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DRAFT November 21, 1995 As will be seen in the next section, existing socioeconomic data was also needed • in order to attempt to replicate the use of the existing transportation system. The parameters used to measure socioeconomic conditions for both replication and ultimate forecasts were number of households and acres of commercial, industrial, and recreational land. The first step was to divide the City into a series of Traffic Analysis Zones (TAZs), zones that were and would remain relatively homogeneous in terms of geography, population density and mobility. An attempt was made to use physical boundaries such as major roads, rivers and railroads as TAZ boundaries, since these are the types of features that limit homogeneity between areas. Figure 2 is a map of the City of Elk River with TAZ boundaries as designated for the transportation planning process. The TAZ map was overlaid upon a map showing block numbers from the 1990 U.S. Census. Population and housing unit counts by block were converted to population and number of dwelling units in each TAZ in 1990. Annual compilation of new dwelling units by neighborhood provided by the City were used to expand the number of households in each TAZ to 1992 numbers. All existing and proposed commercial, industrial and recreational areas were outlined on the March 1992 revision of the City Zoning Map. Discussion with • City staff led to a "percent presently occupied" designation for each area. Acres of commercial or industrial land currently in use were calculated by multiplying the total acreage by the percent occupied for each area. The TAZ map was overlaid upon the Zoning Map to allocate commercial, industrial and recreational acreages to TAZs. To estimate ultimate households, total acreage of land ultimately available for residential use was calculated for each TAZ. Average residential lot sizes were estimated for each TAZ based upon its location on the Residential zones density map, figure 4-A in the City of Elk River Growth Management Plan dated August 22. 1988. This map divides the city into three zones: medium density residential, low density residential (minimum lot size 2.5 acres) and agricultural (minimum lot size 10.0 acres). Total acreage was divided by average acres per household to arrive at total households at ultimate development. Ultimate commercial, industrial and recreational acreage was simply a matter of adding up acreage of designated areas on the Zoning Map within each TAZ. Table 1 shows existing and forecasted ultimate population, households, and commercial, industrial and recreational acreage for each TAZ. This is the basic data used to proceed into the travel demand modeling process. • CTP-230.156 -3- 230-156-80