Regional Job Access and Reverse Commute Planning: NORTH JERSEY TRANSPORTATION PLANNING AUTHORITY AND NEW JERSEY WORKFIRST PROGRAM PDF Version for Printing

Introduction

The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA) replaced the former Federal welfare program with the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) program. A hallmark of the legislation was imposed time limits and mandatory work requirements for welfare recipients. Commonly known as the welfare-to-work (WtW) program, TANF's goals include reducing welfare rolls and providing job skills for welfare recipients and opportunities for steady employment.

Secretary of Transportation Rodney Slater has stated, "Transportation is the to in welfare-to-work." The comment recognizes that welfare recipients often face unique challenges in searching for jobs and maintaining employment. In addition to disadvantages in education, work skills, and training, welfare recipients often lack access to vehicles or housing served by public transportation with which to reach most entry-level and service sector jobs. Estimates are that approximately 75 percent of welfare recipients nationwide live in central cities or rural areas, whereas two-thirds of the suitable job opportunities are in the suburbs. For welfare-recipients to successfully meet the challenge of balancing work and family responsibilities, necessary support services, such as child care and shopping, must be readily accessible. Traditional public transportation services typically do not address these unique commuter demands. Inadequate transportation services are a barrier to the success of the welfare-to-work program.

The Transportation Equity Act (TEA-21) of 1998 included the Job Access and Reverse Commute Program to address the mobility challenges facing welfare recipients and low-income persons. This grant program requires States to develop solutions collaboratively with Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs), local and regional transportation agencies, and social service providers. Partnerships are essential to the success of WtW because reliable access to jobs involves more than merely providing transportation to and from work. In implementing this program, the Federal government acknowledged MPOs as good administrators that already coordinate a wide variety of regional planning agencies.

WorkFirst New Jersey

The State of New Jersey implemented its welfare program, WorkFirst New Jersey (WFNJ), following passage of PRWORA. Like the Federal initiative, WFNJ emphasizes moving aid recipients off welfare rolls and into steady employment.

In 1997, the New Jersey Department of Human Services (NJDHS) studied the State's bus transportation network for its ability to help opportunities for cooperative efforts, or linkages, among New Jersey's 13 northern counties. The plan suggested coordinating county-based or regional services and implemented a method to evaluate and prioritize future job access and reverse commute projects.

These two New Jersey initiatives combined GIS analysis and post-census data to address the fundamental question of how States and regional transportation agencies can meet the transportation-related needs of low-income families seeking to join the workforce. While the two reports have somewhat different goals and reach slightly different conclusions, they provide practical examples for transportation planners and decision makers. The reports illustrate how an easily reproducible method can identify and begin to address the service requirements of a transit-dependent population.

The Region

The NJTPA region encompasses the 13 northernmost counties in New Jersey (see map, page 1) and is home to most of New Jersey's largest cities, including Jersey City, Newark, New Brunswick, Elizabeth, and Paterson. An extensive highway network and large public bus and commuter rail systems serve the area. For several decades, however, employment growth in the traditional urban centers -- including the older "closer-in" suburbs -- has not kept pace with the more rapidly growing suburban corridors that possess substantial land area for greenfield developments and enjoy the regional access provided by an extensive Federal, State, and county highway network.

The 1990 U.S. Census reveals a concentration of poverty (potential WFNJ participants) in the NJTPA region urban centers -- 19.5 percent of all persons below the poverty line compared to 4.8 percent for

the rest of the NJTPA region. Similarly, the unemployment rate reported for the urban centers was well above the rest of the region.

Welfare-to-work participants must have reliable transportation if they are to realize the economic independence envisioned in Federal and State welfare reform legislation. State agencies and MPOs face the daunting challenge of understanding and addressing those transportation-related needs. GIS is a powerful tool for identifying transit routes responsive to the housing patterns, support services, and jobs available to WtW clients. Crucial barriers to mobility can be identified with the careful use of appropriate data and GIS methods. This analytical phase benefits greatly when the process encourages interagency coordination between MPOs, State and local transportation agencies, social service agencies, and workforce programs.

The NJDHS sponsored the WorkFirst study to examine whether New Jersey's existing bus system could help a significant percent of WorkFirst participants reenter the workforce. The study combined current data -- not just census data released every decade -- with GIS applications. The methods employed are not unique, but they are reproducible and suitable for assisting in public policy decision making.

The study's hypothesis is that New Jersey's public bus network can provide an important link between WorkFirst client residences and a variety of destinations. Four different post-census data sets were collected to construct an analysis that tests this hypothesis.

