College dorm trip generation?

[ACtrafficengr]

A tech college near me is adding several dorms, using trip numbers from a new dorm for a two-year college in the next city over. I have questions about comparability of the student population, and accuracy of trip generation based on a single data set.

I'm assuming that ITE code 550 includes faculty, staff and off-campus student housing, so that doesn't apply here. Does anyone here have any info sources that may help?

Thanks.

 

[IRstuff]

is the tech college also two-year? Is there a substantial difference in distance between the dorms and the school buildings? How new are the existing dorms and how much data is it?

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[ACtrafficengr]

I should have said polytechnic university. It will have grad students. The dorms will be within walking distance of the tech classrooms and labs, but I expect students to also take classes at the general purpose university about 1/2 mile away.

The community college dorm is a few years old, so I expect the data is still current. The consultant didn't supply the data, only the trip gen rate they derived from it.

Which brings up another topic. Is it just me, or are trip generation numbers based on a single variable not very useful? Including some surrogate for walkability would probably tame the scatter. Mode share of customers going to a Wal-Mart in Manhattan, NY would surely have a different than one in Manhattan, Kansas.

 

[IRstuff]

Is the GP uni a requirement, or merely an elective? When I was at school, we could take classes at another, more gender-balanced school, but probably less than 10% of the students ever took classes there. The distance was a factor, but today, there may be other factors, including availability/ease of parking, availability/ease of public transportation, likelihood of hoofing or biking.

While I might somewhat agree about the lack of diversity in data sources, if you only had Manhattan, NY, you'd know there would not likely be another place that's a worse case. "Accuracy" is an illusory goal, I think.

How does the data compare with ITE common purpose estimates like:

http://www.ci.troutdale.or.us/publicworks/documents/itelanduselist.pdf

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