Connect is an easy-to-use and free online tool allowing users to instantly calculate how smart location, affordable homes and traffic reduction strategies can reduce driving and greenhouse gas emissions from residential development throughout California. It also calculates how much money and space can be saved from right-sized parking in the Bay Area.
Why:
We need to grow in a way that provides more affordable homes and transportation, with much less traffic and climate pollution.
Yet outdated codes and data often don’t fully account for factors like proximity to public transportation, let alone the benefits of strategies like free transit passes or carsharing. When we don’t account for these factors, we end up with excessive parking, fewer and less affordable homes, more traffic, and fewer spaces for gardens, storefronts, and community amenities.
What:
GreenTRIP Certifications in the Bay Area have shown a new paradigm of low-traffic development is possible. Now, The GreenTRIP Connect tool unleashes the power of smarter planning and decision-making for all users statewide. Thanks to the support of foundations and sponsors, this powerful tool is free for all to use.
How:
Connect allows you to identify a parcel of land being considered for development and then instantly calculate the transportation benefits of locating in a walkable community near transit. With Connect’s easy-to-use interface, just enter a few inputs, and you can then see the benefits of adding more affordable homes and strategies like free transit passes or carsharing. Connect shows how strategies can benefit the community while creating win-win cost savings for both residents and developers.
See the recording of our 2020 webinar, Supercharge Your Affordable Housing Advocacy with GreenTRIP Connect.
Who:
We designed this tool for you: the community members, city officials, and developers who shape and build our communities.
Community members who want to see smarter development and less traffic now have powerful data and modeling at their fingertips. With Connect you can advocate for more traffic reduction strategies and greater affordability, using free data and reports that are easy to share and print. It also can be used to compare a particular proposal with the county average, providing data to help you support smart, well-located developments.
Connect can be recommended to developers or fully incorporated into the development review process, especially since it is a free-to-use tool with tremendous potential benefits. You can also use Connect to engage residents and inform future planning at a larger neighborhood or community scale. Since 2009 cities have started to update zoning and specific plans in ways that support GreenTRIP strategies. We’re looking for more cities to join these innovative GreenTRIP Cities.
Residential developers of affordable and market-rate housing use Connect to determine how much driving and GHGs can be reduced by the project location and design. Connect also shows the benefits of providing only as much parking as needed. You can also use it to help evaluate potential sites for development.
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