Executive Summary: Boston Regional Challenge
This report analyzes the combined costs of housing and transportation for neighborhoods, cities, and towns throughout a Boston regional study area that extends south to Providence, Rhode Island; west to Worcester, Massachusetts; and northeast to Dover, New Hampshire. Our analysis finds that the typical household in the study area spends upwards of $22,000 annually on housing, which represents roughly 35 percent of the median household income ($68,036). With transportation costs for the typical household reaching nearly $12,000 annually, the combined costs of housing and transportation account for roughly 54 percent of the typical household’s income. Similar studies conducted for the San Francisco Bay Area and the Washington, D.C., region have found average housing and transportation cost burdens of 59 percent and 47 percent, respectively.
Housing costs in the Boston area are much higher than national averages and exceed costs in many of the largest metropolitan areas in the country. Average housing costs for owners and renters are highest in many of the cities and towns inside Route 128, including the city of Boston, and between Route 128 and Interstate 495 (I-495) in communities typically referred to as MetroWest.
Housing prices outside of these high-cost communities are indeed lower, but transportation costs are often higher, reducing and sometimes even eliminating the savings made possible by lower housing prices. This appears to be particularly true for individual households that choose to move farther from work in order to reduce their housing costs. Long and frequent trips in an automobile—whether back and forth to work or school, for everyday errands, or for entertainment—can stress a working family’s budget, can cause countless hours to be wasted behind the wheel, and can take a serious environmental toll on the region. As this report shows, areas that are characterized by good access to public transit, jobs, and nearby amenities not only have the potential to keep combined housing and transportation costs in check, but they also can lower greenhouse gas emissions and provide for a more environmentally sustainable future.
Leaders in the Boston area have long recognized that to maintain and grow the regional economy, households on all rungs of the income ladder must be able to find affordable housing options. Without such opportunities, the labor pool needed to power the economy may have no choice but to look for work in other metropolitan areas where housing is less expensive. But affordable housing by itself is not sufficient if its location requires families to experience long, frequent, and expensive car trips. A focus on the combined burdens of housing and transportation costs highlights the importance of strategies such as building mixed-income housing near public transit and job centers and zoning for a mix of uses to reduce the need to drive long distances to meet basic needs. Such strategies help keep costs low for working families, strengthen the economy, and lower the carbon emissions of current and future generations.
