Title: Under What Circumstances Will Land Value Capture Work to Finance Public Transit? Based on Case Studies of Hong Kong, Tokyo and New York City
Description: Public transportation is of great importance to urban development. It largely defines the way a city grows. However, transportation systems are complicated and require large sunk investment. Apart from traditional funding methods such as general property tax, one alternative is land value capture, which is to cover the transit development and operation cost by capturing part of the value created by transit improvement. The thesis aims to find out under what circumstances land value will capture work to finance public transit. It examines three cases where land value capture is applied: Hong Kong’s Rail Plus Property Program, Tokyo’s Land Readjustment Scheme, and New York City’s Tax Increment Financing (TIF) practice. Both Hong Kong and Tokyo achieve success in applying value capture mechanism, while TIF in New York City may have potential problems. Based on the cases, the thesis points out the important elements for value capture to work: high population density and car independence environment, long-term master plan with flexible zoning in transit areas, collaboration or integration between land use and transportation institutions.