Year 1 Work Scope

The implementation of AB 32 and SB 375 requires a new generation of models and basic research. Initially, these will be used to identify context-specific suites of strategies based on the best available science to both reduce greenhouse gasses (GHGs) and sustain the economy, equality, environment, and health of California communities. Later, as strategies are implemented, monitoring and basic research will guide the evolution of these models to evaluate progress towards GHG goals and to inform calibrations of existing strategies and adoption of new ones. An ongoing iterative process is envisioned.

San Francisco is one of the only areas in the U.S. that has an operational state-of-the-art integrated land use and transportation model system, linking an activity-based travel demand model and a parcel-level land use model (UrbanSim?). The integration of these two models make them uniquely well suited to simulate the auto pricing policies, land use strategies, and transportation investments on travel and land use. San Francisco will soon implement the first dynamic downtown parking pricing policy in the U.S., hosts numerous transit-oriented-development projects, and is seriously exploring congestion pricing.

University of California researchers propose the development of a living laboratory in the San Francisco Bay Area to simultaneously learn empirically from these cutting-edge policy developments and to refine the design and test the operation of state-of-the-art land use and travel models. The state and many regions are in the process of developing activity-based travel models and/or land use models. Only the Sacramento region has an operational activity-based travel model, and other regions and the state are probably seven to eight years away from implementing them. Many policy makers are skeptical about the accuracy of land use models. This laboratory would allow for early validations, the results of which would be invaluable to model development efforts. In addition, the rich data sets produced from these models could be mined to improve their behavioral foundations and to inform the development of a wide range of policy performance measures of interest to stakeholders (e.g., environmental justice, housing affordability, and land conservation). The early lessons learned will be transferred to model developers and made accessible to policymakers and planners throughout the state to reduce the cost and improve the outcome of these model development efforts. Undergraduate and graduate students would be widely employed in this laboratory, gaining the academic and hands-on training necessary to become the next generation of modelers and planners.

Tasks, Timeline, and Deliverables

Task 1. Setup the laboratory for the San Francisco UrbanSim? model and possibly the San Francisco activity based model (SF Champ).

Timeline: 12 months

Deliverable: Documentation of the model(s) installed and operating in the final report.

Task 2. Inventory the policies and specify evaluation criteria that are relevant to consider with the UrbanSim? and SF Champ model set in the context of AB32 and SB375.

Timeline: 12 months

Deliverable: Discussion of the identified policies and evaluation criteria in the final report.

Task 3. Conduct research on innovations that can be made to the model set that will make the models more robust and effective for policy, and more behaviorally realistic, for example, by improving the integration of the land use model with the activity-based travel model, moving away from iid errors in some choice models, and/or bringing heterogeneity into these models.

Timeline: 12 months

Deliverable: Discussion of research and its implementation in the model set in the final report.

Task 4. Plan for a series of scenarios to simulate alternative land use and transport packages and explore their combined effects.

Timeline: 12 months

Deliverable: Document this plan, which will be undertaken in year 2, in the Final report.

Task 5. Develop a workplan for extending San Francisco model system to the entire Bay Area region and integrating it with an emissions model.

Timeline: 12 months

Deliverable: Discussion of the feasibility of expanding the model system to the entire Bay Area region and adding and emissions model in the final report.

-- PaulWaddell - 02 Feb 2010