Federal transportation authorizations require metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs) to identify and track key indicators of system performance (e.g. collision rates, emissions, congestion) to ensure that they are stewarding public funds wisely to meet specific goals related to safety, environmental performance, and congestion mitigation, among other areas.

The “collage city” of the postmodern metropolitan region is made up of many different types of built landscapes—neighborhood-scale patterns of streets, blocks, parcels, buildings, and infrastructure—each of which have implications for livability, sustainability, and equity. This project under the guidance of Prof. Stephen M. Wheeler has developed a global typology of 27 built landscape types and has mapped those in GIS for 24 urban regions.

The growing demand for affordable homes, coupled with the increasing local opposition known as NIMBYism (“Not in My Back Yard”), signals a need to put a face to affordable housing.

In fall of 2010, the Sacramento Area Council of Governments (SACOG) and its partners received a grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development for regional planning to accelerate transit-oriented development (TOD) in the Sacramento region. The Center for Regional Change (was primarily responsible for developing mechanisms for analyzing the social equity considerations in prioritizing transit-oriented development projects, and for promoting these considerations as a central part of the TPA selection process.