Executive Summary | 4
Introduction | 6
Policy context | 7
FSHC should use racial and economic segregation to prioritize municipalities for intervention | 11
NJHMFA should emphasize racial justice and TOD in the Qualified Allocation Plan | 18
The Governor and Legislature should create an Unmet Need TOD Zoning Overlay | 27
New Jersey should prioritize affordable housing in station areas at risk of displacement | 28
New Jersey Transit should establish an affordable housing policy for joint development | 32
Reorienting the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail northern extension toward eTOD: Lessons and best practices for new transit lines in New Jersey | 34
DOT should require an affordable housing set-aside ordinance and eTOD planning for TVI | 44
Conclusion | 45
Appendix | 46
Notes | 48
Acknowledgements | 52
New Jersey is a state of contradictions. It is the 13th most diverse state in the country, yet it is one of the most segregated in terms of residential patterns. The Supreme Court of New Jersey has established one of the most robust doctrines to combat exclusionary zoning, but municipalities have some of the strongest home rule in the United States. The state is one of two with a statewide transit system, yet it has relied upon car-dependent sprawl for real estate development for decades. The State of New Jersey can adopt Equitable TransitOriented Development (eTOD) as a land use agenda to tackle these interwoven issues.
Transit-oriented development (TOD) has high momentum in New Jersey, embraced by State leaders, smart growth advocates, and private developers. TOD creates high quality of life, walkable communities with ready access to amenities. It increases the accessibility and use of the transit system and it promotes environmental sustainability by reducing driving. However, State initiatives to promote TOD have thus far paid little attention to equity. Continuing unchecked on this track threatens to lock in the state’s disparities and patterns of residential segregation. eTOD explicitly aims to bring TOD's benefits to all constituencies, particularly Black, Latinx, and lower-income residents. eTOD begins with affordable housing: ensuring that these marginalized residents have a realistic opportunity to live in transit areas seeing new investment.
The State should reassert its authority in land use policy and leverage the statewide transit system and affordable housing programs to build an equitable New Jersey for the 21st Century. Fair Share Housing Center can also play an essential role in eTOD in its role as an interested party in post- Mount Laurel IV declaratory judgments. This report proposes both an advocacy agenda for Fair Share Housing Center and New Jersey Future and a definition of what eTOD should be in the Garden State.
Fair Share Housing Center should prioritize transit-served towns with high racial and economic inequity its Mount Laurel compliance initiatives
Fifty-seven municipalities with Third Round settlements are either disproportionately white and high-income or nonwhite and lower-income. An additional seven priority municipalities do not have settlements. FSHC should focus on these municipalities during its Third Round Midpoint Reviews and the Fourth Round of Mount Laurel
The State should overhaul how it awards low-income housing tax credits to advance racial justice and the building blocks of good TOD
NJHMFA must take a holistic approach to ensure affordable housing is built near transit in walkable communities with access to amenities and good schools.
Governor Murphy and the Legislature should pass legislation to create a statewide Unmet Need TOD zoning overlay New Jersey needs to help municipalities fulfill their full Mount Laurel obligations by increasing developers’ ability to build inclusionary affordable housing in transit walksheds.
The State should protect vulnerable renters in station areas at risk of displacement
Predominantly Black and Latinx station areas are at a significantly higher risk of displacement. State agencies must preserve and build affordable housing in these areas.
New Jersey Transit should establish an affordable housing joint development policy
Affordable housing is not a priority of New Jersey Transit’s joint development activities. As a major transit-adjacent property owner, New Jersey Transit is a vital partner for advancing eTOD.
The State should reorient the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail northern extension toward eTOD
New Jersey Transit is on the path to squandering the opportunity for eTOD in the extension of the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail. The State can and should course-correct quickly to turn this project into a model for future fixed-guideway infrastructure investments.
FSHC should advance the municipal reforms necessary for eTOD in Mount Laurel Fourth Round negotiations FSHC should help municipalities reform exclusionary zoning using the checklist in this report. FSHC should center these best practices in its negotiations with the over 300 towns likely to seek compliance with their Mount Laurel Fourth Round obligations.
The State should comply with the Fair Housing Act by requiring Transit Villages to set aside 20% of new residential construction in the station area for affordable housing The Department of Transportation should comply with the Fair Housing Act, which since 2008 has required Transit Villages to set aside 20% of new residential construction in the designated Transit Village area as affordable.
New Jersey state leaders are embracing transit-oriented development (TOD). Transit-oriented development is a land use and transportation strategy that seeks to focus development near transit stations. In the station area, TOD aims to spur mixed-use development—housing, retail, and other amenities—within walking distance of the station. TOD aims to prevent sprawl, provide residents walkable neighborhoods with easy access to amenities and job centers, and maximize the use of New Jersey’s significant public transportation infrastructure.
Governor Phil Murphy features TOD in his economic plan; private developers are seeking TOD opportunities in response to new demand for housing in outer ring suburbs and downtown cores; and smart growth advocates support the density and sustainability principles of TOD.
However, the State’s TOD framework currently lacks focus on racial or economic equity. It risks replicating the harm of many race-blind programs, reinforcing existing inequitable outcomes, and entrenching the state’s high degree of residential racial segregation. This report centers affordable housing around transit stations as essential to eTOD: lower-income New Jerseyans, particularly Black and Latinx communities, can only share in the benefits of transit-oriented communities if they can afford to live in them.
This report advises New Jersey Future (NJF) and Fair Share Housing Center (FSHC) on the role the State of New Jersey can take so TOD in New Jersey becomes eTOD. The recommendations focus on State policy changes and the actions FSHC can take as an interested party designated by the Supreme Court of New Jersey in post- Mount Laurel IV declaratory judgment actions. Given the fiscal crisis created by COVID-19, this report limits recommendations of new expenditures.
The report proceeds as follows. First, the report reviews the state’s history of exclusionary land-use policy, Mount Laurel, and the opportunity eTOD can present to ameliorate racial segregation in the state. The report follows with an original analysis of racial and economic segregation along New Jersey’s transit lines and recommends that FSHC focus its Mount Laurel compliance efforts on advancing eTOD. It then recommends State reforms to increase the quality and quantity of affordable housing built by private developers near transit stations: a thorough overhaul of the Qualified Allocation Plan and a statewide Unmet Need TOD zoning overlay. The report then turns to displacement, identifying the station areas most at risk and recommending State actions to preserve affordable housing in these areas. The report recommends that New Jersey Transit adopt an affordable housing policy for joint development that includes a minimum set-aside and incentives for more and deeper affordability. This is followed by in-depth analysis of the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail northern extension, making recommendations on how New Jersey can get eTOD right on new rail lines. Finally, the report advises FSHC on advancing municipal eTOD zoning reforms as part of the Fourth Round of Mount Laurel and the Department of Transportation on overhauling the Transit Village Initiative.
Land use regulation has been a critical tool in racial segregation in New Jersey. Consistently, towns have used exclusionary zoning to keep nonwhite residents out of the suburbs.7 Just as Black residents won legal protections against housing discrimination based on race, New Jersey towns started to use zoning as a tool to keep the suburbs out of reach. During the 1960s, 150 municipalities increased lot size requirements. 8 At one point, suburban towns had restricted 98% of available land through exclusionary regulations.9 The effects of exclusionary zoning are disproportionately experienced by Black and Latinx residents, who are less likely to have the intergenerational wealth usually necessary to purchase an owner-occupied home due to mortgage redlining and predatory lending.10 Reflecting on this history, the New Jersey chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and the Latin Action Network argued that “exclusionary zoning is causally linked to racial and economic segregation” in New Jersey.11 This history must be front and center in land use reform in the state.
The State ought to make the rolling back of exclusionary zoning the cornerstone of eTOD. Exclusionary zoning has been central to land use policy in New Jersey, including along its rail corridors (see Map 1). A land use and development policy that does not counteract regulatory systems of exclusion will not be equitable. If New Jersey facilitates placebased interventions in communities where the housing stock is disproportionately out of reach to Black and Latinx residents, it should also be responsible for building affordable housing marketed to Black and Latinx residents to ensure they are able to share in the benefits. Similar to exclusionary zoning, TOD plans have often been premised on guiding suburban growth. Housing prices have increased in advance of a transit line or after a new transit
station is built, making these areas unaffordable for lower-income Black and Latinx renters.12 TOD without building affordable housing and the incorporation of a racial analysis runs the risk of perpetuating exclusionary development. Thus, without efforts to build affordable housing in transit station walksheds, the State will be investing in communities where Black and Latinx residents often cannot choose to live and so do not reap any of the benefits. Race-blind policies often exacerbate racial disparities or fail to provide equitable solutions.13 TOD without equity is no different.
The State should learn from Mount Laurel and make eTOD policy race-sensitive. New Jersey’s heralded Mount Laurel doctrine illustrates the limits of a race-blind approach. In response to a lawsuit from the NAACP on behalf of Black residents of Mount Laurel, which prevented the plaintiffs from building garden apartments, the State Supreme Court established the Mount Laurel doctrine in 1975. The doctrine requires that every municipality provide zoning to meet its fair share of the region’s need for affordable housing. Yet, the Court eliminated race from its assessment of Mount Laurel ’s actions and the Mount Laurel doctrine. It has taken many decades for Black New Jerseyans to access Mount Laurel housing fairly. Black representation among residents has crept up from virtually zero in the 1980s to 17% in the 1990s to 19% in the 2010s.14 Latinx residents, in contrast, had not exceeded 5% by the early 2010s, less than a third of their percentage of the state population.15 Mount Laurel ’s slow progress in providing Black and Latinx residents the choice to live in the suburbs is not surprising given its race-blind design.16
Transit Stations:
Disproportionately Nonwhite and Lower Income
Disproportionately White and High Income
Disproportionately Nonwhite OR Lower Income
Disproportionately White OR High Income
Despite Mount Laurel ’s progress, more work remains. In 2011, New Jersey was “more segregated, and [had] desegregated less quickly, than the nation as a whole.”17 In an Amicus Curiae brief, the NAACP and Latino Action Network argued that the slow progress in racial desegregation “highlight[s] the need for more—not less—vigorous implementation” of the doctrine. Yet, the slow progress of Mount Laurel speaks to the need for policy to ensure equal access for Black and Latinx residents to housing programs. Critical legal theory scholar john a. powell argued that a lack of a focus on race undermined the goal of Mount Laurel “to avert the potential for destructive city-suburb polarization rooted in both racial and economic inequality.”18 Without explicit racial policy safeguards, even uni-
versal policies designed with benefits to nonwhite residents in mind often disproportionately accrue benfits to white residents.19
For TOD to be equitable, the State should put policies in place to ensure TOD equitably benefits Black and Latinx residents. Among affordable housing and urban policy professionals, from the 1980s to the early 2000s, the consensus was to help Black and Latinx residents move out of the city.20 However, this left Black and Latinx neighborhoods facing systemic disinvestment. In 1997, john a. powell wrote that the need for investment in urban neighborhoods in New Jersey was so tremendous that “we are talking about pouring limited resources into a virtually bottomless pit.”21 However, the pen-
dulum has swung to a middle-ground position. The outcomes of tear-down replacement of public housing and mobility to the suburbs are decidedly mixed.22 This pushback against a focus on building affordable housing in the suburbs came principally from urban community leaders and residents who did not want to leave their communities. Today, the emphasis is on ensuring Black and Latinx residents have real housing choices by balancing affordable housing in urban and suburban communities.
New Jersey should target affordable housing to areas where displacement risk is high. Displacement is not new in New Jersey. The plaintiffs in Mount Laurel sought to build garden apartments because the town wanted to drive Black residents out through building code enforcement and tax policy.23 There is a need for an anti-displacement policy in station walksheds and along the northern extension of the Hudson Bergen Light Rail (HBLR). Without focusing on building and preserving affordable housing in station areas at risk of displacement now, a statewide drive toward TOD will not only fail to promote equity but could undermine it by driving out the most vulnerable.
New Jersey may be uniquely positioned to advance eTOD through a regional approach
New Jersey is uniquely placed to advance eTOD at the statewide level. The state is only one of two with a statewide transit network. The Mount Laurel doctrine functions as a statewide affordable housing planning system. New Jersey also has a legacy of state-level land use planning in The State Development and Redevelopment Plan and state planning entities for regions like the Highlands. TOD is most effective at this regional level, as opposed to a local level, since governments can focus on matching the entire transportation system’s capabilities with regional land use development possibilities.24 This regional approach is also at the core of Mount Laure l—and should be central to reducing residential racial segregation through State policy as well.
New Jersey could be on the cusp of a significant advance in residential racial integration. As of December 8, 2020, FSHC has reached Mount Laurel settlements with 332 towns. These settlements are
legally enforceable municipal commitments to zone for, and develop, affordable housing. Between 1980 and 2014, municipalities allowed the construction of 64,744 units to meet their Mount Laurel obligations. Given the recent slew of municipal settlements with FSHC, the state may be nearing a potentially historic level of affordable housing production in the suburbs. Fair Share Housing Center and the State should set a goal of channeling as much of this development as is possible to station walksheds.
While eTOD in New Jersey will not entirely undo decades of car-dependent land-use development, eTOD can ease the burden of car ownership. Living near transit can be a safety net for lower-income households, especially when a family loses a car or when there are not enough cars in the home. Car ownership places a burden on lower-income families. In California, lower-income households that own vehicles spend 19% of their budget on vehicular transportation compared to 16% for other families.25 These cost burdens help explain why 45% of lower-income families and 30% of Black families do not own a car.26 Even when lower income families have access to a car, it is often tenuous. Research that tracked individuals’ car ownership between 1999 and 2011 found that 46% of low-income families cycled in and out of carlessness often several times. Even for families not in poverty, inequities exist, with 27% of Black families entering and exiting car ownership compared to 13% of white families. Immigrant families share cars more than others, with car per adult ratios of 0.6 to 0.8 versus nearly 1.0 for U.S. born adults.27 Lower-income people also struggle more than the wealthy to acquire a vehicle during life events—such as coupling, the birth or adoption of a child, or starting a job— that often spur a car purchase.28 Because New Jersey’s transit network is widely dispersed across the state, a State policy of prioritizing eTOD does not require isolating tenants from car-dependent job centers. However, eTOD anticipates greater reliance on transit and high rates of temporary carelessness.
