PB Placemaking and the Big Question: Who will Pay for Planning?

Two recent news items on either end of the planning spectrum are worth noting:

1) Last week, Parsons Brinkerhoff dissolved the Portland OR office of PB Placemaking, the firm’s premier planning office that recently gathered prestigious awards for Tyson’s Corner presented in the video above.

2) In August, a Sarasota City Commissioner forecasted a grim budget in front of civic activists, noting rising pension costs as the deficit driver.  

Both these news items involve money and planning, but actually they form a larger story on the state of planning.  To understand this story, it helps to look at the various planning scales and ponder their funding sources (I realize there are other types of plans along the planning gradient; this is a rough outline).

1) Regional – Thanks to the Sustainable Community Planning Grants from HUD, there are great regional planning efforts underway.  These federal grants seem to have ushered in a new era for multi-county planning around the country to turn self-defeating competition into powerful collaboration.

2) Sector (or sub-regional) – In talking to other planners around Florida, planning at this scale is happening around big infrastructure projects, such as airport expansions, interchanges and ports. Localities are leveraging federal and state dollars for local land use and transportation planning surrounding the projects. 

3)  Comprehensive Plan – Comprehensive Plans for cities and counties are common around the country, though vary in the level of required elements, analysis and ties to state dollars.  Comprehensive plans are typically paid by localities, though can be supplemented with grants, foundation dollars and state funding.

4) Corridor/nodes – Here in Florida, FDOT has been leading corridor projects along with MPOs.  Our local example is Sarasota’s Citywide Mobility Plan.    

5) Small Area and Neighborhood Plans – These plans are almost exclusively left to localities.  For sprawl repair, redevelopment and smart growth, this is the most important planning increment BUT one that relies on foundational work of visioning, comprehensive planning, and in some cases corridor planning.

Some thoughts on the future of funding:

• The Sustainable Community Planning Grants program had to fight for another round of annual funding.   No matter who wins the next election, the pressure on budgets, especially discretionary items, will only grow. 
• The downsizing of PB Placemaking should be a wake-up call to the planning profession.  It’s important to note that PB also transferred 147 employees from NYC to Pennsylvania, so there are likely factors other than planning TOD involved.  For transit oriented development, the truth is it feels like we are at the tail end of a golden age of TOD planning.  The pipeline is thin, project planning is long, and much of the TOD work was the realization all at once in the mid 1990’s that urban and suburban stations built long ago were actually economic and land use assets. 
• While much of the ballyhoo over pensions is a convenient way to swipe unions and wriggle out of contracts, as more boomers retire, pension costs will crowd out other budget items – like planning.
• When the Florida legislature reduced planning requirements last year, the urgency of data, analysis and planning dissolved.  With less pressure, local budget hawks are demanding no dollars be directed to planning, since we are no longer legally bound to do so.  While they may not succeed at getting zero dollars, they set up a negotiating process that bends the budget downward.  I imagine this is not just a Florida phenomenon.

None of this means planning is dead.  I realize there are a lot of people smarter than I am helping frame new directions but there are a couple of themes:

• Competition for infrastructure-related planning jobs will be fierce
• Although “heavy” transit projects and TOD are slowing down, the real opportunity is bus TOD.  I’ve written on this before, and if you think it’s obvious to localities, it’s not. 
• Planning needs to be rebranded as portfolio management.   Just as families seek advice on their income, taxes, assets and allocations, communities have to do the same thing.  This asserts an economic role for planning, but also provides comfort for stewards of the environment, because they are now an asset class on par with everything else.   Arts lovers will also see an explicit tie since artists build their work in portfolios.  

In closing, I would like to give a virtual nod to G.B. Arrington who worked with PB Placemakers.  He has a way of mixing the technical, practical and artistic aspects of planning communities in an approachable way.  He has made me smile on many occasions. He will no doubt re-launch soon as he is one of the best in the planning business. 