These databases were mapped and overlain using GIS software. Mapping these data was not always easy and overcoming inconsistencies often required several iterations of data matching (for example, geo-coding) between maps and data sets. The report's authors illustrate methods for ensuring accuracy and data integrity -- often a complicated process. New Jersey Transit provided bus route maps to overlay the data maps. The study addressed comprehensive bus routes and fixed routes (such as local, county, and Interstate), as well as the NJ Wheels Program -- an innovative program of feeder transit connections that fill missing links to existing transit stations, park and rides, and circulator services to area stores and restaurants.

The relative proximity of welfare recipients, child care facilities, employment training centers, and employers in relation to transportation services is the key access concern. Choosing analytical tools that work for you will depend on local circumstances and resources. The tools may be as simple as sticking pushpins in a wall map or as advanced as using GIS. The analytical goal is to understand how available transportation services need to be improved or can improve accessibility.

Challenge of Job Access:
Moving Toward a Solution, U.S. DOT

The GIS software was further used to create buffers or boundaries at set distances around the bus routes. Study authors assumed that potential transit riders would be reluctant to walk more than about one-half mile (the average person can walk one-half mile in about 10 minutes). Using this assumption, preliminary spatial analysis techniques were applied to measure the percentage of client residences, training centers, child care and family day care facilities, and potential employers within walking distance of the transit routes. Table 1 presents data on distance from transit routes.

The WorkFirst study concludes that the existing New Jersey bus system is generally capable of serving WorkFirst client needs. Research indicates that nearly 94 percent of welfare families statewide live within one-half mile of a transit route, and that 85 percent of potential employers are within one-half mile of transit. The relatively concentrated patterns of poverty in New Jersey, as well as State's overall population density, afford opportunities to improve transit services. The WorkFirst study provides an interesting comparison to another recent study of the Atlanta metropolitan area, a less-densely populated area where only 50 percent of welfare recipients and only 44 percent of entry-level jobs are within one-half mile of public transportation.

Although WorkFirst study findings suggest the potential for enhancing job access, the study is cautious about its analytical limitations and points to the next steps required to meet the unique needs of this ridership segment:

• A more thorough study would include bus hours of operation, frequency of service, and pickup/discharge site data.

• There is no guarantee that jobs near transit routes will be appropriate -- or available -- for WFNJ clients.

• The study must factor in the need to make multiple trips because numerous trips and stops can considerably lower the probability of finding all necessary services within a reasonable travel distance.

With its careful analysis and balanced presentation of findings, the WorkFirst study is a useful preliminary tool for identifying the transportation needs of WtW clients. Because the study is explicit about the need to implement more planning at the local level, by county-level administrators, NJ Transit, and other transit providers, the study provided a springboard for more intensive study of transit services. The New Jersey Department of Transportation (NJDOT) and the NJDHS have committed resources for county transportation coordination planning, prepared a Transit Training video, and devised a promotional incentive, Get A Job, Get A Ride, which provides any WFNJ participant -- who's working or in training -- 1 free month of New Jersey Transit public transportation.

In July 1998, the NJTPA received an FTA Job Access Planning Challenge Grant to coordinate preparation of community transportation plans throughout the northern New Jersey region. Each county had to develop a Community Transportation Plan that promoted and assisted the WFNJ program by addressing the need for job-access services.

The NJTPA used the grant to examine current data sources and conduct GIS analysis techniques, similar to the work described in the WorkFirst study. This information complemented the findings of the individual Community Transportation Plans. The resulting Regional Job Access & Reverse Commute Transportation Plan includes several work activities that:

• Identify the current location of TANF recipients (see table 2).

• Map poverty and employment concentrations.

• Illustrate the prospective client travel patterns.

• Screen for specific projects proposed in individual County Community Transportation Plans that successfully establish regional linkages -- projects that link particularly well with each other.

• Outline procedures for prioritizing and selecting proposed projects. Once priority programs and projects are identified, they are then forwarded to the FTA for approval for funding.

The NJTPA devoted significant time and monetary resources to identify and document the needs and patterns of welfare recipients' lives. This effort provided an important foundation for interpreting GIS data because it provided information about welfare recipients' education levels, travel and expenditure trends, and emerging suburban and urban employment spatial patterns.

Using NJDHS and U.S. Census data in GIS applications, the NJTPA developed a comprehensive profile of the NJTPA region. The spatial examination of the residential, work, and transit links data helped the NJTPA identify strategic regional linkages capable of connecting transit-dependent populations to job opportunities.

