Housing + Transportation Affordability Toolkit
Measures of Affordability
Traditional measures of affordability have focused on the housing cost element of a household budget. Transportation budgets have been much more difficult to measure, because the cost of owning and maintaining vehicles, fuel, and even riding transit can be quite variable. There are several existing tools to help individuals and public agency staff to understand the combined cost of housing and transportation. In addition, there are several on-line calculators that can help further explain housing and transportation costs. The following links lead to external web sites that maintain these existing measures of affordability.
CNT / CTPD study: Housing + Transportation Affordability Index
The Housing + Transportation Affordability Index developed by Center for Neighborhood Technology (CNT) and its collaborative partners, the Center for Transit Oriented Development (CTOD), is an interactive tool geared towards policy makers that measures the true affordability of housing and takes into account not just the cost of housing, but also the intrinsic value of place, as quantified through transportation costs.
ULI / CNT study: Beltway Burden: The Combined Cost of Housing and Transportation in the Greater Washington, DC, Metropolitan Area
This report developed by the Urban Land Institute (ULI) and CNT provides a comprehensive examination of the “cost of place” in the Washington, DC region presenting a jurisdiction-by-jurisdiction look at the combined housing and transportation cost burdens for households in the metropolitan area. These cost burdens vary significantly across the 22 jurisdictions that were studied where as some areas where households spend more on housing, they tend to spend less on transportation and vice versa. Across the metropolitan area, however, there are neighborhoods where households are saddled with both high housing and high transportation cost burdens.
Center for Housing Policy study: Heavy Load: The Combined Housing and Transportation Burdens of Working Families
This study presents the combined housing and transportation cost burdens of working families (earning between $25,000 – 50,000 annually) in 28 metropolitan areas at the neighborhood level along with an overview of where these working families live in each of the 28 areas and how their location decisions affect their commute times and costs. The study provides a detailed look at Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas-Ft.Worth, Denver, Greater Los Angeles, New York City, Pittsburgh, Portland, the San Francisco Bay Area, and Washington D.C.-Baltimore.
The Washington Area Housing Partnership study: Toolkit for Affordable Housing Development
The Washington Area Housing Partnership’s Toolkit for Affordable Housing Development is a compilation of policies and planning tools that local governments can use to preserve and promote affordable housing development in their respective jurisdictions.
Online Calculators
The following calculators are interactive tools available on-line for users to determine what their possible Housing and/or Transportation costs would be.
Commuter Connections
This simple and straightforward calculator provides information on transportation cost, as well as complementary information on a host of commuter programs to assist in determining which commuting option works best for the rider.
Housing + Transportation Affordability Index Calculator
This calculator provides housing and transportation affordability information for 52 metropolitan areas through a map-based interface. The calculator provides information on housing costs, transportation costs, and combined housing and transportation costs in specific locations within each region, but does not let users enter their own information.
Beltway Burden Calculator
This calculator provides combined housing and transportation costs in the greater Washington, D.C. region and lets users enter their own personal information and compare to similar households in the same neighborhood or in the region as a whole.