As a co-benefit, TOD is also an essential tool in reducing greenhouse gas emissions by reducing driving. 42% of New Jersey's greenhouse gas emissions come from transportation, compared to 28% nationally. 83% of transportation emissions nationally come from SUVs, light trucks, and cars.29 While there is a need to electrify the U.S. car fleet, the International Energy Agency estimates that this will
Transit-Accessible Census Tracts:
Disproportionately Nonwhite and Lower Income
Disproportionately White and High Income
Other transit-accessible tract
take many decades. Continued increases in driving have erased recent gains in fuel efficiency. Between 1990 and 2017, the U.S. vehicle fleet increased fuel efficiency by 18%. Yet, emissions still rose 22% due to a 50% increase in driving. This increase in driving goes hand-in-hand with America’s reliance on suburban sprawl, forcing Americans to drive further each year. Globally, it will take over 150 million electric cars to offset SUV sales if they continue on current trends. In response to this reality, California, Hawaii, and Minnesota have set goals to significantly reduce driving as part of their state targets for emissions reductions. New Jersey should embrace TOD as part of its climate strategy since TOD aims not just to facilitate the use of mass transit but also to build dense hubs near stations that reduce the need for driving.30
The State of New Jersey ought to see itself as the principal actor in eTOD across the state. Despite the Legislature delegating significant power to municipal governments, the State government has ultimate authority over land use policy. To achieve eTOD, the State must reassert its role in land use planning in the station areas. Only the State can plan transit-oriented land use at a regional level, which is necessary for the coordinated planning of transit service for successful TOD. 31 Additionally, the impacts of land use policy are not limited to a given town. Only the State can be relied upon to consider the broader statewide public interest. The State has a responsibility to ensure that Black and Latinx residents have a real opportunity to benefit from the TOD underway in New Jersey.
This section recommends a strategy for FSHC to prioritize municipalities for intervention in the Third Round Midpoint Review process and Fourth Round compliance activities in order to best promote eTOD. The prioritization strategy is informed by original analysis of racial and economic residential segregation in transit-adjacent areas. The analysis identifies two high-priority area typologies for eTOD: disproportionately white and high-income areas and disproportionately nonwhite and lower-income areas. This section lays out the findings of this racial and economic analysis and the proposed prioritization strategy.
There is high prevalence and significant overlap of racial and economic segregation near transit stations
New Jersey has 615 census tracts within a half-mile of a transit station and 244 transit station areas, representing nearly 200 municipalities. This analysis reveals a high overlap of racial and economic segregation near transit stations. This is seen in the map on the cover of the report. As shown in Table 1 below, of the 615 tracts, 124 are disproportionately white. 92 (74%) of these disproportionately white tracts are also disproportionately
high-income. 220 are disproportionately nonwhite. 205 (93%) of these disproportionately nonwhite census tracts are also disproportionately lower-income. 199 of the disproportionately nonwhite and lower-income tracts are majority or plurality Black or Latinx.
Of the 244 transit station areas, 50 (20%) are disproportionately white and high-income. 57 (23%) are disproportionately nonwhite and lower-income.
Race is associated with key housing and transportation characteristics, furthering the need for race-cognizant policy
There are differences between Black, Latinx, and white communities of similar incomes that justify race-cognizant policy. Table 2 demonstrates that among high-income census tracts, disproportionately white tracts have a much higher percentage of single-family detached dwellings and higher homeownership rates. This shows evidence of the restrictive zoning practices preventing nonwhite renters from relocating to these areas. Among lower-income census tracts, there are similarly higher rates of single-family detached dwellings and homeownership among disproportionately white
This analysis extends New Jersey Future’s research on income distribution around transit stations 32 by applying its methodology to examine transit areas’ racial composition and income distribution at the census tract level.
A census tract is “disproportionately white” if the percentage of its population that is white is greater than 200% of the region average or if the percentage of its population that is nonwhite is less than 50% of the region average. Census tracts are “disproportionately nonwhite” if they meet the same thresholds but with “white” and “nonwhite” switched.33 These thresholds were chosen to flag areas of extreme racial segregation. Census tracts that do not meet these thresholds are “aggregately proportionate” Census tracts are compared against their housing region (defined by the former Council on Affordable Housing, or COAH) because the regions represent similar housing and employment markets and have substantially different racial makeups. Transit station areas are aggregates of all the census tracts within a half-mile of the station and are classified using the same methodology.
The income analysis follows a similar method. A census tract is “disproportionately high-income” if the percentage of its households that earn 200% or more of the region’s median income is ≥ 20% higher than the region average. (This can be referred to as having an “equity ratio” in that income threshold of ≥1.2.) A census tract is “disproportionately lower-income” if either the percentage of its households that earn less than 50% OR that earn less than 80% of the region median income is ≥ 20% higher than the region average. Census tracts may also be “center-heavy” or “roughly equitable.”
For the complete spreadhseet workbook used throughout this report, please click here or access this Internet address: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1IAlcUNpOqldAhjvLmFgbKcYX2qRuSvPt/view
and aggregately proportionate tracts. Thus, disproportionately nonwhite census tracts are at higher risk of displacement as development occurs.
Disaggregating further by race in the nonwhite and lower-income areas (e.g., examining majority Black or majority Latinx tracts separately) shows only small differences in housing and transportation characteristics. Therefore, for purposes of this eTOD policy analysis, disproportionately nonwhite and lower-income tracts are treated as a single typology, rather than being disaggregated by each race/ethnicity.
Table 2 (Census tract housing characteristics by category) shows how housing and transportation characteristics vary between the high-priority typol-
ogies. These differences mean that different interventions will be appropriate to advance eTOD in these two types of areas. For example, the creation of an Unmet Need TOD Zoning Overlay will better advance eTOD in disproportionately nonwhite and high-income areas, while anti-displacement initiatives will better support eTOD in disproportionately nonwhite and lower-income areas.
FSHC should prioritize transit-served towns by racial and income inequity in midpoint reviews
In municipalities with settlements with FSHC, the Third Round Midpoint Reviews currently underway offer FSHC the best opportunity to promote affordable housing development near transit stations.
In the midpoint review process, municipalities must demonstrate that they have created a realistic opportunity to construct affordable housing.
FSHC has begun the process but has over 300 municipal reports to review. FSHC has roughly prioritized its reviews based on municipalities that have been difficult to work with in the past or have a large Third Round Fair Share Obligation. FSHC could maximize their impact with a more rigorous methodology: targeting transit-served towns that have the most racial and economic inequity and have the highest Third Round Fair Share Obligations.
Criteria #1: Prioritize municipalities with the high-priority typology census tracts
FSHC should prioritize the 57 municipalities whose transit station areas include the high-priority typology census tracts. In municipalities where FSHC has Third Round settlements, there are 48 municipalities with disproportionately white and high-income census tracts and 10 municipalities with disproportionately nonwhite and lower-income census tracts. Morristown has a census tract in each high-priority typology. FSHC should prioritize these 57 municipalities by the size of their Third Round Fair Share Obligation (1999-2025). With this prioritization, the top municipalities include Mahwah, Ocean City, and Branchburg. The full list of 57 municipalities is included as Table A-1 in the Appendix
Criteria #2: Prioritize remaining transit station municipalities by displacement risk
There are 71 remaining municipalities with transit station-adjacent census tracts, none of which none are within either of the high-priority typologies. This report recommends prioritizing these municipalities using measures of gentrification and exclusion risk from UC Berkley’s Urban Displacement Project.34 Their methodology uses measures including race, population change, and income change to categorize census tracts based on their risk of displacement, gentrification, and exclusion.
FSHC should group the remaining 71 municipalities into the Urban Displacement Project categories with the most exclusionary ranked first and then sort by Third Round Fair Share Obligation within each category to identify the highest priority municipalities.35 Table A-2 in the Appendix contains a full list of these 71 municipalities, alongside their displacement and gentrification classification and Third Round Fair Share Obligation. The top priority municipalities include West Windsor, Princeton, and Clinton.
Criteria #3: Prioritize non-transit municipalities by Third Round Fair Share Obligation
The remaining 204 municipalities with Third Round settlements are not transit-station adjacent. These may be prioritized simply by their Third Round Fair Share Obligation.
1 Middletown township DWHI
2 Wayne township DWHI
3 Linden city TV
4 Freehold borough DNLI
5 City of Orange township TV, DNLI
6 Haddon township DWHI
7 Somerville township TV
8 Bound Brook borough TV
* DWHI: Disproportionately White and High Income DNLI: Disproportionately Nonwhite and Lower Income TV: Transit Village
Disproportionately Nonwhite and Lower
Disproportionately White and High
The Department of Community Affairs should fund non-profit organizations to hold community engagement sessions on racial integration in housing
Systemic racism shaped the New Jersey housing landscape. It may still influence certain communities’ planning and zoning decisions and their failure to meet Fair Share Housing obligations. To increase awareness of residential development’s differential impact by race and advance racial equity, race should be at the forefront of community engagement on residential projects. The Department of Community Affairs, through its Affordable Housing Trust Fund, should provide financial support to non-profit partner organizations to facilitate dedicated sessions on racial equity in community housing
policy. Race and racism are difficult topics for leaders, planners, and community members to talk about. Partner organizations should be encouraged to use the Truth, Racial Healing & Transformation community engagement process, created by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. This framework for community-led engagement is designed to better facilitate difficult conversations on race and racism’s historic and contemporary effects. It has an explicit goal of racial healing and provides pre-reading materials to participants. Better community engagement is a core component of more equitable TOD.
The high-priority typologies are geographically separated along different transit lines
Disproportionately white and high-income areas are concentrated predominately in the northern-central portion of the state towards the ends of transit lines, particularly the Pascack Valley Line, the Gladstone Branch, and portions of the Montclair-Boonton, Morristown, and North Jersey Coast lines. Disproportionately nonwhite and lower-income census tracts are concetrnated in the northern portion of the state near New York City, including Newark, Elizabeth, Jersey City, Passaic, Paterson, Irvington, East Orange, and Atlantic City.
All the Newark Light Rail’s 15 stations are disproportionately nonwhite and lower-income, while all 12 of the Gladstone branch stations are disproportionately white and high-income. The River Line stations, Northeast Corridor stations, and Hudson-Bergen Light Rail stations are predominately nonwhite and lower-income, while the Montclair-Boonton stations, the Mainline stations, and the Pascack Valley stations are predominately white and high-income. The Morristown, North Jersey Coast, and PATCO lines show more internal differences as they alternate between each high-priority classification.
The State of New Jersey should use the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit program to build affordable housing in transit-served communities that are walkable and rich in amenities. It can be costly (one stakeholder called it “brutal”) to build housing near a transit station. TOD is tricky as it almost always involves redevelopment and negotiation with more than one property owner. Finally, planning, demolition, and infrastructure costs are all higher in downtown areas. 36 The New Jersey Housing and Finance Mortgage Agency (NJHMFA) should sharpen its Qualified Allocation Plan (QAP) criteria to ensure that eTOD is possible under these challenging conditions.
This report includes recommendations that advance multiple objectives simultaneously. NJHMFA embracing multiple mandates ensures that the QAP would incentivize high standards no matter how a community is situated. Many of the recommendations fit nicely into the QAP’s existing dual mandate. The QAP sets aside 40% of credits for 57 Targeted Urban Municipalities (TUMs), the most disinvested in the state, yet also includes many incentives to site developments in areas of opportunity. This report recommends two dual mandates to ensure NJHMFA does the most good within this existing split. Most saliently, NJHMFA should award points to advance racial desegregation and prevent displacement. These incentives will steer awards toward areas in TUMs facing the most displacement risk and toward desegregation opportunities outside of TUMs. NJHMFA should also award more points for siting in an excellent school district and near transit. In so doing, NJHMFA would be incentivizing three positive outcomes: within TUMs, more development in station areas; outside of TUMs, more development in the best school districts; and, finally, cases where developers select sites with both access to transit and high-performing schools. Developers can optimize site selection to maximize QAP points. NJHMFA should embrace this to advance equity, TOD, and most of all eTOD.
NJHMFA should set higher standards for racial justice, transit access, active mobility, access to amenities, quality of public education, depth of affordability, and displacement intervention. At present, developer demand for LIHTC outstrips supply, often by three times.37 NJHMFA uses its tiebreaking criteria frequently, and perfect scores are common.38 In response, NJHMFA should increase the number of points available in the QAP from 93 to 131, increase its use of sliding scales, introduce half points, and be more specific in its criteria. These changes would allow NJMHFA to ask more of developers and do so in a fine-grained way.
While NJHMFA does well in targeting opportunity areas, the Agency is not a leader in advancing racial justice through the QAP. In a 2015 evaluation, the Poverty & Race Action Council did not give New Jersey a top score for “[s]coring that discourages racial and economic concentration” or “[m]andatory requirements ensuring affirmative marketing.”39 New Jersey should add a standalone section in the QAP dedicated to racial equity. NJHMFA should:
Award up to four points to incentivize developments in disproportionately white and high-income municipalities. For municipalities classified as disproportionately white and high-income in this report, the “equity ratio” for the top income category (>200% of region median income) can be used to award points. For a value greater than or equal to 3.0, 4 points should be awarded; for a value less than 3.0 but greater than or equal to 2.0, 3 points should be awarded; for a value less than 2.0 but greater than or equal to 1.5, 2 points should be awarded; and for a value less than 1.5 but greater than or equal to 1.2, 1 point should be awarded. No other state so directly
LIHTC Projects within 1/2 mile of rail stations
LIHTC Projects within 1/2 mile of bus stops but not rail stations
LIHTC Projects more than 1/2 mile from public transit
Map 7. Transit Accessibility of LIHTC Projects in New Jersey, 1986–2018. Size of markers corresponds to size of tax credit. Multiple projects appear as darker markers. (Data: HUD)
20% of units set aside for market rate tenants (not eligible for discretionary HERA basis boost)
>20% of units underwritten at 30% AMI (units with vouchers not eligible) Traditional Multifamily Pooled Permanent Financing TOTALPOSSIBLESCORE93131
a 1 point for an inequity ratio of 1.2-1.5 to 4 points for ≥2.0
b 1 point for robust AMP with targets and 0.5 for a good submission
c 0.5 point for submitting all prior records and 1.5 for record of meeting targets
d 8 points awarded for siting in census tracts with highest displacement risk
e 2 points for a train, ferry, or high-frequency bus stop and 1 for a bus stop
f 2 points for excellent and 0.5 for above average service on a transit score
g Award full eight points for excellent school district
h 0.5 point for score of 60-69 to 2 points for 90-100 score on Walk Score
i 1.0 point for continuous sidewalk to the station. 0.5 for deviation up to 25%
j Award full two points for excellent service on a bike score
k 5 points for 15% MBE/WBE utilization and 6 points for 20% utilization
incentivizes desegregation in its QAP, and doing so could draw legal challenges. The Governor and NJHMFA would need to evaluate these legal risks.
