{"416831":{"#nid":"416831","#data":{"type":"news","title":"When Target Comes to Town: How a Big-Box Retailer Changed Davis, California","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp class=\u0022p1\u0022\u003EWhen Target proposed opening a 137,000 square foot store in Davis, California, some residents worried their city\u2019s culture and economy was headed for disaster.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp class=\u0022p1\u0022\u003EIt was to be the first-ever \u201cbig-box\u201d retailer in a city known for its very strict planning guidelines that had kept such stores out of the community. And its arrival would lure shoppers away from locally owned downtown stores, they reasoned, not to mention violate the city\u2019s sustainability efforts and culture.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp class=\u0022p1\u0022\u003EBut that doesn\u2019t seem to have happened, according to a study by the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering\u2019s \u003Ca href=\u0022http:\/\/cee.gatech.edu\/people\/faculty\/6251\/overview\u0022\u003EPatricia Mokhtarian\u003C\/a\u003E and colleagues at the University of California, Davis, and Arizona State University. \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.jtlu.org\/index.php\/jtlu\/article\/view\/336\u0022\u003ETheir work\u003C\/a\u003E is highlighted in the \u003Ca href=\u0022http:\/\/www.accessmagazine.org\/articles\/spring-2015\/the-first-big-box-store-in-davis\/\u0022\u003Espring 2015 issue of ACCESS Magazine\u003C\/a\u003E.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp class=\u0022p1\u0022\u003E\u201cTarget did not mean the end of life as we know it in Davis,\u201d they wrote. \u201cThe store added to the shopping options available to residents, and it lowered overall greenhouse gas emissions without seriously harming downtown.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp class=\u0022p1\u0022\u003EWhat Mokhtarian and her co-authors found in surveying residents before and after the Target opened was that people did shop there, but not necessarily at the expense of downtown stores. And since they weren\u2019t traveling nearly 18 miles outside of Davis to shop at other stores as often, they were actually driving less each month.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp class=\u0022p1\u0022\u003E\u201cAfter Target opened, average monthly shopping [vehicle miles traveled] declined from 98.4 to 79.5 per person, a drop of nearly 19 miles per month per adult age 25 or over,\u201d Mokhtarian and her colleagues noted. \u201cThis decline translates into a savings of over 7.5 million [miles traveled] per year, reducing CO2 emissions by 2.0 metric tons, equivalent to the total CO2 emissions from 589 passenger cars for a year.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp class=\u0022p1\u0022\u003EThose reductions did mean people took fewer trips people to downtown retailers after the Target store opened, but it was a relatively small drop, the researchers said \u2014 nearly four trips over the course of a year.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp class=\u0022p1\u0022\u003E\u201cGiven the mix of stores downtown, most shopping trips for Target-type items were not to downtown even before Target opened,\u201d the researchers wrote. \u201cIn other words, Target is not a good substitute for downtown shopping.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp class=\u0022p1\u0022\u003ERead more about the findings in the \u003Ca href=\u0022http:\/\/www.accessmagazine.org\/articles\/spring-2015\/the-first-big-box-store-in-davis\/\u0022\u003Efull ACCESS Magazine article\u003C\/a\u003E.\u003C\/p\u003E","summary":null,"format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":"","field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EPatricia Mokhtarian, professor in Civil and Environmental Engineering, looks at how the addition of a big box store reduced carbon emissions in Davis, California.\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"Patricia Mokhtarian, professor in Civil and Environmental Engineering, looks at how the addition of a big box store reduced carbon emissions in Davis, California."}],"uid":"27469","created_gmt":"2015-06-19 14:50:07","changed_gmt":"2016-10-08 03:18:41","author":"Kristen Bailey","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","dateline":{"date":"2015-06-19T00:00:00-04:00","iso_date":"2015-06-19T00:00:00-04:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"hg_media":{"416811":{"id":"416811","type":"image","title":"Patricia Mokhtarian","body":null,"created":"1449254258","gmt_created":"2015-12-04 18:37:38","changed":"1475895155","gmt_changed":"2016-10-08 02:52:35","alt":"Patricia Mokhtarian","file":{"fid":"202563","name":"mokhtarian-pat_v.jpg","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/mokhtarian-pat_v_0.jpg","image_full_path":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/mokhtarian-pat_v_0.jpg","mime":"image\/jpeg","size":140811,"path_740":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/images\/mokhtarian-pat_v_0.jpg?itok=ZuwVtXZN"}},"416821":{"id":"416821","type":"image","title":"Target in Davis, California","body":null,"created":"1449254258","gmt_created":"2015-12-04 18:37:38","changed":"1475895155","gmt_changed":"2016-10-08 02:52:35","alt":"Target in Davis, California","file":{"fid":"202564","name":"davis_target_oct_2009_davis_wiki_o.jpg","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/davis_target_oct_2009_davis_wiki_o_0.jpg","image_full_path":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/davis_target_oct_2009_davis_wiki_o_0.jpg","mime":"image\/jpeg","size":88207,"path_740":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/images\/davis_target_oct_2009_davis_wiki_o_0.jpg?itok=Kdspfeiw"}}},"media_ids":["416811","416821"],"related_links":[{"url":"http:\/\/ce.gatech.edu\/","title":"School of Civil and Environmental Engineering"}],"groups":[{"id":"1316","name":"Green Buzz"}],"categories":[{"id":"129","name":"Institute and Campus"}],"keywords":[{"id":"15275","name":"carbon emissions"},{"id":"4776","name":"civil and environmental engineering"},{"id":"7454","name":"CO2"},{"id":"456","name":"retail"},{"id":"166890","name":"sustainability"},{"id":"3005","name":"target"}],"core_research_areas":[],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022mailto:josh.stewart@ce.gatech.edu\u0022\u003EJosh Stewart\u003C\/a\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003ECivil and Environmental Engineering\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"email":[],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}