#2cities

[nationalplayers]

We have been working hard in rehearsal for A Tale of Two Cities these last few weeks and are excited to start tech tomorrow! If you live in the DC/Baltimore area be sure to check out this exciting new adaptation of Dickens’ classic novel!

[vamslife-blog-blog]

@geordyray we're trying to make it back to you #2cities #teleport #airmiles

[greatcities-blog]

Intra-city transit

According to a Pew Research report, in 2011, just two-thirds of young households owned a car.  Increasingly, the members of the creative class have shunned car ownership preferring to live in places where travel via public transit is easy. Three of the four rebounding cities (Boston, Philadelphia, and Washington, DC) have extensive public transit networks serving over the quarter of their population daily.  Most of the other cities have modest rail networks ranging from Detroit’s People Mover with just 2.9 miles of track in a loop downtown to Cleveland’s RTA with 37 miles of track over three lines. 

Many of the future investments in these cities may come from Bus Rapid Transit rather than rail.  Indeed, Cleveland’s HealthLine opened in 2008.  However, existing systems and present ridership trends considered together may signal the

appetite for or viability of transit improvements.  Pittsburgh, Baltimore, and Cleveland are well poised in this area with multi-line systems already in place and a public transit commuting share above 10 percent.

These maps of rail systems are borrowed from Radical Cartography.  All maps are drawn at the same scale. 

Sources:

Pew Research Center.  “Young Adults After the Recession: Fewer Homes, Fewer Cars, Less Debt.”  February 21, 2013. 

Radical Cartography: Urban Mass Transit Systems of North America. 

Tomer, A., E. Kneebone, R. Puentes, and A. Berube.  “Missed Opportunity: Transit and Jobs in Metropolitan America.” The Brookings Institute.  2011. 

U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey (2011, 1-year estimates).  

[greatcities-blog]

Inter-city Transit

As telecommuting becomes more popular and work schedules more flexible, workers may have the opportunity to live in places other than where their office is located.  However, despite recent rapid technological innovations, face-to-face interactions remain invaluable to businesses.  The importance of cities has not diminished as technology improves.  If a creative class worker chose to settle in a declining city to enjoy, for instance, the lower cost of living, they would still need access to regular flights or train departures to economic centers such as New York, Los Angeles, London or Beijing. 

These maps show flights or trains originating from the city studied.  Darker colors indicate more frequent service.

Sources:

Amtrak.  Scheduled departures on the Northeast Corridor in July 2013

Bureau of Transit Statistics.  On-Time Performance February 2013

Flowing Data (R code to map connections)

Google Flight Search.  Scheduled international departures in July 2013

[greatcities-blog]

Anchor Institutions

Large local institutions such as universities and hospitals play a large role in the local economy.  They provide jobs for local residents, attract visitors and new residents, and can have spillover effects to other local businesses if they buy goods locally (such as has been done extensively in Philadelphia and Cleveland).  These anchor institutions play a role in the local economy regardless of their national ranking, however, more prestigious institutions may have an advantage in attracting customers (students or patients) from outside the region. 

These maps show nationally ranked hospitals (green) and universities (blue).  Larger bubbles indicate higher ranked institutions

Sources:

U.S. News and World Report’s, National University Rankings (2013)

U.S. News and World Report’s, Best Hospitals (2012-13)

[greatcities-blog]

School Quality

Although the quality of local public schools is likely not a primary draw for people to move to a city, it is certainly one of the driving forces behind families with school age children moving to the suburbs.  Cities can try as much as they like to attract young creative types to their borders, but without quality schools cities risk losing them just as easily after they have gotten married and had children.  The quality of local schools is notoriously difficult to measure as 1) student test scores may be more likely to reflect the socio-economic characteristics of the students as the quality of teachers and 2) schools are governed on a state level and thus, there is no national measurement standard. 

For this measure, I use 2009 standardized ratings of 4th grade student math test scores developed by the Global Report Card. 

Sources: Global Report Card

[greatcities-blog]

Price of housing and recent changes

I opted to focus on the price of housing last for two reasons.  First, the price of housing may simply reflect population declines that have already occurred.  Second though—and maybe more importantly—low house prices may actually be an opportunity for reinvestment.  For instance, with the average home price in Detroit now below $30,000, there is very little risk involved with investing there.  Such low prices could be an opportunity for creative investment rather than a blight on the city.  Indeed, low-priced housing could also be called  affordable housing.

Another interesting note is that Pittsburgh experienced very little house price decline during the recession and is the only city studied that had higher home prices at the end of 2012 than during their peak in the boom years.

Sources:  Zillow Home Value Index, All Homes.  Through September 2012.