Award up to one point for the Affirmative Marketing Plan. The Plan should target tenant demographics proportionate to the COAH Region. Zero points should be awarded for the required submission, a half point for a good submission, and a full point for an excellent submission. NJHMFA should develop these standards by reviewing best practices, starting with the “Best practices for affirmative marketing and tenant selection” section on page 25. Currently, New Jersey requires all applicants to submit an Affirmative Marketing Plan form. However, the form places only moderate emphasis on targeting nonwhite residents.40 In contrast, Massachusetts requires plans to target tenant demographics proportionate to the region.41 Rhode Island requires marketing to non-English speakers, a model New Jersey should adopt given the historic underrepresentation of Latinx tenants in Mount Laurel housing.42
Score developers on their past performance in marketing. One and a half points should be available. When developers apply, all general partners and investors should submit data for any projects to which NJHMFA awarded funding in the past. The Agency should award a half point for submitting all prior Affirmative Marketing Plans, communications with marketing partners, invoices for advertising, and annual tenant demographics. The remaining two half points should be awarded on a sliding scale evaluating the applicants’ past success in achieving tenant demographics representative of the region.
Award a half point if developers have a letter of support from a traditionally Black or Latinx place of worship, a house of worship with services in languages other than English, or similar non-religious community centers within the development’s walkshed. The letter should detail the organization’s programming relevant to Black or Latinx communities. This half point would require developers to seek out spaces that welcome nonwhite residents. The Poverty & Race Research Action Council identifies faith groups as potentially “pivotal” in encouraging residents to move to unfamiliar communities by “serv[ing] as a welcoming community for newly relocated households.”43
Increase the points available for contracting with Minority/Women Business Enterprises (M/WBE) firms from five to six. The Agency should continue to award five points if 15% of spending will be with M/WBE firms and an additional point if the proportion is 20%. This change would also ensure that this category remains 5% of the total points possible.
NJHMFA should reward the building blocks of good TOD: transit access, active mobility, and access to amenities
The presence of a transit station is necessary, but not sufficient, for quality TOD. Walkability is essential to getting eTOD right as every transit user is also a pedestrian.44 The transit station is an asset at the neighborhood level because it is a significant foot traffic generator in a concentrated area. A TOD strategy seeks to nurture this pedestrian activity by creating a neighborhood with housing, food service establishments, retail, and services within walking distance of the station. An eTOD strategy that loses sight of the importance of walkability in creating a vibrant community will devolve into simply building apartments adjacent to train stations.
NJHMFA should restructure the QAP to incentivize developers to build affordable housing in neighborhoods where residents can walk to amenities. An area full of amenities unlocks walking and adds the vitality that many seek to create through TOD. Recent research from suburban Sweden shows that when a resident has three to five amenities available within 1 kilometer (0.6 miles) of their home, their probability of walking or biking increases from 10% to 15%. That probability jumps to 21% if one of those amenities is a grocery store.45 NJHMFA’s development of a walkshed for each station (as described in the “NJHMFA should develop mapped walksheds” box on page 24) is the baseline to ensure that TOD is accessible from transit.
The recommended point reallocations in this report are based upon NJHMFA’s family round. However, the Agency should make similar changes to its senior and supportive housing rounds. At present, NJHMFA awards no points for senior and supportive housing that is proximate to transit. This is unjustified. Seniors and tenants of special needs housing also take transit. In fact, becoming an empty nester, retiring, and
sickness in the family are all life events where individuals often reduce their car ownership.46 The Agency should award points—similar to what is outlined below—for these populations as well.
Concerning transit access, the NJHMFA should:
Award up to two points for locations in the mapped geometric half-mile walkshed of a train, ferry, or high-frequency bus stop. For senior developments only, NJHMFA should award full points for being in the closer half of the walkshed and only one point in the further half. Seniors often have limited mobility. 47 NJHMFA should award one point for sites with a 15-minute walk to a low-frequency bus stop for all development types.
Add up to two points on a sliding scale based on a transit score. The Agency should develop a mapped score for all of New Jersey to capture a neighborhood's overall service quality. While a station is an excellent anchor node for TOD, its presence does not paint the full picture regarding service quality. NJHMFA should develop a score that factors in the frequency, the destinations served, and attractiveness of different modes. The Agency could develop a score internally or work with a partner. Redfin produces a Transit Score, but the company has computed scores only for 53 communities in New Jersey.48 New Jersey Transit and the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission have developed transit scores, but these focused on how much ridership different areas could generate for new transit service.49
Concerning walkability, the NJHMFA should:
Use the publicly available Walk Score tool from Redfin to award up to two points on a sliding scale. At least Michigan, Minnesota, Colorado, and New Hampshire use Walk Score in the QAP.50 The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation provided early funding to incorporate network distance and street design measures in the methodology.51 The tool has also been used extensively by transportation, land use, and other researchers.62 Walk Score is available by address and scores locations from zero to 100. NJHMFA should award half points on a sliding scale for a property with a Walk Score between 60-69 (the high end of “Somewhat Walkable”), 70-79 (the low end of “Very Walkable”), 80-89 (the high end of “Very Walkable”), and 90-100 (“Walker’s Paradise”). For example, a
property with a Walk Score of 65 could receive a half point, while a property with a Walk Score of 95 could receive the full two points.
Reward developers with up to 1 point for a location that has a continuous sidewalk to the transit station. The Agency should award a full point for a route with a continuous sidewalk that is the most direct one available or 10% longer than the most direct path. NJHMFA should award half a point for a path that adds 10% to 25% to the trip’s length.
Develop a bike score to award up to two points on a sliding scale. Redfin also provides a Bike Score tool, but it is not widely available in New Jersey. Redfin’s Bike Score factors in bike lanes, destination accessibility, and bicycle mode share.53 The Agency could request that the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation fund improvements to Bike Score. Alternatively, the Agency could work with the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission (DVRPC) to develop a score. DVRPC has invested in hiring in-house multimodal planning staff that would be well equipped to assist with this project.
Concerning access to amenities, the NJHMFA should:
Replace the current half-mile geometric walkshed with a half-mile network walkshed to determine access to amenities. It is not practical for developers to replicate the type of detailed analysis that NJHMFA should do for station walksheds. Instead, for each funding application, a more straightforward walkshed for the proposed property should be sufficient. The agency should consider contracting with Remix, perhaps in partnership with New Jersey Transit or DVRPC. Remix can provide a tool to allow developers to create a mapped geometric walkshed for their proposed site to determine the amenities within walking distance.54
Increase the number of points available for amenities from up to six to up to 10. Siting affordable housing in an area with denser amenities increases the likelihood that the neighborhood is sufficiently walkable to reduce car use and ownership rates.
Double the points available for proximity to a full-service grocery store from two to four within the tenpoint allocation for amenities. More than 300,000 New Jersey residents live in areas deemed “food deserts” by the federal government. Food shopping
NJHMFA should develop mapped walksheds
Source: Urban Design 4 Health, 2010, http://urbandesign4health. com/harvard-business-reviewconsequences-of-cul-de-sacs, and Jarrett Walker, Human Transit, 2011
New Jersey should shift from geometric distance to network distance to determine where it should support TOD. The State should focus on the walkshed: the area that a transit rider is willing to walk to the station. As seen in Figure 2, a geometric half mile brings you to the circle’s perimeter in either map. This perimeter is NJHMFA’s current standard for transit accessibility.55 Yet, the distance a network half mile takes a pedestrian is significantly different. The suburban street network on the left is curvilinear, featuring cul-desacs, dead-end streets, and arterial roads. The grid pattern on the right, however, is linear and interconnected. A pedestrian in the grid street network can reach a significantly larger area. NJHMFA could develop these walksheds by partnering with experts with the necessary expertise at the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy of Rutgers University.56
While the street grid determines the accessible area, other factors drive how far the average resident is willing to walk to a transit station. These factors include the strength of the job market accessible by transit and whether the walk is hilly, requires crossing wide streets, or is unsafe. New Jersey should include these features to estimate how far pedestrians will walk to transit.
Finally, New Jersey should focus TOD on rail stations, ferry stations, bus terminals, and high-frequency bus stops. High-frequency bus transit is usually considered to be a bus that arrives, ideally, every fifteen minutes during peak hours.57 NJHMFA currently rewards locations with one bus that comes twice a weekday.58 Development oriented around low-quality transit will be low-quality TOD.
Black and Latinx residents are likelier to walk and bike than their white neighbors.59 The risks are also higher: drivers are less likely to stop for Black pedestrians, police racially profile cyclists, and there is much lower quality infrastructure in lower-income neighborhoods.60 For Black and Latinx male pedestrians, fatality rates are twice that of white men.61 In New Jersey, cyclists and pedestrians made up more than 30% of all road deaths in 2018, behind only Washington, DC and New York City.62 Nationally, pedestrian fatalities have surged 60% since 2009, bringing the number of pedestrians killed by drivers back up to 1989 levels. This uptick closely tracks increases in smartphone use and SUV/light truck sales.63 Alongside a proper focus on the walkshed, more Transit Village Initiative (TVI) funding should be directed to disproportionately nonwhite and lower-income Transit Villages to improve active mobility infrastructure. More than 40% of total funding awarded to Transit Villages did not meet these criteria.64
NJHMFA should develop best-in-the-nation policies to affirmatively further fair housing in tenant marketing and selection. In 2012, the Poverty & Race Research Action Council published "Accessing Opportunity," a comprehensive policy brief on best practices for affirmative marketing and tenant selection in low- and moderate-income housing programs (available at https://www.prrac.org/ pdf/affirmativemarketing.pdf). NJHMFA could incorporate many of the following into the redevelopment of its Affirmative Marking Plan standards:
Include information on school quality, after-school and summer programming, access to transit, and the quality of amenities in marketing to help individuals unfamiliar with an area understand its opportunities
Set standards for identifying those “least likely to apply” instead of allowing developers to do this analysis themselves in a back-ofthe-envelope manner
Adopt Connecticut’s practice of halting a developer’s marketing if there is evidence of an inadequate number of “least likely to apply” applicants
Increase the advertising period for new developments from four months to six months, following Massachusetts’ practice
Increase the frequency of newspaper advertisements over sixty days from once to twice, following Massachusetts’ practice
Reward developers that undertake in-person marketing, reflecting that some research shows half of LIHTC tenants find their units through word of mouth
Incentivize the use of Housing
Choice Voucher waiting lists, in addition to its current point allocation for public housing waiting lists
Require waitlist management practices that give a more equitable opportunity to Black, Latinx, and low-income residents, such as the use of lotteries and allowing applicants with a limited credit file to submit alternative financial information
Limit local resident preferences to areas identified as at risk of displacement
is also one of the most routine trips and the likeliest generator of walking trips.65
NJHMFA should prioritize anti-displacement, depth of affordability, and education
In addition to seeking to ameliorate past racial injustice in housing policy and improve standards for transit, walkability, and amenities, NHJMFA should focus on other equity factors. The Agency should prioritize siting that mitigates displacement, projects with deeper affordability, and school districts with high-quality education. NJHMFA should:
Add eight points to the QAP to incentivize siting in census tracts with high displacement risk. The Urban Displacement Project (UDP) is working with the California agency that awards LIHTC to incorporate displacement risk measures into California’s QAP.66 While UDP’s analysis of the greater New York metropolitan area captures northern New Jersey, the Project does not have metrics for the entire state. The Regional Plan Association (RPA) also developed displacement and gentrification measures that identified similar areas of concern, despite RPA using different criteria.67 NJHMFA should work with the UDP, RPA, or another entity to develop mappable displacement risk measures. The Agency should award the points on a sliding scale to target resources to the highest risk census tracts.
Award up to eight points on a sliding scale to target siting in school districts with excellent instruction and a supportive learning environment. Massachusetts awards up to eight points, with full points awarded for school districts where 90% of 10th graders score proficient on state tests, down to two points for 75%.68 On the other hand, New Jersey awards just three points if at least 40% of fourth-graders meet math and language arts expectations.69 For many, the primary reason to build affordable housing in the suburbs is to increase access to higher quality schools.70 Research suggests that the most significant benefit of moving to an area of high opportunity is its long-term impact on children.71
Increase from eight to 14 the points awarded to developers that set aside 20% of units at 50% of AMI or 10% of units at 30% AMI. In 2016, the median household income for Black and Hispanic households was $47,696 and $52,599, respectively (62.7%
and 69.1% of the state median income).72 Worryingly, NJHMFA has reduced its awards for housing for tenants earning less than 50% of AMI, from 59% in 2013 to 45% in 2017.73 Deeper affordability proximate to transit stations may increase access to TODs for Black and Latinx residents. Historically, moderate-income Mount Laurel housing has tended to skew toward white residents more so than lower-income housing.74
If the Agency adds the points this report recommends, NJHMFA should evaluate if it can also remove points. Mathematically, deleting points for policy or administrative reasons increases the importance of newly added points. NJHMFA should consider the following changes to the QAP:
Remove the point for projects that will satisfy a Mount Laurel affordable housing obligation.75 New Jersey should not reward towns for a history of exclusionary zoning.
Stop awarding points for parking. Local regulations and market demand are more than enough to incentivize parking.76 The Agency should stop awarding points for including a garage as a unit amenity and a parking ratio of 1.0 spaces per unit as a property amenity.
Reduce from two points to one point the award for a location within a Ready to Grow area. The additions proposed in this report will advance the Ready to Grow smart growth goals and increase construction probability in regions with the necessary infrastructure.77
A significant weakness in Mount Laurel implementation is the lack of incentives for a town to fulfill its full “Unmet Need.” Unmet Need is the portion of a town’s affordable housing obligation for which the settlement identifies no specific sites. For example, Ho-Ho-Kus has a 30-unit “realistic development potential” and an “Unmet Need” of 248 units. The expectation is that developers will build the 248 units of Unmet Need through redevelopment at some point. In anticipation of this, the settlement required Ho-Ho-Kus to rezone its downtown to allow for higher density and passed an ordinance requiring affordable housing set asides.78 Yet, it is unknown how long it will take developers to build enough housing to meet the Unmet Need.
The Governor and the Legislature should pass legislation creating a statewide Unmet Need TOD Zoning Overlay. In towns with Unmet Need and a station area, developers should be able to apply for a special permit for any property within the mapped station walkshed proposed in this report. Developers should be allowed to apply to build inclusionary housing to the local Zoning Board of Adjustment (ZBA) for a special permit. In exchange for the developer setting aside 25% of units as affordable in perpetuity, the law should require the municipality to waive any local zoning and code regulations that exceed state standards and make the project financially infeasible. The State’s Department of Community Affairs (DCA) should set the height, bulk, and massing standards on a case-by-case basis through the issuance of a site suitability letter. The standard for refusal should be high, with towns seeking refusal required to prove the site and project are contrary to sound land use planning or represent a substantial environmental hazard. Builders should have the right to appeal decisions to the Law Division of the Superior Court. To ensure an orderly development pattern, DCA should set a per capita-limit on the number of units that developers can build in a community during a three year period.
