2008. “The role of urban form in shaping access to opportunities.” Journal of Transport and Land Use 1(2):89–119

Abstract: is study employs a suite of accessibility indices to investigate whether American cities are designed in such a way that the locations of goods, services, and other opportunities favor certain socio-economic groups over others. In so doing, the study’s ëndings contribute to pressing policy issues such as social exclusion. Seven counties of the Louisville, Kentucky-Indiana MSA serve as the study area for the investigation. Data are derived from three sources: a geocoded travel diary survey, a geocoded database of all opportunities in the area, and a database of shortest-path travel times. Accessibility indices (gravity, cumulative opportunity, and proximity) are deëned for 34 types of opportunities: four aggregate types and 30 disag-gregate types representing the 10 most popular destinations for trips for each of the ërst three aggregate types. ese indices are computed for households that responded to the trip-diary survey. Non-parametric Wilcoxon rank sum tests are used to compare the levels of accessibil-ity experienced by ëve socio-economic groups (i.e., individuals residing in rural communities, individuals residing in single-person and single-parent households, individuals residing in low-income households, women, and the elderly) to counterpart groups. Except for individuals residing in rural areas, the ëndings of this study indicate that groups conventionally consid-ered to be at risk of social exclusion are not disadvantaged in terms of accessibility