Transportation Planning Specialization

Overview

Core Faculty

Gregory Thompson. Professor Thompson’s research focuses on policy analysis of public transportation subsidies and investments. His interests include the institutional, political, and planning history of the light rail transit movement in North America, the relevance of different service strategies for making public transit successful in decentralized urban areas, and the importance of land use versus transportation factors in affecting travel behavior choices.

Jeffrey Brown. Professor Brown’s research explores the role that prejudices in professional practice have had on the development of less-than-optimal transportation networks. His interests include the early professionalization of transportation planning, the changing nature of street and highway planning in the United States, transportation finance, and the relevance of different service strategies for making public transit more successful in decentralized urban areas.

Other Faculty

Rebecca Miles (healthy cities)

Melissa Saunders (urban design/transit oriented development)

Courses

The transportation planning specialization consists of three required courses and a minimum of one elective course chosen from an approved set of elective courses (see below).

Required Courses:

URP 5711 Transportation Planning (Fall).

This course provides an introduction to the U.S. transportation system and how planning is done for it. The course examines contemporary U.S. transportation problems, sources of funding, institutions, and legislation. The course presents the theory and methods employed by planners in resolving transportation problems through investment decision plans, operating strategies, and government policies.

URP 5716 Transportation and Land Use (Spring).

This course examines the critical relationships between the transportation system and the built environment. Students will learn the theories of transportation and land use interaction, understand the nature of the effects of transportation infrastructure on land use and the effects of land use on the way we use the transportation system, be able to critically examine this relationship using established analytic techniques, and be able to assess the likely effects of different transportation and/or land use policy decisions.

URP 5717 Transportation Demand Analysis (Fall).

The course covers: the theory of transportation demand, what planning models are and how to use them, elasticity analysis, estimating several direct demand models with SPSS and a real-world data set, interpreting the estimation output, learning to read a journal article presenting a demand analysis, learning the basics of highway and transit modeling with the CUBE modeling system. This is an intensive, hands-on computer modeling course. 

Electives (select a minimum of one course from this list):

URP 5719 Special Topics in Transportation Planning

URP 5272 Urban and Regional Information Systems (GIS)

URP 5312 Growth Management

URP 5316 Land Use Planning

URP 5350 Pedestrian Oriented Communities

URP 5389 Urban Design

URP 5731 Planning of Community Infrastructure

REE 5315 Real Estate Project Feasibility Analysis

TTE 5205 Traffic Engineering

CNG 5930 Intelligent Transportation Systems

TTE 5805 Highway Geometric Design

GEO 5934 Urban Analysis

And other courses on topics that are relevant to an understanding of how transportation systems are designed and/or used by travelers

Recent Master’s Projects by Students in this Specialization

· Planning in the decision to implement Charlotte’s light rail system

· The Relationship Between New Urbanism and Logistics

· Influence of Public Transit on Land Uses: A Case Study of MAX Light Rail System in Portland, Oregon

· A Study of the Significance of Suburb-to-Suburb Ridership on Commuter Rail Systems: Tri-Rail

· An Analysis of Suburb-to Suburb Commuter Rail Potential: Metrolink in Southern California

· Influence of Land Use Form on the Journey to Work: A Case Study Involving Orange County, Florida

· Measuring the Effect of Transit Route Connectivity on Ridership with FSUTMS: An Orlando Case Study

· How Walkable is Walkable?

· A Comparative Study of the Effects of Continued Suburbanization on Metrolink in Southern California and Tri-Rail in South Florida

· An Analysis of Changes in Public Transit Use Across the United States, by Metropolitan Statistical Area

Recent Studios Taken by Students in this Specialization

· Evaluating Alternative Futures for Taltran (Star Metro)

· Modeling alternative transit futures for the Tallahassee region using Cube Voyager (two different studios)

· Creating transit oriented design corridors for Tallahassee for light rail

· Transportation planning students have also participated in most other studios offered in the department

Employment of Recent Graduates in this Specialization

· Cambridge Systematics

· DMJM (Baltimore)

· KPMJ Peat Marwick (McLean, VA)

· Gannett Fleming (Tampa)

· Florida Department of Transportation

· City of Tallahassee

· URS

· JHK Transcor (Orlando)

· City of Orlando Planning

· Orange County (Florida) Planning

· Transportation Consulting Group (Tallahassee and Winter Park)

· Federal Highway Administration (Washington, DC and Atlanta)

· Martin County Growth Management

· Metropolitan Planning Commission (Nashville)

· Jacksonville Planning Department

· Sacramento Regional Transit

· Reynolds, Smith & Hills

· Glatting, Jackson, Kercher, Anglin

· Polk County Planning Division.