An Unmet Need TOD overlay would help Mount Laurel continue to undo a history of exclusionary zoning. Urban historian Kenneth Jackson describes zoning as a history of exclusion—a “device to keep poor people and obnoxious industries out of affluent areas.” Land use regulations like minimum lot sizes and setbacks were widely used for exclusionary purposes, along with racial covenants.79 Zoning continues to be used for exclusionary ends, especially by prohibiting houses on small lots and multifamily dwellings. 80 Such policies discourage rental housing even if they do not prohibit it outright.
This proposal draws from elements of Massachusetts’ system to build affordable housing in exclusionary suburbs. In Massachusetts, developers can apply for a Comprehensive Permit in a municipality where less than 10% of the housing is subsidized. In exchange for setting aside 25% of the units for those earning 80% of Area Median Income (AMI) in perpetuity, the developer gets relief from local zoning and code.82 State agencies issue site suitability letters to ensure appropriate scale.83 The law sets the bar for localities rejecting applications relatively high. As a result, “82% of the applications for permits are approved by local ZBAs.”84 As recommended for New Jersey, Massachusetts limits the number of ongoing projects built with a Comprehensive Permit to moderate development pace. 85 Unsurprisingly, developers most often use Comprehensive Permits to build rentals in towns with restrictive regulations within commuting distance of major job centers.86 Since 1969, the system has produced more than 75,000 units, of which 30,000 are income-restricted rentals. 87
Black and Latinx people in transit-served communities in New Jersey are at risk of displacement. This section identifies the New Jersey station areas at highest risk of displacement and steps the State can take to prevent displacement. Primarily, the State should preserve and construct affordable housing in at-risk communities so Black and Latinx residents already living in station areas benefit from TOD investment. Given the tarnished record of the federal, state, and local governments in urban revitalization efforts, some in Black and Latinx communities are rightly skeptical of coordinated government investment in their neighborhoods. New Jersey cannot pursue eTOD without acknowledging and addressing the considerable concern that TOD investment can displace Black and Latinx residents.
Many historically disinvested communities want the benefits of investment in their station areas, but not at the expense of being kicked out. The literature around transit-oriented displacement is mixed. Studies from California find “local context, community activism, and the deep history of a neighborhood matter” to whether transit proximity to communities of color can predict gentrification and displacement.88
The logic behind transit-oriented displacement is that when transit investment increases, land speculation increases, and so do rents.89 It is well documented that housing prices increase in advance of a transit line or after a new transit station is built to attract higher-income residents and reflect land values.90-2 Displacement is notoriously difficult to quantify, given its multifaceted nature and the lack of data collection designed to measure it.93 However, the available data for New Jersey suggests that displacement in transit station areas should be of concern to the State. The UC Berkeley Urban Displacement Project has created an “early warning system” that policymakers are
increasingly using to identify areas experiencing displacement and areas at risk of displacement.94 UDP flags risks of displacement that New Jersey should heed now before it is too late.
UDP’s data suggests that majority Black census tracts have higher ongoing displacement and majority Latinx census tracts are more at risk of gentrification.95 Census tracts adjacent to transit stations with a preponderance of Black residents are eight times more at risk of displacement than white station areas. Latinx areas are six times more at risk. The Regional Plan Association (RPA) also developed displacement and gentrification measures that identified similar areas of concern, despite RPA using different criteria for its indices.96
Not all aspects of gentrification and displacement are captured in the available data but remain important because of the ways they impact Black and Latinx communities.
This report identifies the specific station areas of concern where the State and FSHC should focus anti-displacement efforts, affordable housing, and community planning resources. Table 4 ranks the top ten transit stations in northern and central New Jersey by measures of ongoing displacement according to UDP. Transit stations are ranked by the proportion of station area census tracts that have experienced displacement of lower-income households. This typology was chosen for ranking over the “at risk of gentrification” typology because these areas have undergone displacement of lower-income households and therefore the risks are more realized in these areas. Trenton, Hamilton Avenue, and East Orange stations are ranked the highest. If the transit stations were ranked by “risk of gentrification” instead, Jersey City and Paterson station areas would be ranked in the top five. The “at risk of gentrification” typology measures areas that are vulnerable to displacement and are in a “hot market” but have not yet experienced displacement of lower-income households according to Census
data. UDP’s data does not include southern New Jersey; however, Table 5 ranks the top five station areas in southern New Jersey by the risk of displacement using a proxy for UDP’s measure. The Atlantic City Bus Terminal station area is ranked as at the highest risk.97
DCA should preserve affordable housing to forestall displacement
Preservation of affordable housing is imperative to allow lower-income renters, especially Black and Latinx, to remain in their communities to benefit from TOD. The preservation of existing affordable housing fights displacement by preventing rental homes from becoming unaffordable for lower-income households.98 Preservation is often less expensive than new construction.99 Of particular concern are affordable units built in the mid-1980s, since many of their controls expire in the next few years.100
The State of New Jersey should take the following steps to protect existing affordable housing in transit station areas:
The Governor and Legislature should increase funding to DCA’s Neighborhood Preservation Program to fund housing rehabilitation in lower-income, highdisplacement risk neighborhoods.101
DCA should prioritize funding in the Neighborhood Partnership Funds and Innovation Funds (both part of the Affordable Housing Trust Fund) to preserve affordable housing in transit station areas with high displacement risk.102
DCA should provide technical assistance for public housing authorities to use the federal Rental Assistance Demonstration (RAD) Program to preserve existing affordable housing. The City of Passaic used RAD to revitalize three of its former public housing developments and keep 130 residents housed.103 Passaic’s approach stands in contrast to Plainfield, which displaced 120 households when it tore down family housing in Elmwood Gardens to replace it with 58 senior units.104
*Percent of station-adjacent census with classification **Count of station-adjacent census tracts with classification
nered with the North Camden Land Trust to prevent the displacement of 115 families, rehabilitated their units, and transferred ownership to the residents. NJHMFA abated all city and state property violations and stabilized the Land Trust.106 Community land trusts can allow residents to build equity through homeownership and help close the racial wealth gap, without relying upon single-family models.107
The Governor and the Legislature should pass tenant protection bills backed by the Housing and Community Development Network of New Jersey
Lastly, the NJHMFA and DCA should provide technical assistance to communities looking to set up Community Land Trusts (CLTs) in transit station areas and prioritize allocating them funding, particularly in disproportionately nonwhite and lower-income areas. CLTs are nonprofit corporations that develop and steward land in perpetuity for community-serving purposes like affordable housing.105 CLTs preserve community by ensuring residents do not suffer displacement due to land speculation and gentrification. For example, in Camden, NJHMFA and the Neighborhood Preservation Balanced Housing Program part-
Anti-displacement initiatives as part of eTOD should not only focus on subsidized housing. Most renters live in the private rental sector and lack the predictability of rent increases and the due process rights of subsidized housing tenants. Assemblypersons Benjie E. Wimberly and Verlina Reynolds-Jackson have introduced two bills, supported by the Housing and Community Development Network of New Jersey, to provide a modicum of stability for private rental tenants.108 Both bills are incredibly moderate, with neither providing a right to lease renewal, protection from no-fault evictions, or restricting the starting rent of a lease. Both are weaker than recent legislation passed by the Oregon and California legislatures. Nevertheless, the Governor and Legislature should pass:
A1923 “Establish a Statewide Limitation on Rent Increases,” which would prohibit rent increases of more than 5%
Gentrification and displacement are two separate concepts to describe neighborhood change. Gentrification can cause displacement of residents, but not all displacement is caused by gentrification (e.g., the razing of public housing as part of HOPE VI).109 Gentrification is an economic phenomenon framed as neighborhood revitalization that results in the working class’s physical and social dis-
ruption, frequently in a racialized context.110 Displacement is when lower-income residents are involuntarily physically and socially priced out of a neighborhood.111 The fear of displacement is as central to gentrification as economics. Gentrification is also “a sense of loss of place, erosion of cultural cohesion and loss of community support and political power.”112
plus inflation (not to exceed 10%) over 12-month periods. Buildings built within the past 15 years and affordable housing would be exempt.113
A1914 “Let Seniors Ask for Rent Increase Limits,” which would allow seniors who are 55 or older, have lived in their home for at least a decade, and have limited incomes to apply for limits to future rent increases. DCA would set increases based upon a formula designed to closely track inflation. Property owners would be able to apply for a financial hardship waiver under certain conditions. Through the rulemaking allowed in the bill, DCA should exempt LIHTC and other affordable housing programs.114
A1923 mirrors the “anti-gouging” models Oregon and California recently adopted that limit rent regulations to within a tenancy.115 The Brookings Institution highlighted that Oregon, with its 7% base factor, will likely create only modest distortions.116 Surprisingly, there is a relatively limited empirical literature on rental regulations.117 The two most significant recent empirical analyses reach contradictory
conclusions.118 A comparative statistical analysis looking at New Jersey found that rent control does not significantly explain differences in rents, unit size, or maintenance between 74 cities with rent control and 87 similar cities without it.119 It did show that New Jersey cities with rental protections had a significantly higher Black population than those without.120 Research from the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco shows that the moderate rent control in the Bay Area may be slowing the displacement of low-income and nonwhite residents.121 Germany has a long and successful record with rental regulations that only apply within a tenancy, with many private sector investors preferring the stability it provides.122
Seniors’ particular vulnerability may justify A1914’s model that provides more restrictions on rent increases. Research shows that New Jersey seniors in transit areas are likely more vulnerable to rental increases.123 Thirty percent of the state’s seniors rely exclusively on Social Security benefits for income.124 According to the Department of Human Services, 86% of Latinx and 80% of Black senior households earn too little to achieve “basic economic security,” compared to 65% and 54% of Asian and white senior households.125
HUD Community Challenge grants and community benefits agreements support community engagement
Engagement on TOD projects should begin with meaningful collaboration and coalition building with community members. Engaging residents first is imperative to mitigating the fear of displacement like the fear that “this development is not for us” which has played out in Camden.126 From 2012-2014, during the planning process of a new, shared, multi-cultural center in southeast Seattle, a diverse and gentrifying immigrant community, the City’s Community Cornerstones Program exemplified inclusive engagement strategies. It began by reaching out to immigrant- and refugee-serving community organizations, businesses, and trusted community
leaders to build relationships before engaging larger communities, and ultimately engaged over 700 people.127 City leaders, developers and community members leveraged funds from HUD Community Challenge Grants to facilitate this community engagement. Similarly, Los Angeles Metro incorporated community benefit agreements into their Transit Oriented Communities program, which requires affordable housing, local hires with prevailing wages, and community needs assessments in TOD projects.128 New Jersey Transit, DCA, and NJHMFA should consider similar strategies in transit development areas with high risk of displacement.
New Jersey Transit (NJT) should adopt a joint development policy requiring affordable housing to be set aside for residential development on NJT land. Joint development projects are an effective policy lever for promoting eTOD. As transit agencies lease or sell surplus property, they can establish minimum requirements or financial incentives that ensure development on that property includes affordable housing. This facilitates new affordable units on transit station-adjacent properties at little cost to the public. At least 15 U.S. transit agencies have affordable housing policies or have completed projects that include affordable housing.129 In contrast, NJT has neglected affordable housing in its joint development to date.
In 2019, NJT established the Real Estate and Development Office after the Legislature passed a law requiring the agency to create a division focused on real estate, economic development, and TOD. The office facilitates joint development projects on agency-owned land and maintains an inventory of agency-owned properties and projections of their revenue-generating potential. NJT has not released a joint development policy articulating the agency’s priorities and processes for joint developments. NJT should adopt a policy to establish a consistent approach to joint development, create clarity for partners, and provide public accountability.
NJT is currently violating the Fair Housing Act, which, as of 2008, requires that 20% of State property used to create housing be set aside for affordable housing.130 NJT does not have a policy for the development of affordable housing on its property, nor has affordable housing been an implicit priority. The procurement documents NJT released in the fall of 2020 for the Metropark and Jersey City joint development opportunities emphasize promoting value capture, economic development, and mixed-use TOD, but make minor or no reference to affordable housing, respectively.131 Notably, NJT did not include
any incentives to include affordable housing, such as imposing a minimum requirement of affordable units or having affordable housing-related criteria in the pass/fail qualifications or evaluation criteria.
NJT should adopt an affordable housing policy that states its objectives for promoting affordable housing in joint developments and includes mechanisms to accomplish them. NJT’s policy should include a minimum affordable housing percentage, a lease discounting framework, and affordable housing-specific competitive selection criteria.
As a baseline, NJT should establish a 20% minimum for affordable housing within residential joint developments to comply with the Fair Housing Act. This proportion would match the minimum used by many other transit agencies with affordable housing policies. NJT should also provide leases at graduated discounted rates to incentivize set-asides greater than 20% and at deeper affordability levels. Bay Area Rapid Transit uses this approach. BART offers three levels of discounts for projects that meet its 35% affordable housing goal. The discount increases with the depth of affordability offered, reaching 30-60%.132 This sort of transparent framework provides higher clarity to partners as they plan proposals. While discounts trade off agency revenues for affordable housing, the foregone revenue from any discounted leases would generally be nearly insignificant relative to a transit agency’s total revenues.133 Therefore, lease discounts could be substantial value for money if they help make the difficult financial margins for eTOD projects work. Table 6 shows an example framework for NJT, which would offer discounts when developments surpass 30% affordable units and provide deeper affordability. Finally, NJT should award points during competitive selection processes along affordable housing dimensions, such as the percentage of units that are affordable, the depth of affordability, and the developer’s expertise in affordable housing.
† Adapted from Bay Area Rapid Transit’s Network. ‡ Average AMI of deed-restricted affordable housing units only
The Department of Community Affairs should establish maximum parking ratios and develop a Municipal Parking Reform Guide
Towns require, and developers often build, too much parking in TODs.134 Research shows that tenants use less than 70% of available parking in TODs.135 This oversupply adds extra costs for housing construction. The State’s Residential Site Improvement Standards (RSIS) gestures at lower parking ratios for developments near mass transit, but does not provide specific criteria. The DCA should amend the parking standards in the RSIS to introduce lower ratios for new developments and replace parking minimums with maximums. The maximums proposed in this report would support more affordable housing, less congestion, lower environmental impact, and more pedestrian- and bike-friendly neighborhoods.136
In addition to an adoption of TOD-appropriate parking maximums, DCA should utilize the walkshed and transit quality standards that this report recommends NJHMFA develop. The Agency should apply the new ratios to all medium- to high-density housing identified in the RSIS.
