Measuring public transport and built environment integration at the neighborhood scale: Towards a quantitative assessment methodology

Abstract

Public transport and built environment integration at the neighborhood scale is an important aspect of land use transport integration. Public transport systems and the built environment affect each other in a multitude of ways at the neighborhood level. These mutual effects impact the quality and performance of both systems; whether the outcome is positive or negative depends on how carefully they are attuned to each other – or in other words, how well they are integrated. Yet despite this importance, there are only few attempts to quantitatively define and measure integration at the neighborhood scale. Existing approaches have limitations, most importantly, they lack a clear theoretical framework of what exactly should be measured. To fill this research gap, a new approach to identify quantitative indicators for integration at the neighborhood scale is presented. It is based on the systematic analysis of mutual interactions between public transport systems and the built environment and the subsequent identification of measuring points.