Brian Taylor

About Brian Taylor

Brian D. Taylor, PhD, FAICP is a Professor of Urban Planning and Public Policy in the Luskin School of Public Affairs and a Research Fellow in the Institute of Transportation Studies at UCLA.  Professor Taylor studies travel behavior and transportation equity, finance, history, and politics.  His recent research examines post-pandemic work and travel behavior, including trends in staying home and going out, working from home, commuting, and public transit use.  He also studies the politics and equity of transportation pricing and finance, including fuel taxes, local option sales taxes for transportation, road pricing, and public transit fare policy; his book on American street and highway finance, The Drive for Dollars: How Fiscal Politics Shaped Urban Freeways and Transformed American Cities, was published in 2023 by Oxford University Press.  At UCLA Professor Taylor teaches courses on transportation, land use, and urban form; public transit and shared mobility; and transportation economics, finance, and policy. 

Areas of Expertise

Transportation policy and planning

Selected Publications

1. Taylor, Brian D., Eric A. Morris, and Jeffrey R. Brown.  2023.  The Drive for Dollars:  How Fiscal Politics Shaped Urban Freeways and Transformed American Cities.  Oxford and New York:  Oxford University Press.  360 pages.
2. Siddiq, Fariba and Brian D. Taylor.  2025.  “Wither the Commute? Analyzing Post-Pandemic Commuting Patterns in the U.S. Transportation Research Interdisciplinary Perspectives,” Transportation Research:  Interdisciplinary Perspectives.
3. Chiu, Phoebe, Yu Hong Hwang, Fariba Siddiq, and Brian D. Taylor.  2025.  “The Evolving Travel and Driving Behaviors of Older U.S. Travelers in the 21st Century,” Transportation Research Record:  Journal of the Transportation Research Board.
4. Morris, Eric, Samuel Speroni, and Brian D. Taylor.  2024.  “Going Nowhere Faster:  Did the COVID-19 Pandemic Accelerate the Trend Toward Staying at Home?”  Journal of the American Planning Association, published online.
5. Speroni, Samuel, Fariba Siddiq, Julene Paul, and Brian D. Taylor.  2024.  “Peaked too soon? Analyzing the shifting patterns of PM peak period travel in Southern California,” Travel Behaviour and Society, 36(July):  100787.
6. Gahbauer, John, Jacob L. Wasserman, Juan Matute, Alejandra Rios, and Brian D. Taylor.  2024.  “Using a Modified Delphi Approach to Explore California’s Possible Transportation and Land Use Futures,” Transportation Research Record:  Journal of the Transportation Research Board, 2678(9):  311-323.
7. Siddiq, Fariba and Brian D. Taylor. 2024.  “A Gendered Perspective on Ride-Hail Use in Los Angeles, USA,” Transportation Research, Interdisciplinary Perspectives, 23, January, 100938.
8. Venegas, Kimberly, Brian D. Taylor, Severin Martinez, and Yu Hong Hwang.  2023.  “Take the High (Volume) Road:  Analyzing the Safety and Speed Effects of High Traffic Volume Road Diets,” Transportation Research Record:  Journal of the Transportation Research Board, 2678(6):  74-86.
9. Morris, Eric A., Samuel Speroni, and Brian D. Taylor. 2023. “Going Nowhere Fast: Are Changing Activity Patterns Behind Falling Personal Travel?” Journal of Transport Geography, 110, June, 103620.
10. King, Hannah, Jacob L. Wasserman, and Brian D. Taylor.  2023(2024).  “Terra Incognita:  California Transit Agency Perspectives on Demand, Service, and Finance in the Age of COVID-19,” Transportation Research Record, 2678(12):  643-655.
11. Wasserman, Jacob and Brian D. Taylor.  2023.  “State of the BART:  Analyzing the Determinants of Bay Area Rapid Transit Use in the 2010s,” Transportation Research, Part A:   Policy and Practice, 172:  103663.
12. Siddiq, Fariba, Jacob Wasserman, Brian D. Taylor, and Samuel Speroni.  2023.  “Transit's Financial Prognosis:  Findings from a Survey of U.S. Transit Systems during the COVID-19 Pandemic," Public Works Management & Policy, 28(4): 393-415.
13. [Note:  Current and former student co-authors are listed in italics]

Recent Courses Taught

Transportation, Land Use, and Urban Form

Public Transit and Shared Mobility

Transportation Economics, Finance, and Policy