The NJTPA plan concludes with clear recommendations as to what the region's proposed programs should include and how they will be prioritized. Communicating the method of prioritization is an important element of the plan as it sets the ground-rules -- the expectations and the criteria -- for communities to develop their local plans.

Effective Environmental Justice Practices

The WorkFirst Study demonstrates how post-census data incorporated into GIS mapping can facilitate a better understanding of the needs of an often highly transit-dependent population:

• With the cooperation of the State's health and social services agencies, it is possible to compile highly relevant data on the welfare recipients, the location of training centers for welfare recipients, and licensed child care facilities.
• The State's labor department maintains important post-census, administrative records data about business establishments and also employment and payroll (ES-202) data. Restrictions and limitations on the use of this data can often be overcome when there is a compelling public purpose.
• GIS mapping of post-census data provides a spatially sensitive technique for exploring the unique transportation needs of welfare recipients as well as the opportunity to match transit and para-transit services to these needs.
• The report assessed barriers to job access for welfare recipients (e.g., the fact that bus service was inadequate in certain counties) that could be solved by specific policy initiatives. It also identified the uncertainties in the analysis that require further research.

The NJTPA Regional Job Access and Reverse Commute Transportation Plan also demonstrates several effective practices important for integrating environmental justice principles into transportation planning:

• The study used the Job Access Planning Challenge Grant to focus upon the crucial problem of job access, which disproportionately affects low-income and, often, minority populations. Developing successful transit solutions that address this problem directly benefits often overlooked communities and is consistent with national social policy focused on eliminating barriers for all who need to work.

• The study illustrates how cooperative relationships with Federal, State, and local partners, and collaboration between State labor departments and social service agencies can effectively leverage resources to solve problems. The diverse expertise and resources tapped facilitated identification and use of multiple data sets, disclosed critical gaps in transit services, and explored needed operational services and capital equipment purchases. Each primary participant made complementary contributions to the planning process. The Federal government helped to communicate the broad environmental justice principles and goals as well as made funds available. The MPO and State-level agencies provided regional coordination and administration and were significant resources for data. The counties and other local partners, as well as the social service agencies, contributed intimate knowledge about local job-access and transportation obstacles, and they were able to suggest specifically targeted solutions.

• The NJTPA plan also demonstrates how post-census data can be combined with GIS applications to provide an analytical and presentation tool. Data-based maps bring a new perspective to the job-access problem. GIS methods enabled planners to better understand poverty and welfare spatial patterns and make more informed decisions about transit service needs.

• MPOs can provide the necessary forum for developing close partnerships with local communities affected in the transportation planning process. In this case, NJTPA coordinated the plans of New Jersey's northern and central counties to ensure identification of regional deficiencies and opportunities. By soliciting the participation of many counties and local agencies, the NJTPA successfully integrated environmental justice practices by ensuring that the planning process considered the concerns of all the constituents.

We have to stop thinking like transportation organizations, labor organizations, or human resource organizations and start thinking like organizations that are here to provide services -- whether it be services for those who are in welfare-to-work, or housewives to work, or husbands to work. We need a holistic approach.

Ernest Maddox
Michigan Department of Employment Security

• Ensure Data Quality. To be a valuable resource, the data sources must be current and accurate. Different States, municipalities, and social service agencies collect and maintain data of differing qualities. It is important to fully check sources and evaluate the limits and applicability of the data because the quality of data factors significantly in the ability to perform valid analyses.

• Identify Qualitative and Primary Data Sets. Important limitations of secondary data sets must be overcome to design transit and para-transit services that accurately address the travel and support-service needs of its target population -- in this case, WtW participants. Certain types of needs can only be identified through more direct forms of outreach and communication with social services, transportation providers, potential employers, and eligible participants. Traditional market research tools such as focus groups, surveys, and interviews can complement other forms of regular public involvement to reveal these needs and preferences. Designing responsive transit services requires understanding the needs and patterns of multiple trips or trip chains in various communities. Similarly, many entry-level jobs require evening or weekend work, which may require more extensive research into time-of-day and day-of-week dimensions to create responsive transit services.

• Establish Effective Partnerships. Transportation planning is more than a desktop exercise, and the transportation decision maker must collaborate with a diverse set of stakeholders in order to select, prioritize, and, ultimately operate effective job-access and reverse-commute services and routes. The process depends upon partnerships among members of the transportation and education and training communities.