Finally, DCA should develop a municipal parking reform guide. It should guide a Payment in Lieu of Parking (PILOP) Fund and models for street metering.137 A PILOP Fund seeks contributions from developers for all parking spaces not provided below the maximum and helps municipalities pass benefits on to the community for walking and cycling initiatives (e.g., the PILOP Fund in Metuchen, NJ). On-street metering around new developments also prevents parking spillover and would create additional PILOP revenue.
* Parking Space / Housing Unit
New Jersey should reorient the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail northern extension toward eTOD. NJT’s current plans show a park-and-ride system with minimal thought to station access or affordable housing. If carried out, the agency would squander a unique potential opportunity for eTOD. New Jersey can and should set a high bar for eTOD for new rail lines with the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail Northern Branch Corridor Project. FSHC can help reorient the extension toward eTOD in the Fourth-Round Mount Laurel compliance planning, and NJF should take up opportunities in the corridor for municipal advocacy.
Nationally and internationally, new transit projects have provided transformative opportunities for planning eTOD at a regional scale. If designed to prioritize development and housing goals, new transit can reshape regional land use patterns. Yet new transit does not automatically generate eTOD or even new development.138 The literature on planning transit infrastructure for TOD notes the importance of proactive planning, coordination between different actors, and land use regulations that allow developers to build eTOD projects as-of-right.139 Transportation and land use planners need to work hand-in-hand if the goal is for new transit lines and land use controls to spur a mutually beneficial cycle of increasing transit ridership and inclusive real estate development.140
Transit investment is also an equity question. Since communities of color are more likely to rely on public transportation than white communities, they should be the primary beneficiaries of new transit projects.141 Yet, decisions about which transit investments to fund often disproportionately benefit white users. In contrast, elected officials and agencies often pursue new transit investments in nonwhite, lower-income communities without putting in place adequate protections for resi -
dents and businesses that may be harmed by rising land values.142
The Hudson-Bergen Light Rail system (HBLR) is already an exemplary case for TOD promises and pitfalls. First opened in 2000, the system has accelerated the integration of the Hudson County real estate market with the broader New York City market. The line spurred new development, earning it one appraisal as a “testament to the value of investment in new transportation infrastructure.”143 But it has also contributed to increased rents on the so-called Gold Coast and exposed residents to displacement pressures.144
A northern extension has been part of HBLR longrange planning, and since 2007, NJT has focused on options to repurpose the Northern Branch, a freight line owned and operated by CSX Transportation.145 The project is currently in the midst of the federal Environmental Impact Statement process, and NJT published the most recent Supplemental Draft Environmental Impact Statement (SDEIS) in 2017. Yet NJT is not planning the Northern Branch Corridor for eTOD. Unless the project takes a decisive shift in another direction, the project could prove to be a waste of a unique opportunity—potentially failing to deliver new housing at all or causing displacement of nonwhite and lower-income residents.
Beyond the HBLR northern extension, other proposed fixed-guideway transit projects in the state include the HBLR western extension in Jersey City, a possible HBLR southern extension in Bayonne, and the proposed 14-station Glassboro-Camden Light Rail line. The last project is currently in a public comment period for a Draft Environmental Impact Statement.146 This report’s recommendations for the HBLR northern extension should be applied to these additional projects to ensure that new transit lines create opportunities for eTOD.
The Northern Branch Corridor Project proposes seven stations in five municipalities. slightly overlaps with the alignment. While all six municipalities have majority nonwhite populations, they are substantially dif ferent from one another. Leonia is a suburban enclave, while others, like Palisades Park and Fairview, have higher densities and substantial populations of lower-income renters. Engle wood, which will host three of the seven proposed stations, is sharply segregated by race, income, and housing density, with the alignment along the dividing line.
Without appropriate measures, a new transit line with major redevelopment projects could threaten vulnerable populations with displacement, especially in North Bergen, Fairview, Pali sades Park, and in less affluent parts of Englewood. While all the municipalities along the proposed line have rent control or rent leveling ordinances, FSHC and NJF should ensure these rent leveling measures are significant enough to prevent low er-income renters’ displacement.
Municipalities in the corridor have also fallen short of their Mount Laurel obligations. Only Ridgefield has a Third-Round settlement with FSHC (North Bergen, as a Qualified Urban Aid Municipality, is exempt). Englewood has recently filed a Mount Laurel declaratory judgment action, though its most recent Housing Element and Fair Share Plan (HEFSP) lowballs its obligations.148 Leonia’s master plan reexamination contin ues to postpone their Third Round Fair Share Obligation. Meanwhile, Palisades Park and Fairview have not updated their housing plans since 2000 and 2009, respectively.
Land use patterns in the corridor make eTOD difficult without planned redevelopment
The Northern Branch alignment falls within a low-density commercial and industrial corridor, substantially removed from existing downtowns in North Bergen, Ridgefield, and Leonia. The alignment is both an opportunity and a challenge: with well-envisioned land use controls in place, the project could provide access to land ready for redevelopment. However, without proactive local planning, the project may fail to spur new development. Without planning that explicitly targets affordable housing, the affected municipalities may find them selves desperate to attract developers to raise revenues for needed infrastructure upgrades, regardless of the equity con
Corridor
sequences. Indeed, NJT’s current plans for the project appear eerily similar to textbook examples of failed TOD planning. Experts warn against scenarios where “a transit project may follow a right-of-way (such as an unused freight rail corridor or highway median) that is relatively inhospitable to TOD without major infrastructure upgrades. If market demand is not robust enough to generate sufficient revenue to fund these improvements, station area development may remain constrained.”151
Uncertainty about the HBLR project timeline has made proactive planning difficult. Englewood has created a floating TOD zoning designation that can be applied by the city council after the HBLR service opens. Leonia’s recent master plan reevaluation notes the difficulty of planning around a future station with an uncertain timeline.152 Yet, as Englewood and Leonia’s master plans suggest, there are real opportunities in the corridor for eTOD-friendly planning. These communities already have substantial density, rely on commuting to New York City, and are actively examine transit-adjacent redevelopment options. With additional resources from the State and pointed advocacy from FSHC and NJF, proactive planning could capitalize on the HBLR extension's opportunities.
NJT is designing Northern Branch station areas for park-and-ride use, not for eTOD
Draft station plans appear to prioritize sufficient parking at minimal cost and with minimal land acquisition.153 They do not prioritize pedestrian access or aim to create opportunities for new pedestrian-friendly development with station access. In many cases, stations are located away from existing downtowns, situated near hard-to-develop sites, and accessed across large surface parking lots. Designs appear particularly unfriendly to eTOD in Ridgefield (see "Proposed Ridgefield Station").
When completed, the HBLR Northern Branch extension stands to be one of the most vulnerable infrastructure assets to sea level rise in New Jersey. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) projects all sea level rise scenarios will impact planned station areas along the HBLR extension, especially the low-lying station areas alongside the Meadowlands’ transitional wetlands, by 2050 when sea level rise is expected to have risen between 1 and 2 feet relative to 2000.154 New Jersey must consider the imminent threat of sea level rise on the HBLR extension since it is uniquely vulnerable to climate change.
Based on NOAA projections, these are the potential flooding impacts at different scenarios of sea level rise in the geometric half-mile station areas:
Under a 2-foot sea level rise scenario, five station areas would see flooding (91st Street, Ridgefield, Palisades Park, Leonia, Englewood Rt 4) and two (Palisades Park and Leonia) would be substantially impacted.
Under a 4-foot sea level rise scenario, all five station areas would be substantially impacted.
New Jersey Should Reorient the Northern Branch toward eTOD
Successful—let alone equitable—TOD is unlikely in the corridor without a dramatic change of direction. The following recommendations apply recommendations detailed elsewhere in this report to the Northern Branch municipalities and indicate additional possibilities for advocacy in the corridor.
NJT should add affordable housing as an explicit project goal for the HBLR Northern Branch Corridor Project and reconsider proposed station plans
New Jersey’s transit agencies should, by default, include the development of transit-oriented affordable housing as an explicit project goal in all new public transit infrastructure projects. NJT has demonstrated its capacity and eagerness to prioritize TOD in other projects around the state, such as its recent Request for Qualifications to redevelop Metropark Station.155 It should bring the same intelligence to the Northern Branch, with a renewed focus on affordable housing.
Adding such a goal would accord with existing Northern Branch Corridor goals and objectives, which include “meet the needs of travelers in the project area,” “attract growth and support development in Bergen and Hudson Counties,” “attract riders to transit,” “improve services for lower-income/ minority/transit-dependent travelers,” and “support favorable farebox recovery.”156 Lower-income and nonwhite residents in the corridor municipalities are the travelers and paying customers that the project will serve. Addressing their needs, especially affordable housing, would explicitly provide the basis for reconsidering the SDEIS plans.
Making affordable housing a priority would also have financing benefits. Since 2013, the Federal Transit Administration (FTA)
has evaluated New Starts funding applications on, among other things, whether projects bring benefits to low- and moderate-income households. NJT can use local affordable housing plans to improve projects’ competitiveness for funding.157
Once the State revises the HBLR project goals, NJT should redesign the proposed stations, prioritizing site selection and station access planning to enhance walkability and facilitate eTOD on nearby parcels. Doing so may require locating stations on parcels that are more expensive, may be more disruptive to existing traffic patterns, and may require selecting structured parking.
NJT should include an updated analysis of flood risks in the corridor in a second SDEIS
The current SDEIS flood risk analysis is based on FEMA’s unreliable 100-year FIRM flood zone data and solely considers the flood risks to the stations themselves.158 NJT should reevaluate flood risks in the corridor on the basis of NOAA projections of sea level rise and forthcoming DEP sea level rise statewide standards. This reevaluation should include risks posed to station-adjacent redevelopment sites, especially those identified by HEFSPs for transit-oriented affordable housing.
FSHC should prioritize municipalities in the corridor
FSHC should pursue Third Round settlements and, if necessary, litigation in Englewood and Leonia. These are the towns without settlements or viable HEFSPs.
FSHC should prioritize Ridgefield—the one town in the corridor with an existing settlement—in its Third Round midterm reviews. Specifically, FSHC should reject Ridgefield’s proposed affordable housing zoning on Overpeck Creek-adjacent sites that are projected to be vulnerable to sea level rise and work with the town to locate alternative transit-oriented sites (see box and map).
FSHC should prioritize all six municipalities for attention during the Fourth Round.
FSHC and NJF should vigorously advocate for proactive eTOD land use planning, including redevelopment studies where appropriate, in all six HBLR municipalities, as well as in other municipalities with planned transit stations
This advocacy should aim to ensure the towns’ HEFSPs, master plans, and redevelopment studies are consistent with the eTOD planning best practices. Particular focus should be given to:
Proactive establishment of eTOD zoning overlay districts in station areas as soon as station sites are finalized.
Siting of proposed affordable housing projects where they are accessible to HBLR stations but not on sites threatened by sea level rise.
Municipality-wide implementation of policies to prevent displacement (missing-middle zoning, inclusionary zoning, updated rent control ordinances, etc.).
DCA, DOT, and NJT should fund the local capacity to plan for eTOD outcomes
Municipalities will need funding to plan for eTOD. DCA should allocate funding from the Affordable Housing Trust Fund Innovation Funds, and DOT should allocate discretionary funding to corridor municipalities. This report recommends that DCA begin awarding planning grants for municipalities interested in applying for TVI under new eTOD standards; TVI planning grants could shepherd corridor municipalities toward TVI and eTOD.159 NJT and DOT could also direct funds and expertise from the Transit-Friendly Planning, Land Use & Development Program to support eTOD-friendly vision planning.160 Funding would be especially impactful in the corridor’s less resourced municipalities: Palisades Park, Fairview, and North Bergen.
Once the Northern Branch Corridor Project is past the EIS stage, NJT should seek to use FTA New Starts funds to provide grants to corridor municipalities for eTOD-supportive land use planning. Other transit authorities, such as the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority have made use of New Starts funding for local planning grants.161
NJT’s draft plans for Ridgefield show a park-and-ride station removed from eTOD opportunities. The planned station is sited at the south edge of town, between a six-lane highway and major electrical substation. The SDEIS describes a strategy of minimal impact: the station would not contribute to downtown traffic and “minimizes the loss of business and residential uses” that would result from acquiring property closer to downtown.162 Additional analysis should evaluate the station site more holistically, considering the opportunities walkable station access provides and the potential for added affordable housing units through eTOD.
Further complicating matters, potential redevelopment sites and proposed sites for affordable housing fall within boundaries projected by NOAA to flood under sea level rise. At the northern edge of the borough and within a quarter mile of the Palisades Park Station area a site is proposed to be zoned for a seven-story high-density multi-family affordable housing development,163 per the conditions of the Borough’s draft HEFSP and settlement with FSHC.164 It is located in a tract of land that will be substantially flooded under 2 feet of sea level rise—on the lower bound of sea level rise estimates.
Municipalities make many of the most crucial decisions for the success of eTOD. FSHC has already successfully shaped local land use policy by issuing municipalities guidance on preparing Housing Element Fair Share Plan (HEFSPs).165 FSHC should signal to municipalities with transit stations that it will prioritize eTOD best practices for the Fourth Round. This section outlines critical priorities for eTOD zoning, robust community engagement, and planning for climate change. FSHC should collaborate with NJF to develop the recommendations in this section into a Fourth Round compliance planning guide for municipalities.
FSHC should advocate for municipalities to adopt eTOD zoning as-of-right
The foundation for eTOD is a planning and zoning framework conducive to affordable housing development in transit station neighborhoods. Yet most TOD projects are currently unable to receive approval as-of-right and must instead seek a variance. Zoning ordinances that facilitate as-of-right approvals for eTOD projects cut out contentious and expensive zoning variance review processes, ultimately speeding project timelines, reducing project costs, and contributing to housing affordability. Zoning for eTOD as-of-right puts municipalities, rather than developers, in the driver’s seat, allowing for inclusive planning processes upfront, rather than fights over individual projects.166 These ordinances should make use of the following best practices.
