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vii ABSTRACT Across the country, metropolitan regions have continued to grow outward from their traditional urban cores. Populations in former city centers continue to decline while surrounding suburbs are often showing substantial growth. Furthermore, many traditional suburbs have become ethnically and economically diverse communities with extensive commercial and employment opportunities. What we are seeing today is a pattern with older suburbs mimicking former urban centers while newer suburbs develop, stretching the metropolitan regions even further. This study is designed to advance the research initiated in TCRP Report 55 (available online at http://trb.org/news/blurb_detail.asp?id=2563). What the industry is beginning to understand since the previous research is that there are no simple solutions for serving the suburban environs. Rather, a complex mix of conditions exist which lead to success and which need to be measured by reasoned expectations. This includes defining effective metrics of performance, as well as the institutional, organizational and financial characteristics which also support achievement. This study produced a guide on suburban transit service with a refined view of the suburban environment. The guide has been published separately as TCRP Report 116 (available online at http://trb.org/news/blurb_detail.asp?id=6525). We have reviewed services within a regional context, not looking at service types as stand alone features off the menu of transit services. The research recognizes that the provision of service is complicated by both the physical features of a region and also by the institutional characteristics which make up each transit system.
