Freeway construction effects on job-housing balance: An empirical study of Freeway No.5

• Main Authors: Lin-Shu-Ju, 林書汝
• Other Authors: Jen-Jia Lin
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2010
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/76514715536555372936

碩士 === 國立臺北大學 === 都市計劃研究所 === 98 === “Job-housing balance” refers to the balance between housing supply and employment opportunities in terms of space, quantity and content. In other words, it is unnecessary for people to leave away from their residences to workplaces. Instead within a certain area both living and working needs are self-sufficient. Developing transport infrastructures is one of the important factors affecting job-housing balance. Improving accessibility increases the incidence of long-distance travel behaviors. This could result in the phenomenon of job-housing imbalance as well as the increase of commuting costs and time consumed. The opening of Freeway No.5 in 2006 has shortened the travel distance between Yilan and Taipei and changed the spatial structure of people’s daily lives. Has the population interactions between Taipei and Yilan been raised, which results in the expansion of the commuting areas of Taipei and imbalanced living and working phenomenon? Most of the previous researches about job-housing balance emphasized the design of indicators and strategies for mitigating imbalance. The impact of transport infrastructures, however, on job-housing balance has been neglected in discussion. Taking Freeway No. 5 and Taipei-Yilan are as research subjects, the purpose of this study is to empirically analyze the impact of freeways on job-housing relationships; furthermore, to develop strategies for the local governments to achieve job-housing balance. In this study, the before-and-after travel demand data of the opening of Freeway No. 5 was used as research data, and literature review, linear regression and linear programming were applied as research methods. First of all, from relevant literature, four job-housing balance indicators were extracted: |J/ER-1|, spatial dissimilarity index, commuting time and excess commuting. Secondly, the linear programming approach was used to measure the indicator of excess commuting. Finally, the impacts of highway on job-housing balance were explored by linear regressions and the development strategies on balancing the relationships between housing supply and employment opportunities were recommended. The sample data was classified into aggregate, Taipei City/County and Yilan County in order to identify if there were differences between Taipei and Yilan. The empirical results show factors that caused imbalanced distributions of activities include the opening of Freeway No. 5, higher vehicle ownership, higher housing prices, and more higher-educated population. Raletively, variables such as closer to the interchanges or more married population could induce a more balanced job-housing relationship. From the aspect of travel time to discuss the factors of job-housing imbalance, the results show that longer commuting time occurs in areas with more concentrated population or higher vehicle ownership. Contrarily, the opening of Freeway No. 5, more higher-educated population, higher estate prices, and more working population could cause shorter commuting time. This result is different from the distribution of activities inasmuch as better accessibility could reduce commute time between workplace and residence, whereas in fact the locations of residence and employment are in different areas. Based on the empirical findings in this study, five strategies are suggested as strategic development references for urban planning, transportation and economic sectors to alleviate the phenomenon of job-housing imbalance: amount control of housing and employment development, configuration of land-use planning, license plate management and high occupancy vehicle control on freeway, levy of congestion fee in rush-hour, and encouragement of setting up branching offices and the usage of communication technologies. Keywords: freeway, job-housing balance, linear regression, linear programming