Adopt explicit transit-oriented zoning, such as zoning overlays in station areas
TOD overlays make the municipality’s intentions clear to developers and the public. In addition to the zoning instruments mentioned below, these overlays should include parking ratio maximums, increased allowable
density, and affordable housing set-asides of 20% or higher.167 There could also be a streamlined approvals process for projects in the overlay zone.168
Allow construction of “missing-middle” housing in station areas and allow accessory dwelling units in all single-family zones
In relatively built-out communities, allowing small multifamily units can increase housing production and thereby counteract displacement pressures. Indeed, these measures stand in direct contrast to the old zoning approaches that reinforced racial segregation and accelerated the displacement of people of color.169 Several cities with extensive single-family zones have legalized duplexes and triplexes (and in some cases fourplexes and cottage clusters) in the past two years, including Minneapolis, Portland, and Cambridge, MA.170 A similar proposal is in the works for transit station areas in Chicago.171 The best of these ordinances implement form-based density controls—effectively allowing triplexes but disallowing McMansions. This reassures nervous neighbors and potentially mitigates land value inflation. FSHC and NJF should also follow developments in Berkeley, CA, which is evaluating how to allow missing-middle housing without causing displacement through any alteration, demolition, or remodeling that property owners may take in response to new regulations.172
eTOD will only be feasible as-of-right if developers have sufficient built-in flexibility to react to changing market conditions without seeking variances. A simple way to provide developers flexibility without giving up municipal control is to regulate density with maximum floor area ratios rather than dwelling units per acre. Maximum floor area ratios implicitly limit the number of bedrooms built on a site without dictating their organization into units.173
Allow side-street mixed-use development to include “horizontal” mixed-use or ground-floor office space
“Vertical” mixed-use—housing over retail—is the gold standard for “activated” streets. However, developers often struggle to fill mandatory storefronts in new residential districts and even report subsidizing commercial tenants. The economics of storefront retail is challenging. In weaker markets, allowing “horizontal” mixed-use—residential and commercial side-by-side—is less risky for developers and thereby facilitates affordable housing construction. In moderate markets, mixed-use zoning should allow ground-floor offices or “flex” units in order to build in long-term flexibility for commercial use without the immediate cost burden of filling empty storefronts.175
FSHC should advocate for municipalities to engage marginalized communities during the preparation of Fourth Round compliance plans
Achieving eTOD requires inclusive planning, involving long-term and active engagement of a diverse set of community partners including local residents, small business owners, community development institutions, and neighborhood organizations.175 Yet, crucial preliminary stages of both TOD planning and Mount Laurel compliance planning usually take place behind closed doors. Mandatory public notice in land review processes happens after settlement agreements have been finalized with FSHC, often after developers have selected sites and architects have drawn plans.
Top-down planning should be a concern not only in municipalities with disproportionately nonwhite and lower-income areas but also in municipalities with mixed- and even high-income disproportionately white areas. While the latter may already employ strategies for public engagement, these may overrepresent affluent residents, while lower-income and nonwhite residents are left out of planning processes meant to benefit them. Indeed, they may be doubly affected when station areas host limited lower-cost market-rate housing alongside prime development sites. Enabling marginalized communities to shape the futures of their neighborhoods
requires their involvement at the beginning of planning, in all types of municipalities.
As part of the Fourth Round compliance guidelines for municipalities, FSHC should detail recommendations for stakeholder meetings with lower-income and nonwhite residents before municipalities draft HEFSPs. FSHC should also continue to encourage municipalities to allow for public comment on draft HEFSPs before submittal to FSHC.176 Enabling people of color to shape their communities’ futures requires their involvement early in the planning processes. Given American planning’s deeply racialized history, engaging residents first in the planning process can mitigate displacement fears.
FSHC should advocate for municipalities to consider the imminent threat of sea level rise when selecting affordable housing sites
FSHC’s advocacy should encompass environmental justice principles—the non-discriminatory and participatory involvement of people in developing, implementing, and enforcing environmental governance.177 At least a dozen New Jersey rail stations are in areas that will see flooding with just 2 feet of sea level rise—a conservative estimate— based on NOAA projections. Another thirty-six will see flooding in a 4-foot sea level rise scenario. These include 39 census tracts ongoing displacement, 8 census tracts ongoing gentrification, and 23 census tracts at risk of gentrification as classified in this report. FSHC should ensure that municipalities do not seek to fulfill their Mount Laurel obligations by planning new housing in the flood plain.
FSHC should update site suitability criteria to reflect new guidance forthcoming from DEP
Governor Murphy’s recent Executive Orders 89 and 100 recognize the multidimensional threat posed by climate change.178 Pursuant to EO100, the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) must adopt Protecting Against Climate Threats (PACT) regulations integrating climate considerations into its regulatory and permitting programs, including its discretion of land use.179 Once DEP has released its updated flood
Percent of half-mile station buffer subject to flooding due to sea level rise 2 ft 4 ft
5–10%
Scenario: 10–20% >20%
State planning entities should coordinate regional affordable housing opportunities
Governor Murphy’s appointees to the Highlands Council, Pinelands Commission, and Meadowlands (NJ Sports & Exposition Authority) should embrace the 2008 reforms to the Fair Housing Act. The law requires 20% of residential units to be set aside as affordable.180 The law also tasks the entities to “coordinate regional affordable housing opportunities with municipalities in areas with convenient access to infrastructure, employment opportunities, and public transportation.”181 The State planning entities should use these tools to advance eTOD. Many towns in the planning areas have stations and are within commuting distance of New York or Philadelphia. Market rate rents in these communities are
high enough to cross-subsidize affordable units. The entities should actively encourage inclusionary developments in towns where the cross-subsidy can be large. The ability to regionally plan Mount Laurel obligations also opens opportunities. In the Highlands, for example, development is so restricted by environmental regulations that many towns will struggle to find developable land.182 Yet, a 2009 analysis estimated that 16 of the region’s 88 towns have the infrastructure and access to transit required by Chapter 46 for regional reallocation.183 The Highlands Council should focus on these 16 towns, perhaps allocating obligations through an inter-town credit transfer program.184
hazard rules, FSHC should update the site suitability criteria initially developed by COAH to reflect the new standards.185 The current site suitability criterion reads, “[c]ompliance with flood hazard area constraints, as defined in N.J.A.C. 7:13.”186 FSHC should update its interpretation of N.J.A.C. 7:13 to align with the new DEP standards for riverine and coastal flooding. It is assumed the forthcoming PACT regulations will be uniformly implemented to types of development and building codes as flood hazard control area rules currently are. Should this not be the case, FSHC should consider otherwise using its discretion in areas where the rule applies. Although FSHC cannot promulgate new rules, it should use an updated inter-
pretation of the flood hazard area criterion, once the PACT rules are adopted, to ensure that new affordable housing does not place lower-income, vulnerable, and nonwhite populations at risk of climate change and flooding.
FSHC should highlight to municipalities the risk of sea level rise when reviewing municipalities’ Fourth Round compliance plans and seek alternative sites with less vulnerability
In doing so, FSHC should prioritize municipalities where sea level rise is a particular threat to eTOD.
The Transit Village Initiative (TVI) is New Jersey’s flagship TOD program, although there are some who question its utility. In the initiative's 20 years of existence, the New Jersey Department of Transportation has approved just 33 Transit Villages out of the state’s 244 transit station areas.187 Developers often liken it a “gold star” that does little to spur development unto itself.188 Some municipal officials echo that sentiment. While the TVI is not a powerful engine of TOD, it serves a purpose as a technical assistance program for municipalities. The State should refashion TVI as an eTOD program, paired with a requirement to comply with the Fair Housing Act and DCA planning grants.
NJDOT coordinates the TVI, which also involves NJT, DCA, NJHMFA, and other agencies. Municipalities must prove they have zoned for TOD, adopted a resolution stating their willingness to grow, made pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure improvements, and met other criteria. The application process guides municipalities toward certain planning goals. In addition to recognition as a Transit Village, municipalities can apply for grants to fund streetscape improvements from a $1 million annual TVI budget administered by NJDOT.
For affordable housing, the TVI only requires that land use regulations include a statement that the municipality will comply with State law.189 FSHC recently sent a letter to the New Jersey Attorney General arguing the 2008 amendments to the Fair Housing Act require all new residential construction in Transit Villages to set aside 20% of units as affordable.190 This part of the statute is not enforced by the State nor have the courts weighed in.
NJDOT should make changes to the TVI application, which has not been updated since 2012. To help fund the more extensive planning this report recommends below, DCA should award grants for planning from the Innovation Fund set-aside of the Affordable Housing Trust Fund. This funding would also ensure
the cost of planning activities does not prevent lower-income communities from applying to the TVI. DOT should add the following to the TVI application:
Towns with a Mount Laurel obligation must have zoning with a 20% set-aside and that allows for sufficient density for inclusionary housing within the station walkshed
Towns with an Unmet Need under Mount Laurel must release a request for expressions of interest for the development of inclusionary housing within the walkshed
Require dedicated engagement sessions on affordable housing and residential segregation
Require that the governing body resolution include a commitment to build affordable housing within the transit station walkshed
Prepare a municipal affirmative marketing plan with the goal of marketing market rate and subsidized housing to a racial demographic mix representative of the COAH housing region
Require that the housing element of the master plan identify where affordable housing will be built within the station area walkshed
Require that the Housing Element and Fair Share Plan be included in the TVI application
Conduct a demographic analysis of the walkshed, including data on race, income, tenure, household size, and condition of housing
Conduct an evaluation of the station property under control of the transit agency as a site for affordable housing, including an analysis of necessary parking reforms and documented engagement with the relevant transit agency
If New Jersey takes proactive and robust action now and continues to do so in the coming decades, tens of thousands of additional New Jerseyans could live in walkable neighborhoods served by transit across the state’s wide variety of municipalities. State leaders are excited about TOD, but they should not assume that its benefits will flow to the Black and Latinx communities that leaders have historically excluded from the benefits of development. The State should prioritize the construction and preservation of affordable housing in transit station areas to ensure that Black, Latinx, and lower-income residents are present to share in the benefits of New Jersey’s recommitment to its station areas.
New Jersey can be the national model of using a regional approach to advance eTOD. The State has the tools and the opportunity to address residential segregation through TOD. There are already foreseeable opportunities for the State to take a regional approach and intervene in re-planning for eTOD, such as along the Hudson Bergen Light Rail northern extension. The State of New Jersey should not shy away from transformative projects and land use initiatives. New Jersey needs a comprehensive, statewide land use strategy to address the regional nature of racial residential segregation and to slow the car-dependent sprawl that is accelerating climate change. The Governor, Legislature, and State agencies should recognize eTOD as the right statewide land-use strategy for the 21st Century.
* DWHI: Disproportionately White and High Income
* Census tract classification according to Urban Displacement Project, https:// www.urbandisplacement.org/new-york/gentrification-and-displacement
SGE: Super Gentrification or Exclusion
OE: Ongoing Exclusion
SE: Stable Exclusion
AG: Advanced Gentrification
ODLIH: Ongoing Displacement of Low-Income Households
ATR: At Risk of Gentrification
NLLIH: Not Losing Low-Income Households:
NDDA : No Displacement Data Available
1. “Why Are New Jersey’s Suburbs so Segregated?,” NJ Spotlight News, May 6, 2019, https://www. njspotlight.com/2019/05/19-05-05-why-are-new-jerseys-suburbs-so-segregated/.
2. “Lower-income” is defined in this report as households with <80% of Area Median Income.
3. Reconnecting America and the Center for Transit-Oriented Development, “What Is Transit-Oriented Development,” Mixed Income Transit-Oriented Development Action Guide, 2008, http://www.mitod.org/whatisTOD.php.
4. “Governor Murphy Marks One-Year Anniversary of Economic Plan,” Insider NJ, October 1, 2019, https://www.insidernj.com/press-release/governor-murphy-marks-one-year-anniversary-economic-plan/; “The State of Innovation: Building a Stronger and Fairer Economy in New Jersey” (New Jersey Economic Development Authority, October 2018), https://www. njeda.com/pdfs/StrongerAndFairerNewJerseyEconomyReport.aspx.
5. cunytv75, The Stoler Report - Real Estate & Banking Executives Outlook on the NJ Market, 2018, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8WUbOqQKhQ&ab_channel=cunytv75; Jessica Perry, “Demographics, Other Factors Helping to Spur Suburban Revival,” NJBIZ (blog), October 15, 2018, https://njbiz.com/demographics-other-factors-helping-to-spur-suburban-revival/.
6. john a. powell, “Post-Racialism or Targeted Universalism,” Denver University Law Review 86, no. 3 (2009 2008): see in particular 795–96.
7. Lawrence S. Lustberg and Eileen Connor, Brief of Proposed Amici Curiae, NJ NAACP and Latino Action Network, In the Matter of the Adoption of N.J.A.C. 5:96 and 5:97 by the New Jersey Council on Affordable Housing, No. 67,126 (n.d.).
8. Lustberg and Connor, at 22.
9. Naomi Bailin Wish and Stephen Eisdorfer, “Impact of Mount Laurel Initiatives: An Analysis of the Characteristics of Applicants Ond Occupants Mount Laurel Housing Symposium,” Seton Hall Law Review 27, no. 4 (1997 1996): 1269 citing N.J. Dep’t of Community Affairs, THE RESIDENTIAL LAND SUPPLY (1972); Norman Williams, Jr. & Thomas Norman, Exclusionary Land Use Controls: The Case of North- Eastern New Jersey, 22 SYRACUSE L. REv. 476 (1971). These regulations included: “prohibitions on the construction of garden apartments and townhouses, minimum lot size requirements, minimum house size requirements, minimum frontage requirements, cost-increasing design standards, prohibitions on publicly subsidized housing, and excessive zoning for industrial or commercial uses.”
10. Kenneth T. Jackson, Crabgrass Frontier: The Suburbanization of the United States, 1st edition (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1987), Chapter 11; Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, Race for Profit: How Banks and the Real Estate Industry Undermined Black Homeownership (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2019).
11. Lustberg and Connor, Brief of Proposed Amici Curiae, NJ NAACP and Latino Action Network, In the Matter of the Adoption of N.J.A.C. 5:96 and 5:97 by the New Jersey Council on Affordable Housing at 24.
12. Robert Cervero and John Landis, “Twenty Years of the Bay Area Rapid Transit System: Land Use and Development Impacts,” Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice 31, no. 4 (July 1, 1997): 309–33, https://doi.org/10.1016/S09658564(96)00027-4; Gerrit J. Knaap, Chengr Ding, and Lewis D. Hopkins, “Do Plans Matter?: The Effects of Light Rail Plans on Land Values in Station Areas,” Journal of Planning Education and Research 21, no. 1 (September 1, 2001): 32–39, https:// doi.org/10.1177/0739456X0102100103.
13. powell, “Post-Racialism or Targeted Universalism,” 790–91.
14. Martha Lamar, Alan Mallach, and John M. Payne, “Mount Laurel at Work: Affordable Housing in New Jersey, 1983-1988,” Rutgers Law Review 41, no. 4 (1989 1988): 1256; Wish and Eisdorfer, “Impact of Mount Laurel Initiatives,” 1294; Stephanie R. Bush-Baskette, Kelly Robinson, and Peter Simmons, “Residential and Social Outcomes for Residents Living in Housing Certified by the New Jersey Council on Affordable Housing Articles Inspired by the Work of John M. Payne: Discussions of Mount Laurel Today,” Rutgers Law Review 63, no. 3 (2011 2010): 888.