• Recognize Crucial Resource Needs and Devise Sustainable Program. The ultimate measure of success, of course, is not a well-received transportation plan, rather it is the number of persons who successfully enter the workforce because transportation services respond to their needs. This ultimate success is achieved only with effective partnerships, careful strategic and operational planning and adequate resources -- financial, technical, legal, operational. Funding for job access and reverse commute programs is clearly one factor necessary for success. The State of New Jersey provides matching funds under its NJ Transportation Innovative Fund, which are matched with Federal Labor Welfare to Work Grants and/or the FTA's Job Access and Reverse Commute Grants. The National Transit Resource Center has amassed a database of Federal funding opportunities for transportation and mobility partnerships that includes, but is not limited to, programs traditionally used by community transportation systems. The primary resource for this information was the Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance. From this directory, planners identified more than 100 programs within 20 different Federal agencies.

Lessons Learned

Making employment accessible to WFNJ participants is an ongoing challenge, but the plans and reports described above can help relevant agencies achieve that goal. The process of developing these plans has related some important lessons about environmental justice, data analysis, and planning:

• Many State and Federal agencies compile post-census data, which can be invaluable resources for analyzing demographics, needs and transit destination locations for target populations, such as WorkFirst participants.

• GIS applications are tools that provide a method for analyzing data two dimensionally. The spatial representation of data and patterns holds significant benefits, especially when examining linkages between regions.

• GIS applications are readily available and user-friendly in that they can be used by a variety of transportation organizations, government agencies, or social services.

• The limitations of GIS data and analysis must be recognized and incorporated into a report's conclusions.

• A regional planning agency, such as an MPO, can be instrumental in providing resources, guidance, and links with smaller jurisdictions. Such arrangements foster opportunities for broader planning solutions and often provide an opportunity to engage a more diverse set of participants.

• Effective use of quantitative tools (like GIS) requires an understanding of the qualitative characteristics of the populations and regions for which an agency plans. Agencies must be sensitive to the entire context in which welfare recipients live, including gender, marital status, education, training, and more. Post-census data alone does not present the entire picture and should not be depended upon to completely define the problem or to build solutions.

References

Richard K. Brail, Assessment of Public Transportation Opportunities for WorkFirst New Jersey Participants. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy, Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, July 1997.

Laura Leete and Neil Bania, Assessment of the Geographic Distribution and Skill Requirements of Jobs in the Cleveland-Akron Metropolitan Area (Report No. WP-95-04), Cleveland: Case Western University, Center for Urban Poverty and Social Change, 1995.

Employment Transportation Toolkit, Community Transportation Association of America, cited May 2000. www.ctaa.org/ntrc/atj/toolkit/toolkit_full.pdf

Regional Job Access & Reverse Commute Transportation Plan, New Jersey Transportation Planning Authority, Inc., October 1999.

Regional Transportation Plan for Northern New Jersey, Appendix I, North Jersey Transportation Planning Authority, Fall 1995.

David S. Sawicki and M. Moody, "Developing Transportation Alternatives for Welfare Recipients Moving to Work," Journal of the American Planning Association, Vol. 66., No. 3, Summer 2000.

The Challenge of Job Access, Moving Toward a Solution, U.S. Department of Transportation, Federal Highway Administration and Federal Transit Administration, Washington, DC, cited May 2000. http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/reports/challeng.htm

National Personal Transportation Survey, 1990. http://www-cta.ornl.gov/npts/1990/index.html

Community Transportation Association

National Transit Resource Center: www.ctaa.org/ntrc/atj
Publications: www.ctaa.org/ntrc/ctap/pubs

Federal Transit Agency welfare-to-work
www.fta.dot.gov/

New Jersey Department of Transportation WorkFirst
www.state.nj.us/transportation/workforce

North Jersey Transportation Planning Authority
http://njtapa.njit.edu

Poverty Center at Case Western University Job Access Project
http://povertycenter.cwru.edu/jobaccess/cupsc.htm

Jeremy Colangelo-Bryan
Director, Workforce and Community Transportation
NJDOT
One Penn Plaza East, 4th Floor
Newark, NJ 07105
(973) 491-7743
cedojcb@njtransit.state.nj.us

Diane Schonyers
Supervising Research Analyst
Office of Policy and Planning
NJ Dept of Human Services
PO Box 700
Trenton, NJ 08625
(609) 292-1094
dschonyer1@dhs.state.nj.us

David Harris
Manager of Regional Planning
NJTPA
One Newark Center, 17th Floor
Newark, NJ 07102
(973) 639-8400

For more contact information on the NJTPA Regional Job Access & Reverse Commute Transportation Plan, see: http://njtpa.njit.edu.

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