITIES [VIDEO]
8.1  Mode Shares
8.2  First and Last Mile
8.3  Park-and-Ride
8.4  Line-haul
8.5  Timetables
8.6  Bus Bunching
8.7  Fares
8.8  Transit Capacity
8.9  Modal Magnitudes

9 ROUTING [VIDEO]
9.1  Conservation
9.2  Equilibrium
9.3  Reliability
9.4  Price of Anarchy
9.5  The Braess Paradox
9.6  Rationing
9.7  Pricing

10 NETWORK TOPOLOGY [VIDEO]
10.1  Graph
10.2  Hierarchy
10.3  Degree
10.4  Betweenness
10.5  Clustering
10.6  Meshedness
10.7  Treeness
10.8  Resilience
10.9  Circuity

11 GEOMETRIES [VIDEO]
11.1  Grid
11.2  Block Sizes
11.3  Hex
11.4  Ring-Radia

lV THE PRODUCTION

12 SUPPLY AND DEMAND [VIDEO]
12.1  Induced Demand
12.2  Induced Supply & Value Capture
12.3  Cost Perception
12.4  Externalities
12.5  Lifecycle Costing
12.6  Affordability

13 SYNERGIES [VIDEO]
13.1  Economies of Scale
13.2  Containerization
13.3  Economies of Scope
13.4  Network Economies
13.5  Intertechnology Effects
13.6  Economies of Agglomeration
13.7  Economies of Amenity

VI THE PROGRESS

14 LIFECYCLE DYNAMICS [VIDEO]
14.1  Technology Substitutes for Proximity
14.2  Conurbation
14.3  Megaregions
14.4  Path Dependence
14.5  Urban Scaffolding
14.6  Modularity
14.7  Network Origami
14.8  Volatility Begets Stability

15 OUR AUTONOMOUS FUTURE [VIDEO]

Bibliography
Elements of Access: Transport Planning for Engineers, Transport Engineering for Planners. By David M. Levinson, Wes Marshall, Kay Axhausen.
Elements of Access: Transport Planning for Engineers, Transport Engineering for Planners. By David M. Levinson, Wes Marshall, Kay Axhausen.

Now available: Elements of Access: Transport Planning for Engineers, Transport Engineering for Planners. By David M. Levinson, Wes Marshall, Kay Axhausen. 336 pages, 164 color images. Published by the Network Design Lab.

About the Book

Nothing in cities makes sense except in the light of accessibility. 

Transport cannot be understood without reference to the location of activities (land use), and vice versa. To understand one requires understanding the other. However, for a variety of historical reasons, transport and land use are quite divorced in practice. Typical transport engineers only touch land use planning courses once at most, and only then if they attend graduate school. Land use planners understand transport the way everyone does, from the perspective of the traveler, not of the system, and are seldom exposed to transport aside from, at best, a lone course in graduate school. This text aims to bridge the chasm, helping engineers understand the elements of access that are associated not only with traffic, but also with human behavior and activity location, and helping planners understand the technology underlying transport engineering, the processes, equations, and logic that make up the transport half of the accessibility measure. It aims to help both communicate accessibility to the public.

Features & Details

  • Size 8×10 in, 21×26 cm.  340 Pages
  • Images 164 Images (most in color)
  • ISBN
    • Softcover: 9781389067617
    • Hardcover: 9781389067402
  • Publish Date Dec 31, 2017
  • Language English

Purchase

Reviews

  • Jarrett Walker:  Elements of Access is really a tour of the whole field of transport planning, and its goal is to strike a balance between academic precision and readability.  In this, it’s a great success.  I’ve never taken more pleasure from reading academic writing about transport.  The writing is mostly clear and easy to read, and deftly combines technical ideas with references to everyday life.
  • Elisabetta Vitale Brovarone Dealing with the 5 Ps of access. Review of Elements of Access: Transport Planning for Engineers, Transport Engineering for Planners. Journal of Transport Geography 72 p. 274.
    • “There is an indissoluble link between land use and transport. It might sound hair-rising to those who theorised the positive utility of travel, but basically, most of the time we spend travelling is to reach places where we can carry out activities. Since the pioneering studies of Robert Mitchell and Chester Rapkin in the ‘50s, several scholars have studied the link between land use and transport and tried to foster a constructive dialogue between these two domains. Nevertheless, they are still deeply separate, in terms of disciplines, professions and planning domains.The book is clearly aimed at bridging this gap, and more. It fosters an informed dialogue between transport engineers and spatial planners, grounded on mutual (more than reciprocal) knowledge. Furthermore, it tries to help both to communicate accessibility and its various facets to the public. …”