15. Lamar, Mallach, and Payne, “Mount Laurel at Work.” The authors make no substantive mention of Latinx residents. The word “Hispanic” is only included twice and both times without substantive comment. Neither “Latino” or “Latin” are mentioned either. Wish and Eisdorfer, “Impact of Mount Laurel Initiatives,” 1294.
16. john a. powell, “Injecting a Race Component into Mount Laurel-Style Litigation Panel OneRacial Segregation in Housing,” Seton Hall Law Review 27, no. 4 (1997 1996): 1380.
17. Lustberg and Connor, Brief of Proposed Amici Curiae, NJ NAACP and Latino Action Network, In the Matter of the Adoption of N.J.A.C. 5:96 and 5:97 by the New Jersey Council on Affordable Housing at 6.
18. powell, “Injecting a Race Component into Mount Laurel-Style Litigation Panel One - Racial Segregation in Housing,” 1380.
19. powell, “Post-Racialism or Targeted Universalism,” 794–95.
20. Danilo Pelletiere and Sheila Crowley, “Affordable Housing Dilemma: The Preservation vs. Mobility Debate,” SSRN Electronic Journal, 2012, 7–9, https://doi.org/10.2139/ ssrn.2111576.
21. powell, “Injecting a Race Component into Mount Laurel-Style Litigation Panel One - Racial Segregation in Housing,” 1373.
22. Lawrence J. Vale, Purging the Poorest : Public Housing and the Design Politics of Twice-Cleared Communities, Historical Studies of Urban America. (London: University of Chicago Press, 2013); Pelletiere and Crowley, “Affordable Housing Dilemma,” 2012, 10–12.
23. “Mount Laurel Doctrine | Fair Share Housing Center,” accessed October 18, 2020, https:// fairsharehousing.org/mount-laurel-doctrine/.
24. Robert Cervero, The Transit Metropolis (Washington, DC: Island Press, 1998), 404–5.
25. Lorien Rice, Transportation Spending by Low-Income Households: Lessons for the San Francisco Bay Area (San Francisco, Calif: Public Policy Institute of California, 2004), vi.
26. Nicholas J. Klein and Michael J. Smart, “Car Today, Gone Tomorrow: The Ephemeral Car in Low-Income, Immigrant and Minority Families,” Transportation 44, no. 3 (May 1, 2017): 501, https://doi.org/10.1007/s11116-015-9664-4.
27. Klein and Smart, 500–506.
28. Nicholas J. Klein and Michael J. Smart, “Life Events, Poverty, and Car Ownership in the United States: A Mobility Biography Approach,” Journal of Transport and Land Use 12, no. 1 (2019): 411.
29. NJDEP, “NJDEP-Air Quality, Energy & Sustainability,” accessed December 7, 2020, https://www. nj.gov/dep/aqes/oce-ghgei.html.
30. Cervero, The Transit Metropolis
31. Jarrett Walker, Human Transit : How Clearer Thinking about Public Transit Can Enrich Our Communities and Our Lives (Washington, DC: Island Press, 2012), 181–204.
32. Tim Evans, “Off Track? An Assessment of Mixed-Income Housing Around New Jersey’s Transit Station.” (New Jersey Future, May 2015), https://www.njfuture.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/Off-Track-Assessment-of-Equity-around-NJ-Transit-Stations.pdf.
33. U. S. Census Bureau American Community Survey (ACS ) data was simplified into five categories: Black, White, Latinx, Asian, and Other. “White” includes only non-Hispanic white individuals. Individuals of Hispanic ethnicity are “Latinx,” regardless of race. Black, Latinx, Asian, and Other populations compose the nonwhite category. ACS race/ethnicity data is from Census Reporter and ACS income data is from Social Explorer.
34. Chapple & Thomas, “Urban Displacement Project,” 2020, https://www.urbandisplacement.org/ new-york/gentrification-and-displacement.
35. If a municipality contains census tracts with multiple categories of displacement, the highest category of displacement was designated.
36. Joel Schwartz, Debra Tantleff, and Patrick Terborg, Personal communica7tion, In-Class Discussion, October 5, 2020.
37. “Low Income Housing Tax Credit Qualified Allocation Plan,” May 7, 2019, 43, https://www. nj.gov/dca/hmfa/media/download/tax/qap/2019_2020_QAPproposedA500amendments_blacklined.pdf; David Kinsey, Phone, October 21, 2020.
38. Katherine Brennan, Personal communication, Phone, October 19, 2020.
39. Sarah Oppenheimer, “Building Opportunity II: Civil Rights Best Practices in the LIHTC Program,” Civil Rights Research (Poverty & Race Research Action Council, July 2015), https://prrac. org/building-opportunity-ii-a-fair-housing-assessment-of-state-low-income-housing-taxcredit-plans/.
40. “AFFIRMATIVE FAIR HOUSING MARKETING PLAN: For Affordable Housing in (REGION 1)” (New Jersey Department of Community Affairs, December 2011), https://state.nj.us/dca/ divisions/lps/hss/admin_files/affirmmrktg/region1.doc.
41. “Low Income Housing Tax Credit Program: 2018-2019 Qualified Allocation Plan” (Department of Housing and Community Development, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, n.d.), 58, https://www.mass.gov/doc/2018-2019-qap/download; Sarah Oppenheimer, “Building Opportunity II: Civil Rights Best Practices in the LIHTC Program,” Civil Rights Research (Poverty & Race Research Action Council, July 2015), 18, https://prrac.org/building-opportunity-ii-a-fair-housing-assessment-of-state-low-income-housing-tax-credit-plans/.
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46. Klein and Smart, “Life Events, Poverty, and Car Ownership in the United States,” 404.
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64. Taken from TV funding allocations from 2013-2020.
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73. “Addressing New Jersey’s Rental Housing Affordability Crisis” (Princeton School of Public and International Affairs, January 2020), 20, https://issuu.com/woodrowwilsonschool/docs/ affordable_housing_policy_workshop_report.
74. Lamar, Mallach, and Payne, “Mount Laurel at Work,” 1211, 1213–14;4Wish and Eisdorfer, “Impact of Mount Laurel Initiatives,” 1291, 1296–97.
75. “New Jersey 2018-2019 Qualified Allocation Plan,” 53.
76. “New Jersey 2018-2019 Qualified Allocation Plan,” 47.
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79. Jackson, Crabgrass Frontier, chap. 11.
80. Regional Plan Association, “Untapped Potential: Opportunities for Affordable Homes and Neighborhoods near Transit,” November 2017, https://rpa.org/uploads/pdfs/RPA-Untapped-Potential.pdf.
81. Starting in 1982, Massachusetts began to allow towns to count toward the 10% all the units in a development that was built with a Comprehensive Permit (Gornstein and Verrilli 2006).
82. Aaron Gornstein and Ann Verrilli, “MIXED-INCOME HOUSING IN THE SUBURBS: LESSONS FROM MASSACHUSETTS,” September 2006, 113.
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85. Gornstein, Personal communication.
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87. Bonnie Heudorfer, Personal communication, Phone, November 17, 2020.
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89. Chapple and Loukaitou-Sideris.; Samuel Stein, Capital City: Gentrification and the Real Estate State (London ; Brooklyn, NY: Verso, 2019).
90. Casey Dawkins and Rolf Moeckel, “Transit-Induced Gentrification: Who Will Stay, and Who Will Go?,” Housing Policy Debate 26, no. 4–5 (September 2, 2016): 801–18, https://doi. org/10.1080/10511482.2016.1138986.
91. Stephanie Pollack, Barry Bluestone, and Chase Billingham, “Maintaining Diversity in America’s Transit-Rich Neighborhoods: Tools for Equitable Neighborhood Change” (New England Community Developments).
92. Knaap, Ding, and Hopkins, “Do Plans Matter?”
93. Elizabeth C. Delmelle, Isabelle Nilsson, and Alexander Bryant, “Investigating Transit-Induced Displacement Using Eviction Data,” Housing Policy Debate 0, no. 0 (October 7, 2020): 2, https://doi.org/10.1080/10511482.2020.1815071.
94. Karen Chapple and Miriam Zuk, “Forewarned: The Use of Neighborhood Early Warning Systems for Gentrification and Displacement,” Cityscape 18, no. 3 (2016): 109–30.
95. The UDP measures gentrification and displacement with metrics based upon the displacement literature. These include gentrification vulnerability in a base year, the percentage change in college-educated population and change in real median household income, the movement of lower-income households out of the census tract, and whether the neighborhood is a “hot market.”
96. “Pushed Out,” 6–14, 24–25, and 36–37.
97. Chapple and Loukaitou-Sideris, “Transit-Oriented Displacement or Community Dividends?,” April 9, 2019.
98. Stein, Capital City; Stephen Danley and Rasheda Weaver, “‘They’re Not Building It for Us’: Displacement Pressure, Unwelcomeness, and Protesting Neighborhood Investment,” Societies 8, no. 3 (2018): 1–16.109
99. Lance Freeman, There Goes the Hood: Views of Gentrification from the Ground Up (Temple University Press, 2011).
100. Chapple and Loukaitou-Sideris, “Transit-Oriented Displacement or Community Dividends?,” April 9, 2019.
101. The proxy incorporates several displacement characteristics used in the UDP methodology to classify areas of “vulnerable to gentrification” in 2016 and ranks transit station areas by the sum of these characteristics
102. Chapple and Loukaitou-Sideris, “Transit-Oriented Displacement or Community Dividends?,” April 9, 2019.
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106. Ibid.
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110. “NJ HMFA Annual Report,” 2008, https://www.nj.gov/dca/hmfa/media/investor/annual_reports/2008_hmfa_annualreport.pdf.
111. Velasco, Gabriella Velasco, “How Community Land Trusts Can Advance Racial and Economic Justice,” Urban Institute, Housing Matters, February 26, 2020, https://housingmatters. urban.org/articles/how-community-land-trusts-can-advance-racial-and-economic-justice.
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120. Ambrosius et al., 128–29.
121. Jackelyn Hwang and Bina P. Shrimali, “Increasing Access to Affordable Housing Opportunities in Silicon Valley,” Community Development Working Paper (San Francisco, CA: Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, December 2019), https://www.frbsf.org/community-development/publications/working-papers/2019/october/increasing-access-to-affordable-housing-opportunities-in-silicon-valley/.
122. Jonathan Fitzsimons, The German Private Rented Sector: A Holistic Approach: Working Paper (Copenhagen: Boligoekonomisk Videncenter, 2014), 88; Andrew Allen, “German Rent Control Works for Both Landlords and Tenants,” March 13, 2019, https:// www.ft.com/content/efe1f74c-3c1d-11e9-9988-28303f70fcff; Jonathan Eley, “A German Lesson in Rent Controls,” June 12, 2015, https://www.ft.com/content/7e682660-101911e5-bd70-00144feabdc0; Matt Phillips, “Most Germans Don’t Buy Their Homes, They Rent. Here’s Why,” Quartz, accessed April 22, 2020, https://qz.com/167887/germany-hasone-of-the-worlds-lowest-homeownership-rates/.
123. Devajyoti Deka, “Benchmarking Gentrification near Commuter Rail Stations in New Jersey,” Urban Studies 54, no. 13 (October 1, 2017): 2969, https://doi. org/10.1177/0042098016664830.
124. Deka, 2969; “Living Below the Line: Measuring Economic Insecurity Among New Jersey’s Retired Seniors” (State of New Jersey Department of Human Services Division of Aging Services, January 2017), 12, https://www.nj.gov/humanservices/news/reports/Living%20 Below%20the%20Line%202017.pdf.
125. “Living Below the Line.”
126. Danley and Weaver, “‘They’re Not Building It for Us.’”
127. “Seattle, WA — Building Racial Equity Into Development,” Government Alliance on Race and Equity (blog), April 12, 2015, https://www.racialequityalliance.org/2015/04/12/ seattle-washington-is-one-of-the-fastest-growing-big-cities-in-the-nation/.
128. City of Los Angeles Department of Public Works, “Measure JJJ | Bureau of Contract Administration,” 2016, https://bca.lacity.org/measure-JJJ#:~:text=Passed%20by%2Sthe%20 voters%20on,fees%20into%20the%20City%27s%20Affordable.
129. Robin Kniech and Melinda Pollack, “Best Practices in Transit Agency Joint Development,” 2010, 8.
130. Fair Share Housing Center, “Re: N.J.S.A. 52:27D-329.9(b),” Legal Memorandum, September 1, 2020.
131. NJ Transit, “NJ TRANSIT RFQ/EOI No.RE20-002,” October 2020; NJ Transit, “NJ TRANSIT RFQ/ EOI No.RE20-003,” October 2020.
132. Bay Area Rapid Transit, “BART Draft Framework for Determining Financial Return from Affordable Housing,” April 13, 2020, https://www.bart.gov/sites/default/files/docs/ Att%202%20-%20BART%20TOD%20Draft%20FR%20Framework%20-%20v7%20 2020-04-13.pdf.
133. Nat Bottigheimer, Personal communication, In-Class Discussion, September 28, 2020.
134. Reid Ewing et al., “Trip and Parking Generation at Transit-Oriented Developments: Five US Case Studies,” Landscape and Urban Planning 160 (April 1, 2017): 69–78, https:// doi.org/10.1016/j.landurbplan.2016.12.002.
135. Robert Cervero, Arlie Adkins, and Cathleen Sullivan, “Are Suburban TODs OverParked?,” Journal of Public Transportation 13, no. 2 (June 1, 2010), https:// doi.org/10.5038/2375-0901.13.2.3. Ewing et al., “Trip and Parking Generation at
Transit-Oriented Developments.” Daniel G Chatman, Stephanie E DiPetrillo, and Vincent F Nichnadowicz, “FINAL REPORT March 2010,” n.d., 81.
136. “In Mid-Density Zones, Portland Has a Choice: Garages or Low Prices?,”Sightline Institute (blog), October 2, 2019, https://www.sightline.org/2019/10/02/in-mid-density-zonesportland-has-a-choice-garages-or-low-prices/.
137. “The 3 Essential Rules of Parking Reform,” Bloomberg.com, September 20, 2019, https:// www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-09-20/how-to-reform-your-city-s-bad-parkingrequirements.
138. Government Accountability Office, “Multiple Factors Influence Extent of Transit-Oriented Development,” November 2014, https://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-15-70.
