Publication: Transportation Research Part D: Transport and Environment

The concept of accessibility has acquired numerous meanings along multiple dimensions during the century of its evolution. This essay argues for the salience of two dimensions: application-based and definition-based. In its application, accessibility has incorporated positive and normative dimensions which have varied in prominence over time. In its definition, accessibility has varied between a mode of evaluation incorporating measured mobility and proximity, on the one hand, and a predefined market basket of urbanist improvements to transportation and land use systems, on the other. Advocates of the accessibility shift should emphasize both the measured approach to accessibility and accessibility’s normative side.