A description of the work: Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) has been widely studied and introduced as one of the methods to reduce the use of cars in the developed world and some well-development regions in China. However, Changsha, though having one of the fastest metro developments in China’s “non-first-tier cities” with the vast TOD or other similar urban development taken palace, has not been paid much attention in this field. Therefore, in order to fill the gap, this research aims to study the the relationship between people’s travel behaviour and TOD in Changsha. An online survey has been distributed to 239 responses and a binary logistic regression model has been used to identify the factors that lead people to take metro. There are three key findings in this dissertation: 1) High metro stations accessibility is the most significant in attracting people using metro while reducing car ownership and restricting urban car parking also play certain roles, but socio-demographic factors, like gender, age and income, are not significant at this aspect; 2) Increasing land-use diversity and optimising walking and cycling-friendly design can help to boost neighbourhood travel and reducing car usage while increasing density should not help much in this perspective; 3) Only few people have TOD-style daily travel mode and most of them have to put housing prices and layouts first in choosing their current residences, but they are still interested in living in a neighbourhood with TOD attributes. To better achieve TOD in Changsha, urban planners and policymakers should further improve the experience of non-car urban travel, optimise neighbourhood design and planning, and increase the investment in affordable housing to achieve greater freedom of housing choice.

Rapid economic development and urbanisation cause serious traffic problems. To combat the traffic issue, many countries have begun to implement Transit Oriented Development (TOD). TOD can not only promote the development of public transport and alleviate traffic congestion but can also effectively curb urban sprawl and urban land problems, which have an impact on urban social development. This paper will use the city of Chengdu as an example to study the social impact of TOD on urban development.