Transportation demand management is crucial to Amazon’s future move to Arlington, Va., as “a forward approach to planning,” according to a new report by the Northern Virginia Affordable Housing Alliance.
Ally Schweitzer of WAMU reports that home values are already rising in the Crystal City neighborhood of Arlington, where one of Amazon’s second headquarters will open. To keep home prices affordable in both Arlington and the Washington DC region, the NVAHA notes that subsidies are important but that a handful of other best practices, including TDM, urgently need to be employed.
The report finds that more diverse housing than just single-family homes needs to be constructed throughout the region, and not just next to Metro stations but also on “community-serving land controlled by entities like hospitals, faith-based institutions, universities, and charities.” A good example of that kind of development, the report notes, is the 70 affordable rental units that Arlington County funded on the site of Clarendon Baptist Church.
The report cites what may be the biggest obstacle to aligning our housing and transportation priorities, which need to work lockstep with each other in all phases of city planning but often don’t or can’t:
Residents routinely fight new development for a perfectly legitimate reason: They think it will worsen traffic, crowd schools, and generally make their lives harder. It’s important for residents to understand how they can benefit from growth.
If done correctly, the practice of TDM can make a planning strategy cohere because it demands that leaders understand how people are moving around and through certain spaces and that they are communicating travel options to the public. Amazon can play a valuable role in helping the region’s leaders make the changes needed in housing and transportation as its business shifts the patterns of regional travel.
Photo of the part of Amazon’s Arlington headquarters that will begin redevelopment at 1770 Crystal Drive, from Google Maps.