Can Transportation Strategies Help Meet the Welfare Challenge?

It is understandable that welfare reformers, economic development experts, and housing advocates turn to transportation policies as strategies for overcoming some of the enormous shortcomings in US urban policy. However, transportation programs cannot compensate for failures in other policy areas, p...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of the American Planning Association 1998, Vol.64 (1), p.15-19
Main Authors: Wachs, Martin, Taylor, Brian D.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Central business districts
Commuting
Earnings
Employment
Labor market
Neighborhoods
Public transportation
Transportation
Urban areas
Welfare
Welfare reform
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Summary:It is understandable that welfare reformers, economic development experts, and housing advocates turn to transportation policies as strategies for overcoming some of the enormous shortcomings in US urban policy. However, transportation programs cannot compensate for failures in other policy areas, precisely because transport is also a damaged part of the deeply flawed urban policy. The purpose of welfare was to eliminate poverty, but the purpose of welfare reform is to eliminate welfare. Transport alone cannot be expected to eliminate both welfare and poverty itself; rather, it should be part of integrated economic development, housing, and educational programs to address urban poverty, not as an afterthought to correct for omissions in other urban policies.
ISSN:0194-4363
1939-0130
DOI:10.1080/01944369808975952