139. John Hersey and Michael Spotts, “Promoting Opportunity through Equitable Transit-Oriented Development (ETOD): Barriers to Success and Best Practices for Implementation” (Enterprise Community Partners, October 2015), https://www.enterprisecommunity. org/resources/promoting-opportunity-through-equitable-transit-oriented-development-etod-barriers; Karen Chapple and Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris, Transit-Oriented Displacement or Community Dividends? : Understanding the Effects of Smarter Growth on Communities, Urban and Industrial Environments. (Cambridge: The MIT Press, 2019), 31, {"https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/Princeton/detail. action?docID=5750436":["ebookcentral.proquest.com","Access restricted to 1 concurrent user"]}; Ian Carlton and William Fleissig, “Steps to Avoid Stalled Equitable TOD Projects” (Living Cities, April 2014), https://www.livingcities.org/resources/259-stepsto-avoid-stalled-equitable-tod-projects.; Ellen Greenberg, “Regulations Shape Reality: Zoning for Transit-Oriented Development,” in The New Transit Town: Best Practices in Transit-Oriented Development, ed. Hank Dittmar, Dena Belzer, and Gerald Autler (Washington, DC: Island Press, 2004), 63, 67.
140. Walker, Human Transit, 181–204.
141. Algernon Austin, “To Move Is To Thrive: Public Transit and Economic Opportunity for People of Color” (Demos, November 15, 2017), https://www.demos.org/research/move-thrive-public-transit-and-economic-opportunity-people-color.
142. Chapple and Loukaitou-Sideris, Transit-Oriented Displacement or Community Dividends?, 2019.
143. Martin Robins and Jan Wells, “Land Development at Selected Hudson-Bergen Light Rail Stations” (Alan Voorhees Transportation Center, Rutgers University, April 2008), i, ii, 36, http://vtc.rutgers.edu/land-development-at-selected-hudson-bergen-light-rail-stations/.
143. Freemon, “There goes the Hood”; Gentrification of Two New Jersey Cities
145. “What is Northern Branch,” in New Jersey Transit, “Northern Branch Corridor Project,” accessed November 21, 2020, http://northernbranchcorridor.com/.
146. “Glassboro-Camden Line,” accessed November 11, 2020, http://glassborocamdenline.com/.
147. New Jersey Transit, “Northern Branch Corridor Supplmental Draft Environmental Impact Statement and Section 4(f) Statement (SDEIS),” March 17, 2017, http://northernbranchcorridor.com/docs.html.
148. Phillips Preiss Grygiel, “Third Round Houusing Element and Fair Share Plan, City of Englewood: 2014 Revision,” April 2014, http://www.cityofenglewood.org/ filestorage/9306/11452/11511/Third_Round_Housing_Element_and_Fair_Share_ Plan_2014_%281%29.pdf.
149. H2M Architects + Engineers, “Leonia Master Plan Reexamination Report,” July 22, 2020, https://www.leonianj.gov/home/showdocument?id=1670.*Cite Leonia Master Plan
150. Michael F. Kauker Associates, “Borough of Palisades Park, Housing Plan Element,” May 25, 2000, http://bcgisweb.co.bergen.nj.us/planning/masterplans/Palisades%20Park/45-002. pdf; Michael F. Kauker Associates, “Master Plan Reexamination Report, Borough of Palisades Park, New Jersey,” May 25, 2000, http://bcgisweb.co.bergen.nj.us/planning/ masterplans/Palisades%20Park/45-001.pdf; Kauker & Kauker, “Master Plan Housing Element, Borough of Fairview, NJ,” October 2, 2009, http://bcgisweb.co.bergen.nj.us/ planning/masterplans/Fairview/18-009.pdf.
151. Hersey and Spotts, “Barriers to Success,” 57
152. H2M Architects + Engineers, “Leonia Master Plan Reexamination Report.”
153. Station plans are published in New Jersey Transit, “Northern Branch Corridor SDEIS” Technical Appendices.
154. Todd Bates, “Saving New Jersey from the Rising Tide,” accessed November 11, 2020, https:// impact.rutgers.edu/the-rising-tide.
155. “Reinventing Metropark Station: From Suburban Park-and-Ride to TOD Community,” NJTOD, November 28, 2020, http://www.njtod.org/reinventing-metropark-station/.
156. New Jersey Transit, “Northern Branch Corridor SDEIS,” ES-5.
157. Hersey and Spotts, “Barriers to Success,” 11, 24; Michael Spotts, “Leveraging the New Transit Policy Guidance to Create Inclusive Communities of Opportunity” (Enterprise Community Partners, 2013), https://www.enterprisecommunity.org/resources/new-starts-leveraging-new-transit-policy-guidance-create-inclusive-communities.
158. New Jersey Transit, “Northern Branch Corridor SDEIS,” chap. 16.
159. North Bergen has previously contemplated TVI status at the existing HBLR Tonnelle Avenue station. See Burgis Associates, “Periodic Reexaminatin of the Master Plan, Township of North Bergen, Hudson County, New Jersey,” October 22, 2009, 25, https://www. northbergen.org/_Content/pdf/AdoptedReex-10-22-09.pdf.
160. “Transit Friendly Land Use,” NJ Transit, accessed December 9, 2020, https://www.njtransit. com/TransitFriendly.
161. LACMTA has been able to create planning grants for TOD-supportive land use planning from federal transportation planning funds (STP and CMAQ). Hersey and Spotts, “Barriers to Success,” 38; see also Spotts, “Leveraging the New Transit Policy Guidance to Create Inclusive Communities of Opportunity.”
162. New Jersey Transit, “Northern Branch Corridor SDEIS,” 26–6.
163. The zoning is currently before council, with a vote scheduled for December 14, 2020. A previous vote scheduled for November 23 was adjourned in order to allow greater time for notification of residents in the proposed rezoning areas.
163. “Ridgefield, NJ, Housing Element and Fair Share Plan—Draft Report” (New York, NY: Gregory Associates LLC, March 2018), 45.
165. “Draft Hackensack Meadowlands District Master Plan Update 2020” (Lyndhurst, NJ: New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority, August 2019), https://njmc.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws. com/pdfs/master-plan-2020/draft-master-plan.pdf.
166. Housing and Community Development Network of New Jersey, “Developing Effective Municipal Housing Plans: A Guide for Nonprofits and Advocates on Implementing the New Jersey Supreme Court’s March 2015 Decision of Fair Share Housing,” May 2015.
167. Greenberg, “Regulations Shape Reality,” 63.
168. For an example in practice see the discussion of the Seattle Urban Village program in Hersey and Spotts, “Barriers to Success,” 26; see also City of Chicago, “Equitable Transit-Oriented Development (ETOD) Policy Plan: Draft for Public Comment,” September 2020, https:// www.chicago.gov/content/dam/city/sites/etod/Pdfs/ETOD-Policy-Plan_Full_9-14-20.pdf.
169. Regional Transportation Authority [Chicago], “Streamlining the Entitlement Process for Transit-Oriented Development: Best Practices Summary,” October 2012, https://www. rtachicago.org/sites/default/files/documents/plansandprograms/landusetod/Streamlining_The_Entitlement_Process-_Best_Practices_Report.pdf, 2-4; GAO, “Multiple Factors Influence transit-oriented development,” 18-20.
170. Jena Hughes, “History of Racist Planning in Portland,” Portland.gov, September 2019, https:// www.portland.gov/bps/history-racist-planning-portland.
171. City of Minneapolis, “Policy 1: Access to Housing: Increase Supply of Housing and Its Diversity of Location and Types,” in Minneapolis 2040, 2019, https://minneapolis2040.com/ policies/access-to-housing/; City of Portland, “Residential Infill Program,” accessed October 18, 2020, https://www.portland.gov/bps/rip; Michael Andersen, “Portland Just Passed the Best Low-Density Zoning Reform in US History,” Sightline Institute (blog), August 11, 2020, https://www.sightline.org/2020/08/11/on-wednesday-portland-will-pass-thebest-low-density-zoning-reform-in-us-history/; Laura Wamsley, “Oregon Legislature Votes To Essentially Ban Single-Family Zoning,” NPR.org (blog), July 1, 2019, https://www. npr.org/2019/07/01/737798440/oregon-legislature-votes-to-essentially-ban-single-family-zoning; Community Development Department, City of Cambridge, MA, “100%-Affordable Housing Zoning Overlay Proposal,” March 2019, https://www.cambridgema.gov/ CDD/Projects/Housing/~/media/74B9BB16BB974B619201B2AC17489EC3.ashx.
172. City of Chicago, “Equitable Transit-Oriented Development (ETOD) Policy Plan: Draft for Public Comment.”
173. Lori Droste et al., “Missing Middle Report” (22, February 26, 2019), https://www.cityofberkeley.info/Clerk/City_Council/2019/02_Feb/City_Council__02-26-2019_-_Regular_Meeting_Agenda.aspx.; Sophie Hahn, “Opinion: ‘Missing Middle’ Housing: Neither Affordable nor Restitution, but Still a Good Idea to Explore,” Berkeleyside (blog), April 23, 2019, https://www.berkeleyside.com/2019/04/23/opinion-missing-middle-housing-neither-affordable-nor-restitution-but-still-a-good-idea-to-explore.
174. Schwartz, Tantleff, and Terborg, Personal communication.
175. Schwartz, Tantleff, and Terborg; Jeffrey Albert, Personal communication, interview by CoeScharff, In-Class Discussion, September 15, 2020; Government Accountability Office, “Multiple Factors Influence Extent of Transit-Oriented Development.”
176. “New Publication by MZ Strategies, LLC: Advancing Equitable Transit-Oriented Development through Community Partnerships and Public Sector Leadership,” MZ Strategies, accessed November 26, 2020, http://mzstrategies.com/blog/new-publication-by-mz-strategies-llc-advancing-equitable-transit-oriented-development-through-community-partnerships-and-public-sector-leadership.
177. walkableprinceton, “Princeton Council Criticizes ‘Fair Share Housing Center’ As Affordable Housing Trial Continues,” Walkableprinceton (blog), January 24, 2017, https://walkableprinceton.com/2017/01/23/council-lashes-fair-share/.
178. Troy Singleton and Loretta Weinberg, “Senate Bill 232,” 242 § (2020), https://www.njleg. state.nj.us/2020/Bills/S0500/232_I1.PDF.
179. Philip D. Gov. Murphy, “Executive Order 89” (New Jersey, October 29, 2019), https://nj.gov/ infobank/eo/056murphy/pdf/EO-89.pdf. Philip D. Gov. Murphy, “Executive Order 100” (New Jersey, January 27, 2020), https://nj.gov/infobank/eo/056murphy/pdf/EO-100.pdf.
180. Ibid.
181. Devjoy Sengupta, “REIMAGINING AFFORDABLE HOUSING IN THE NEW JERSEY HIGHLANDS REGION” (Senior Thesis, Princeton, N.J, School of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University, 2009), 24.
182. Sengupta, 23.
183. Sengupta, 41.
184. Sengupta, 47.
185. “COAH-Based Site Suitability Criteria for Affordable Housing Sites,” n.d.
186. Ibid.
187. David Kinsey, “SPI 591a: Policy Workshop: Equitable Transit-Oriented Development in New Jersey” (Princeton School of Public and International Affairs, September 15, 2020), 1.
188. Schwartz, Tantleff, and Terborg, Personal communication.
189. “NJDOT Transit Village Criteria and Scoring Guide” (New Jersey Department of Transportation, November 2012), https://www.state.nj.us/transportation/community/village/doc/guide.rtf.
190. Fair Share Housing Center, “Re: N.J.S.A. 52:27D-329.9(b),” September 1, 2020.
The authors thank the leaders and experts in the public, private, and non-profit sectors who shared their perspectives for this report. This document would not have been possible without their generosity. However, the recommendations and any errors in this report are the authors’.
Jeffrey Albert, Princewood Properties
Katherine Brennan, New Jersey Housing and Mortgage Finance Agency
Nat Bottigheimer, Regional Plan Association
Jon Carnegie, AICP, Voorhees Transportation Center, Rutgers Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy
Yvette Chen, Fair Share Housing Center
Sheena C. Collum, South Orange, NJ
Jim Constantine, LRK
Louis Di Paolo, New Jersey Policy Perspective
Colin Driver, Borough of Somerville
Tim Evans, New Jersey Future
Joseph Forgione, JMF Properties
Christiana Foglio, Community Investment Strategies
Adam M. Gordon, Fair Share Housing Center
Aaron Gornstein, Preservation of Affordable Housing
Bonnie Heudorfer, Consultant
Andrew Kaplan, New York City Housing Authority
Peter Kasabach, New Jersey Future
Andrew Swords, New Jersey Department of Transportation
Joel Schwartz, Landmark Properties and Townscape Design
Debra Tantleff, TANTUM Real Estate
Patrick Terborg, TD+Partners
George Vallone, Hoboken Brownstone Company
James C. Williams IV, Fair Share Housing Center
Rachel Zack, Remix
The authors of this report are particularly indebted to our advisor David N. Kinsey, FAICP. David has spent his career serving the public interest by advancing Mount Laurel, coastal protection, and smart growth in New Jersey. The American Institute of Certified Planners called David a “pragmatic idealist” when it recognized his record of success as a Fellow of the American Institute of Certified Planners. Without his expertise, guidance, and good humor, this report would not have been possible.
Patrick Boduch previously worked in Chicago at Deloitte Consulting and Campbell & Company. He also volunteered for a year in the spiritual care department of a Catholic hospital in Cincinnati.
Dallas Browning previously worked for the Kentucky Science & Technology Corporation, a nonprofit partnered with the Kentucky Cabinet for Economic Development, on developing startup and innovation ecosystems in underserved areas.
Kai Chong-Smith previously worked in policy roles in the Ontario civil service, including three years working in economic policy at the Ministry of Indigenous Affairs.
Jonah Coe-Scharff’s research and design work addresses the history and politics of housing in the US. He has led conceptual urban projects at WORKac and designed cartographic visualizations with Somatic Collaborative.
Wendy L. Gomez works on urban and social policy at the local level and in movement building. She previously worked as a qualitative researcher at UCLA on criminal justice reform.
William McMutuary is focused on community organizing and combating oppression. Before attending SPIA he spent six years in the Navy as a Persian Farsi Intelligence analyst.
Alex Merchant previously served as a Senior Policy Advisor for the New York City Deputy Mayor of Operations. His policy focus is on housing, transportation, and social policy.
Renee A. Peterkin is a U.S. Navy Veteran who previously worked for the Atlanta Community Food Bank engaging in community outreach in underserved areas of the Greater Atlanta Region.
Juan Pablo Ponce de Leon worked with HECTOR in Newark, NJ on participatory urban design and participated in the 2019 SPIA workshop addressing federal coastal flooding response.
Tom Taylor previously worked on social housing policy for the Department of Health and Human Services in Melbourne, Australia and focused on better support for tenants in public housing.
Zach Zook works on food security, poverty, and social policy issues. He previously worked in Lebanon and Syria with Mennonite Central Committee, managing a wide variety of humanitarian relief programs.
