Strengthening Transit Through Community Partnerships
The Congress for the New Urbanism (CNU) has released a report on suburban poverty, focusing on the Puget Sound region in Washington, within the national context of growing poverty beyond city limits in many regions of the country. The report summarizes a May 2017 symposium in Seattle that drew nearly 1,000 participants.
Combating the Suburbanization of Poverty: The Future of Just, Sustainable Growth in the Puget Sound Region is the result of a partnership between CNU, King County GreenTools, and the Bullitt Foundation. The multi-faceted discussion that led to the report was held on May 2, 2017, in conjunction with CNU’s annual Congress in Seattle.
The report summarizes key points and findings from the event’s speakers, including Elizabeth Kneebone of the Brookings Institution, co-author of Confronting Suburban Poverty in America; and Scott Bernstein, president of the Center for Neighborhood Technology (CNT).
Bernstein, using CNT’s AllTransit and Housing and Transportation Index tools, has shown how spatial mismatch contributes to the expense of transportation and persistent suburban poverty in Puget Sound. With housing widely spread out, fewer areas that mix services and retail with housing, and most jobs concentrated in the urban core, suburban residents all pay a high premium for transportation—a reality that hits those in poverty the hardest.