Effective Practices

Performing Crosstabulations for Environmental Justice Analysis with Census Transportation Planning Package

U.S. Census Bureau

Effective Practice:

Using travel information crosstabulated by relevant race and income categories available with the Census Transportation Planning Package 2000 (CTPP 2000).

Participants:

The CTPP 2000 is a cooperative effort sponsored by the State Departments of Transportation under a pooled funding arrangement with the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO).

The CTPP is expected to be primarily of interest to State Departments of Transportation, Metropolitan Planning Organizations and Transit Service Providers, but other agencies and stakeholders will be interested in this data source including:

• Other Government Agencies
• Non-Governmental Organizations, Private-Sector, Community-Based, Environmental Advocacy
• Academic Institutions and Students
• The Media
• Market Analysts
• The Public

Description

The CTPP is a set of special tabulations from the decennial census designed for transportation planners. The CTPP contains tabulations by place of residence and by place of work, and reports the travel flows between the home and work place. The new CTPP data sets, due to be released in the Spring of 2003, will enable the user to crosstabulate travel patterns by a much greater number of variables than with the 1990 CTPP.

The Census Transportation Planning Package Working Group is currently designing specifications for the software to improve the ease of use and functionality of the CTPP 2000 data. The goal is to have software that provides an easy way for users to access the data, without sophisticated database or geographic information system (GIS) expertise.

The CTPP software will perform three main functions:

• Finding a CTPP table;
• Browsing or examining the data; and
• Saving, printing or exporting the data to other formats.

Users will be guided to prepare a table by selecting options for geography and data. This is a key change from the CTPP 1990 version. To examine CTPP 2000 data with the software, users will be able to view crosstabulated data from a specific table and a targeted geographic area simultaneously without having to export the data into another software package. Options will also be provided to aggregate categories, summarize the data, and export it into such formats as ASCII, GIS, spreadsheets and databases. The CTPP 2000 software will also allow the user to create and print simple maps without a separate GIS or mapping software.

Overall, the CTPP 2000 will increase the number of available variables and enable user-specified crosstabulations. For example, between 6 and 7 variables from the Census long form will be able to be viewed for the same geographic area, helping the user determine even minute details about low-income and minority communities.

Benefits

For the Agencies:

• Pending approval by the Census Bureau's Disclosure Review Board (DRB), the Census Bureau intends to provide data for a detailed geographic summary level for State DOTs and MPOs.
• Agencies will have updated information about place-of-work, means of transportation, private vehicle occupancy, time leaving for work, and
  travel time to work.
• Data users will find that transportation and travel flow data can be crosstabulated by race, ethnicity and income and compared between and within states, metropolitan areas, and communities.

For the Community:

• Communities anticipate being able to use the data to help determine where new transportation systems and other facilities can best serve low-income and minority communities.
• The CTPP is expected to help neighborhood groups assess the potential impacts of transit services on low income and minority populations.

Contacts/Resources

Federal Transit Administration
Eric Pihl
(202) 366-6048
E-mail: eric.pihl@fta.dot.gov

Federal Highway Administration
Elaine Murakami
(202) 366-6971
E-mail: elaine.murakami@fhwa.dot.gov

Federal Highway Administration
Ed Christopher
PH: 708-283-3534
FAX: 708-283-3501
edc@berwyned.com

Census Population Division
Phil Salopek
(301) 457 -2454
E-mail: phillip.a.salopek@census.gov

More information about the CTPP:
CTPP Hotline - (202) 366-5000
http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/planning/census_issues/ctpp/