Figure 1.1
described. Beyond such immediate payoffs, this report projects, in summary, a systematic research and development effort de- signed to close the gap between innovation and application, and to accelerate the development of new urban transportation in a deliberate and careful way. The longer view must include not only the future of urban transportation but the future of urban America.
THE URBAN FRAMEWORK
Much urban transportation today is geared to the city of 50 years ago, and that city is itself largely obsolete today. The physical layout of most cities-the platting, the street design, and basic service systems-was created a century or more ago. Urban areas have changed radically since their basic trans- portation systems were established. They have grown in popu- lation, experienced significant shifts in the location of people, industry and land uses, and have expanded substantially in arca,
Between 1940 and 1960, for example, the population in urban areas grew from 78 million to 125 million, as shown in figure 1.1. Table. 1.1 indicates the increase in number of major urbanized arcas in the United States since 1940. In many of these, the growth took place entirely on the fringe of the urban- ized area, with the central city and high density suburbs de- clining. For example, in Boston the city core population declined by 6 percent, the close-in, high density suburbs in- creased by 2 percent, while the lower density suburbs grew by 95 percent. In St. Louis, the data for the comparable areas were minus 9 percent, plus 14 percent, and plus 335 percent. Some metropolitan areas had growing cores, as well as grow- ing fringes. For example, in Los Angeles the urbanized area core expanded and increased its population by 60 percent bc- tween 1940 and 1960 but even in this instance, the urbanized area fringe (within and outside the city) grew by 386 percent in population. An example of the expansion in population of the urban fringe is illustrated by figure 1.2, which shows the popu- lation in the fringe of the Cleveland Standard Metropolitan Sta- tistical Arca (SMSA) increasing from 0.55 million persons in 1950 in an area of 613 square miles to an estimated 1.19 mil- lion persons in an area of 1,138 square miles in 1965. Behind these aggregate figures lies a complex shifting of populations which has helped to intensify commutation prob- lems. In the large, older urban arcas, and in some of the newer oncs as well, a significant portion of the middle class, white- collar population has moved to the suburbs. At the same time, large numbers of predominantly unskilled, rural, nonwhite migrants moved into the older central cities, as indicated in figure 1.2. The nonwhite population of central cities has al- most doubled from 1950 to 1966, while the white population decreased. Finally, white collar and administrative jobs have increased in central city areas; but many industrial and un- skilled job opportunities have moved from the cities to the suburbs.8
