Environmental justice analysis - Challenges for metropolitan transportation planning

This research focuses on three major challenges of incorporating environmental justice into metropolitan transportation planning. The data needed are compared with the data currently available on the spatial distributions of race and income, the spatial distributions of trip ends, trip tables, network performance, and cost estimates of improvements. Several conflicting definitions of equity are offered, as are applications for each within the context of environmental justice. The importance of choosing a correct unit of analysis is discussed, with particular emphasis on how the geographic unit of analysis is a poor proxy for the group unit, which is theoretically required, as the analysis's purpose is to compare performance measures across groups. The primary goal of this paper is to explore challenging topics such as these raising questions and concerns. The answers to the questions raised will differ depending on each implementing agency's objectives and resources.