Mixed-Income Transit-Oriented Development Action Guide
Reconnecting America, the Center for Transit-Oriented Development & Strategic Economics
The Mixed-Income Transit-Oriented Development (MITOD) Action Guide is an online tool that takes communities through a step-by-step analysis designed to help retain and increase lower income TOD housing as well as to optimize the benefits that can be gained through careful planning. TODs can bring a number of benefits: increased transit ridership, less regional congestion, lower parking demands, and walkable neighborhoods where residents can live and all can work and recreate. However, unless care is taken during the planning and execution of TOD, redevelopment can have an unintended consequence—the loss of affordable housing. Reconnecting America and the Center for Transit-Oriented Development, together with Strategic Economics, have crafted the MITOD Action Guide to help communities preserve and expand affordable housing while promoting TOD. The MITOD Action Guide helps stakeholders evaluate their initial perceptions about a TOD location, analyze existing conditions, recognize opportunities and determine strategies, all with the purpose of developing a MITOD plan.
MITOD can help to lessen income segregation and provide job and other economic opportunities to lower income residents. When communities well served by transit redevelop a range of housing products, they can benefit from the synergies made possible by a mix of different household incomes. MITOD can provide truly affordable housing by allowing residents to minimize the two largest household costs—housing and transportation. Transit providers can benefit through greater stability in transit ridership affordable by MITOD, as lower income households utilize transit more frequently than others, often traveling during non-peak times as well as for commuting purposes. Employers also can benefit from MITOD as it provides access to a more diverse job employment pool, and can help to improve retention and reduce tardiness through predictable travel.