Class 14Atlanta: Form and FunctionRef: Alain Bertaud, Clearing the Air in Atlanta: Transit and Smart Growth or Conventional Economics? IntroductionThis paper contains an excellent analysis and description of the spatial structure of the Atlanta metropolitan region. It makes the point that Atlanta is exceptional in terms of its spatial structure even when compared to other large American metropolitan regions. Bertaud states that given this structure, transit expansion andsmart growth are not feasible solutions for solving the severe problemswith congestion and pollution in the Atlanta region. He gives two reasons to back-up this view: 1. The current spatial structure is incompatible with a sizeable transit market.2. The existing spatial structure cannot be changed significantly within the next 20 years.The first point is true – the second is debatable.He goes on to say that technology and pricing are the only way to solve the problem of congestion and pollution in Atlanta. However, he feels that people are unlikely to support this option if they believe that federally subsided transit and smart growth will solve the problem. Atlanta TodayAccording to Bertaud, Atlanta is one of the most congested and polluted city in America. He points out that from 1998 to 2000 the federal government blocked sending money to Atlanta for more highway investment. The flow of funds resumed in 2000 after the region satisfied the Feds that they where taking action to address the problem with clean air.Bertaud states that high rate of pollution and congestion is linked to a high rate of growth - implying that this link is inevitable. Between 1990 and 2000, the Atlanta region grew at a rate of 3.14% annually - one of the highest rates of growth in the country.The region is also very successful economically (at least in the early 2000). Bertaud supports this point by pointing out that in 2001, Atlanta had the 6th lowest unemployment rate of the 28 biggest region in the country (3.5%), it had the 11th highest per capita income out ofthe 48 regions in the country over 1 million people and had one of the lowest cost of living amongst major cities in the country. He attribute this outcome to the fact that the various actor responsible for Atlanta where ‘doing the right thing’.He says that when passing judgment on the spatial organization of Atlanta we need to keep in mind that while this organization generates high levels of pollution and congestion it provided jobs, housing and business in sufficient quantities to match its high demographic growth. In other words, he is saying that the spatial organization of Atlanta contributed to its low cost of living. This is a dubious claim with no evidence to support it.He reports on the regional development plan which was prepared by the Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC) with the goal to reduce pollution and congestion (actually with the goal of restoring federal funds it seems). The two main components of this plan were i) increased investment in transit, ii) promoting transit oriented development.Bertaud argues that this plan will not work as discussed above and goes on to analyze the spatial structure of Atlanta.DensityHe rightly states that density is a crude measure of a city’s spatial structure but it is also a significant and robust measure if done using a consistent methodology. I would also argue that density can be misleading if we don’t take into account the nature of the place – high density alone is not enough to support transit use, the place must also be walkable and attractive.Bertaud looks at 46 metro regions from around the world and found that Atlanta was the least dense at 6 persons per hectare. Atlanta stood out even amongst American cities. For example, Houston (11 p/h) was twice as dense, LA (22 p/h) was almost 4 times as dense and NY (40 p/h) was 6 times as dense. Compared with many European city the difference was stark – London had 62 p/h and Barcelona 171 p/h. The Asian cities where even denser: Bangalore (207), Shanghai (296), Seoul (322) and Mumbai (389).According to Bertaud, even LA was denser, echoing a common misconception that LA is particularly American example of sprawl.Population Density ProfileBertaud also looks at density profile which he defines as density in concentric ring around the city. He says that this is a more subtle indicator of spatial structure – the shape of the profile indicates whether or not the city center is a strong attractor of jobs and people.What he found was that the profile of Atlanta was extremely flat with very little variation in density across the metropolitan area and you go out from the center. (LA also has a flat profile but at a much higher level than Atlanta.) More traditional cities like Paris and London, New York and Chicago have a higher density at the center which decreases sharply as one move away from the center.Density profiles might be misleading in cities that have unusual configurations. Spatial Distribution of JobsBertaud also looked at the spatial distribution of jobs.He found that in 19901) 2% of jobs in CBD2) 8% within 5 km of city center3) 7% accessible by metro 4) 44% not accessible by metro or bus The last point of course can be as 56% of jobs accessible by metro or bus. The problem might not be just the access but the level of service and convenience that is offered by the transit in such a sprawling region.Atlanta is ExceptionalBertaud concludes his analysis by stating that Atlanta is exceptional – even amongst US cities it has exceptionally low density and a dispersion of jobs and people.He goes on to say that from an economic point of view this low density does not matter because Atlanta seems to be doing so well. This actually seems to contradict his earlier point that suggests that the economic success is related to this unusual spatial pattern. (In his book “How Cities Work”, Alex Marshall argues a similar point that the transportation system that we chose for our cities (and presumably theresulting spatial pattern) does not matter to whether or not the city willbe successful.)However, Bertaud is right in arguing that in terms of getting transit to work successful the spatial structure of Atlanta matters a great deal.He says that cities with well developed transit have a higher density and heavier concentration of business and retail in the center city. Which to me seems to beg the question – which comes first, the transitor