Live Near Work. Get Paid.

At least that's the formula for some D.C. residents as part of this pilot program:

Perhaps moving to be near your job would be more appealing if it came with $12,000 dollars. Washington, D.C.'s Office of Planning is launching a pilot program called Live Near Your Work that will match up to $6,000 in incentives that businesses offer to employees to move near work or public transit. The new digs just have to be within two miles of work, within half a mile of a Metro station, or within a quarter mile of a "high-quality" bus corridor. The program has $200,000 to give out in total, which isn't much, but that's just for this initial phase.

I've been researching downtown incentives a great deal lately and this strikes me as a very interesting one.  The key will be to quantify the benefits and demonstrate intended resulting actions like use of mass transit or walking/biking.

Chad Emerson.