Environmental justice and transportation equity: a review of MPOs

Surface transportation policies at the local, regional, state, and national levels have a direct impact on urban land use and development patterns. The types of transportation facilities and services in which public funds are invested provide varying levels of access to meet basic social and economic needs. The way regions develop land dictates the need for certain types of transportation, and on the other hand, the transportation options in which regions invest influence patterns of urban development. While many lament the trend toward suburban sprawl as damaging to the environment or unaesthetic, those who support social equity should also be concerned about the associated impacts. Substantial investment in highway development and other transportation programs that encourage private automobile use has supported low-density developments that extend increasingly farther and farther from the central city, and to residential and commercial areas that are increasingly spread out, producing "edgeless cities" (Lang 2003). In addition to being costly to state and local governments, transportation policies that encourage these growth patterns play a substantial role in producing some indirect, negative social and economic effects, including perpetuating residential segregation and exacerbating the inability of minorities to access entry-level employment, which is increasingly found in suburban areas. MPOs are well suited to provide leadership in the areas of metropolitan development and civil rights.