Joe DiStefano

Principal

Joe DiStefano leads the regional and large-scale master planning team at Calthorpe Associates. He is an urban planner with more than 15 years of experience in land use and transportation planning and policy at the regional, local, and corridor scales. His work and research spans from federal and local transportation and land use planning and policy to transit-oriented design and implementation strategies. He also specializes in the relationship between land use and climate and energy impacts. Joe and his team are developing cutting-edge scenario development and modeling tools to express the varying impacts of development and infrastructure investment choices at a variety of scales. The models are being deployed through the Vision California process and the Envision Bay Area project, and provided critical and timely information in California’s SB 375 greenhouse gas target-setting process. The models are also being calibrated and customized for use in international settings. Mr. DiStefano has led a variety of projects, including:

• Vision California - (California, USA)
• Envision Bay Area - (San Francisco Bay Area, CA, USA)
• Louisiana Speaks - (Louisiana, USA)
• Fresno Southeast Growth Area (SEGA) Specific Plan - (Fresno, CA, USA)
• Envision Utah - (Salt Lake City Region, Utah, USA)
• Southern California COMPASS - (Los Angeles Region, CA, USA)

Prior to joining Calthorpe Associates, Mr. DiStefano worked with the Surface Transportation Policy Project (STPP) in Washington D.C., where he helped prepare the Smart Growth Toolkit, a decision-makers’ manual to aid growth management and smart growth practices at the local and regional level. His work at STPP culminated in the publication of the book Five Years of Progress, which examines state and local projects funded and/or made possible by the Federal Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act of 1991 (ISTEA).

At a transportation consulting firm in Los Angeles, Mr. DiStefano worked with the Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportation Authority and the California Department of Transportation on studies of the Metrolink commuter rail system and the Metro Rail subway and light rail lines.

Joe DiStefano received his Masters in City and Regional Planning at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and a Bachelor of Arts in History from the University of California at Berkeley.