High Speed Rail in Florida Just Got Way More Interesting

Last week, a little noticed press release from a railway in Florida laid a new piece in the Florida rail puzzle.  All Aboard Florida, owned by Florida East Coast Industries, Inc. (FECI), announced plans to connect south Florida with Orlando with high(er) speed passenger rail by 2014.  The $1 billion project would be privately funded, running mostly on existing track and a projected new 40 mile spur to Orlando.

Paulus Magnus of Reason and Rail has been covering this story in depth.  He and his followers (in comment sections) have been pointing out several interesting aspects of this story. Streetsblog Capitol Hill is also covering.

Can They Get it Done on Time?  Several aspects of the project need to be fleshed or thought out a bit more.  That last 40 mile spur to Orlando won’t be easy, complicated by the as-of-yet undisclosed location of a final station (the airport or Disney or somewhere else?).   The choice of train cars does not seem to be settled, and given the long lead time for purchase orders, seems to bump into the aggressive time line.

Real Estate – This is the most fascinating part of the story.  Florida East Coast Industries was acquired by Fortress Investment Group in 2007, which separated the railroad and real estate subsidiaries into two separate companies—Flagler and Florida East Coast Railway—so each could focus on its primary line of business. The $1 billion investment won’t likely come from passenger rail, but through the combination of rail and real estate.  Of course 2007 was a tricky year to do anything in real estate, but it may not matter.  In the end, it is the long range performance that the company is teeing up.

Magnus looked into their individual parcels and highlights this midtown piece, which used to be a rail station and is near both Metrorail and Metromover stations.

Amtrak – While comparisons to Amtrak are certain, several quirks about FECI’s trains, tracks, market and operating environment will not be easy to replicate.  FECI’s track alignment balances and orchestrates freight and passenger rail, a thorn in Amtrak’s side elsewhere in the U.S.   

Speed – The ultimate speed is still not really clear; it seems to top out at 110 mph, which average speeds between 60 and 80 mph.  This is certainly competitive with auto travel. The company will add Wi-Fi and other amenities not found in a confined car with children or clients.

It is also interesting to see how the rail company is positioning itself.   From their brochure, they note:

All Aboard Florida is: A privately owned, operated and maintained passenger rail system will bring:

• Taxpayer costs savings from reduced highway maintenance

• Lower carbon emissions

• Economic boost from new construction and operating jobs

• Increased tourism

• New transit-oriented development opportunities

• Increased revenues from rising property values near stations, which can be used for local programs (e.g. schools, parks, public works, police and fire protection).

So why does this matter?

First, this is not the be-all project that immediately spawns a new era in rail.  But it is a missing link that fills several critical gaps:

• This story is gaining steam with conservatives.  Given the market signals on the promise of rail, great rail can be the focus of attention as anti-rail forces become marginalized
• The company itself is touting reduction in carbon.  While it is not a predominant theme, they use the word - carbon.
• Smart growth-ers need to contact the company and the state and local transportation/planning officials to offer support.   That support is no longer rail/no-rail, but good project versus off-the-charts great project. 
• Florida has new planning rules.  While the sometimes-stifling process of dealing with state planning is no longer a big deal, this project will hopefully expose where even 2011 rules don’t match modern needs.  I am specifically thinking of the new sector planning process, which has a 15,000 acre minimum.  Urban projects need concentrated focus on a much smaller footprint and with tools to deal with the complexity.   The 15,000 acre sector plan is for new towns in the middle of nowhere, which means a really useful tool got turned into sprawl accelerant.   Let’s get real about small area planning for urban areas and use it here.
• The link to other transportation options.  The downtown Miami location offers great connections to get you where you need to go - subway, walking, cabs, ports, circulators.  The Orlando link will be the trickiest but offers a "dream big" moment for all types of existing and as-of-yet invented vehicles and technology.
• This private sector project might offer clues on how to sequence other fixed guideway investments to coordinate public and private sector improvements.  The lesson here is not that private investment is the only way to go, but to see how private projects might stimulate more effective public and public/private projects.   

A big Hat Tip to Dave Brook at www.carsharing.us for the heads-up on this story.