Lincoln Institute of Land Policy

About: Lincoln Institute of Land Policy is a nonprofit organization based out in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Property tax & Urban planning. The organization has 45 authors who have published 92 publications receiving 1506 citations.

Physical Activity and Environment Research in the Health Field: Implications for Urban and Transportation Planning Practice and Research

Abstract: This article reviews literature fromthe health field investigating the characteristics of environments that support or hinder physical activity. This literature shows that physical activity is associated with objective and subjective measures of accessibility to recreational facilities and local destinations, as well as with neighborhood safety and visual quality. Walking and biking emerge as prominent forms of physical activity and occur primarily in neighborhood streets and public facilities, suggesting that building walkable and bikable communities can address health as well as transportation concerns. The studies help advance environment-behavior research related to urban and transportation planning. They identify behavioral and environmental determinants of physical activity and employ rigorous data collection methods and theoretical frameworks that are new to the planning field. The article concludes that multidisciplinary research will likely yield promising results in identifying the aspects of en...

Dry Laws and Homicides: Evidence from the São Paulo Metropolitan Area

Abstract: We use a difference-in-differences design to estimate the causal impact of the adoption of dry laws in the Sao Paulo Metropolitan Area (SPMA) on violent behaviour. Dry laws cause a 10% reduction in homicides. Similar impacts were found on battery and deaths by car accidents.

Special-District Formation among the States:

Abstract: FORMER HOUSE SPEAKER Tip O’Neil’s adage that “all politics are local” underscores the importance of local governments in American life. The strong role of states in determining what local governments can and cannot do may lead to the assumption that states actually create local governments. For the most part, however, this is not the case. Most state rules delineate the conditions and procedures for creating local units (e.g., cities or special districts) and the powers those units will possess. Basically, state rules create incentives and disincentives for citizens to form local units. When new jurisdictions are formed, the newly created cities or special districts do not simply fill a gap in the existing system of local governments. Instead, new jurisdictions are overlaid atop existing local governments, each with its own set of powers and duties. Increasingly, these new jurisdictions are special districts, a relatively rare form of local government before the 1950s (Stephens and Wikstrom 1998).1 Although the academic debate over whether fragmented or consolidated systems result in better substate governance has been long and lively, it has not led to the development of a theoretical framework that explains why special districts or other forms of local government are more likely to arise in some states Special-District Formation among the States