This project will address limitations in the current literature surrounding air quality impacts of vehicle traffic, especially in underserved communities. The team will employ a refined near-roadway emission exposure surrogate that balances spatial precision and computational burden to estimate changes in exposure levels and health risks and the distribution of these burdens over time as EV adoption increases.
Rural residents face significant mobility challenges because travel destinations are far, opportunities like jobs and access to essential needs are limited, and rural roadways are more dangerous than their urban counterparts. UC Davis researchers used US Census microdata and conducted interviews to describe socioeconomic and mobility characteristics of carless households and residents in rural California to understand barriers to access and travel adaptations among individuals with limited access to a vehicle.
This project addresses the need to increase access to grant funds to develop electric vehicle (EV) carsharing in underserved communities, particularly in rural and suburban areas. The research team designed this translational research project to engage communities interested in developing electric carsharing programs.
This study contributes to our growing understanding of environmental justice rising from vehicle electrification, underscoring the need for policy frameworks that create a more equitable transportation system.
As electric vehicles are being adopted in relatively wealthier communities, there is a question as to whether pollution is being shifted from these communities to more disadvantaged, lower income communities which tend to be located near fossil fuel power plants. This project proposes to conduct a high-resolution accounting and measurement of the emissions and associated impacts through three phases of research.
Associated publication from Journal of Transport Geography on whether dockless or dock-based Bikeshare systems better address enhancing equitable service level outcomes.
This research will improve long-term sustainability by identifying how and why (or why not) transportation electrification (TE) projects align with regional and local transportation goals. The research will result in a deep dive case study that can serve as a template for evaluating future TE expenditures with respect to identifying and quantifying disadvantaged community benefits.
This research explores the range of tangible benefits that the implementation of transportation electrification programs can achieve for disadvantaged communities.
This research aims to develop an equitable and sustainable freight‐oriented land use methodology to support future planning activities, facilitate the integration of freight activity across urban, suburban, and rural areas, and facilitate the transition of heavy‐ and medium‐duty vehicles toward zero‐emission. The project will analyze freight distribution patterns considering supply and demand and estimate social, environmental, and labor impacts in different communities.
The goal of this research is to identify how rural zero-car households in California meet their transportation needs, and what policy solutions might improve access and mobility for these households.
