Source: Luc Nadal

How to Use TOD Standard

The TOD Standard is a multi-use tool that can help educate, plan, evaluate, and improve urban development in cities. It has been used at various levels of governance, from national to state, to municipal to the neighborhood, as well as by multiple stakeholders from planning agencies, developers, universities, and advocacy organizations. It can be applied in the following ways:

An Educational Tool

The TOD Standard lays out the core principles, objectives, and metrics of TOD. Together these form a powerful educational framework, helping decision makers and policymakers and young professionals understand the components of TOD and what good TOD is at a high level.

For practitioners and universities, it is an excellent resource for planning workshops and curricula development as the concepts, definitions and assessment tool can form the basis for educational modules and activities about what makes a good TOD and how a particular area may need improvement.

MIT students perform a TOD assessment along Guadalajara's new metro corridor. August 2017. The MIT Department of Urban Studies and Planning organized a course and a hands-on workshop with an objective to learn and apply the TOD Standard on a development site and draw recommendations for a private developer and the Guadalajara city planners. Read more about the initiative in Getting TOD Right in the Guadalajara blog post. Source: ITDP.

A Policy or Planning Framework

Core principles and objectives of inclusive TOD are a foundation for policymaking, from setting goals and targets to laying out the components of the urban policy or plans.

TOD Standard and its assessment tool can also act as guides to planning and evaluating the progress against the set-out policy.

In Jharkhand, India, the State Government adopted a State TOD policy based on the objectives and metrics of the TOD Standard. The policy guides localities in developing their own local development plans, but with the ambitious goal at least 80% of the city or metropolitan population must have walking access to transit within 400 metres. It also focuses on connectivity, complete streets, active frontages, increased density, and affordable housing. Source: ITDP.

In an effort to address the pedestrian-unfriendly large superblocks that were sprouting up all over China (like the one here), in 2015, the People Republic of China, Ministry of Housing & Urban-Rural Development (MOHURD) approved a Guide on Planning and Design of Areas along Urban Rail Transit which specifically referenced the Objectives of “Connect” Principle, banning large, gated urban superblocks transforming the structure of urban development throughout China. Source: ITDP.

An Assessment Tool

The TOD Standard is a comprehensive scoring tool that can be used to evaluate urban development at the neighborhood and the project scales.

By applying the TOD Standard, city planners and advocates can understand how well a project or neighborhood is delivering on the promise of TOD. Citizens and civil society organizations can make use of the TOD Standard to rate existing conditions or redevelopment proposals and to advocate for higher-standard complete communities where they live or work.

In the Netherlands, the Government of the South Holland Province has used the TOD Standard metrics to gather data on station area characteristics along the commuter rail lines. The data helps to monitor changes to the built environment of the station areas, but it can also help the Province to distinguish built environment characteristics like car-dependent areas and transit-adjacent development. Source: State of South Holland.

A Recognition System

TOD Standard established three performance levels: Gold, Silver, and Bronze status, to provide an opportunity for recognition of existing TOD projects.

Recognition through this comprehensive assessment framework identifies best practices, while encouraging interest in building projects that embody the TOD principles. Individual developers, practitioners, cities, and communities can use the TOD Standard and seek project recognition.

Central St. Giles mixed-use project in London, England, has been recognized as a Gold TOD Standard for its exceptional design and equity measures. Numerous projects have been evaluated and recognized by the TOD Standard and referenced in the literature. Source: Rick Ligthelm via Flickr.