Overview
Compact development – characterized by high densities, more multi-family residential use, and effective public transit – offers many benefits of interest to the public. This includes improving sustainability, and offering lifestyle advantages, such as greater opportunities for socialization, and easy access to amenities. However, given the recent pandemic, the public may be concerned about living in compact areas that are known to have more frequent and longer person to person interactions than less dense areas. Given this, public support for compact development may change. To study this relationship between perceived concern for COVID-19 transmission and public support for compact development, we conducted a national online survey in April 2022.
Figure 1. Seattle Metropolitan Area in Washington State, USA.
Concern of COVID-19 Transmission Suggests Less Support for Compact Development Policies
Among the respondents, 31.1% expressed great or very great concern, 34.3% expressed moderate concern, and 34.7% expressed no concern or slight concern for COVID-19 transmission. A correlational analysis reveals a relationship between perceived concern and those who live in areas with high density, who use both sources of COVID-19 information, have a lower income, and have higher education.
A lack of public support for compact development suggests preference for more interpersonal space to limit interpersonal interactions in the built environment to reduce the risk of virus transmission. Thus, it is likely that another wave of COVID-19 infections or a new viral infection may result in further decrease in support for compact growth.
These findings are somewhat concerning because the perceived threat of disease transmission associated with compact development is likely to result in decreased public support for such policies. To ensure continued public support, urban policy makers will need to allay public fear of virus transmission in compact built environments by incorporating public health measures for controlling virus transmission in existing and future developments.
Other Determinants of Support for Compact Development Policies:
Structural equation model (SEM) results showed that concern for COVID-19 transmission and single-family residence type were negatively related to support for compact development. Among respondents’ county characteristics, population density had no relationship, but COVID-19 caseload was positively related to support for compact development. Both sources of COVID-19 information were negatively related to support for compact development. Among the demographic variables, age and household income were positively related to support for compact development. No statistically significant relationship was present between either gender or household income, and support for compact development.
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4122786
Funded by: XXX
PI: Himanshu Grover; Co PI: