Urban Design
Streetsblog Basics
Rocky Road
Cycling intimately acquaints you with every bump, slice, crease, divot, ledge, ripple and of course pothole in a street, because not noticing means you might get thrown off your steed into bone-breaking and life ending car traffic.
December 19, 2007
What Makes a Place Walkable?
Bikes at Work has an interesting database that uses census numbers to show how many people walk to their jobs in cities, towns and villages across the US. A quick search for the highest walk-to-work locations for towns with over 1000 people yields the following results:
December 14, 2007
Reinventing Grand Army Plaza: What Are Your Ideas?
The Grand Army Plaza Coalition (GAPCo) and the Design Trust for Public Space are launching an "Ideas Competition" called Reinventing Grand Army Plaza. Building on GAPCo's on-going effort to re-envision this historic Brooklyn crossroads, the Ideas Competition will solicit new, creative proposals for Grand Army Plaza's re-design. Top submissions will be exhibited in the summer of 2008 at the Brooklyn Public Library or the Brooklyn Museum of Art.
December 13, 2007
Blinding Headlights Make Part of West Side Greenway Unusable
Blinding headlights make cycling difficult on a mile-long uptown stretch of the Hudson River Greenway.
December 12, 2007
New Grand Army Plaza Concept is “Brilliantly Obvious”
In the most recent issue of the Architect's Newspaper, Editor-in-Chief William Menking has some very enthusiastic things to say about the Grand Army Plaza Coalition's project, Rethinking Grand Army Plaza (download the proposal here) which was recently awarded a 2007-2008 Design Trust fellowship. Menking writes:
December 11, 2007
Manhattan Bridge Bike & Ped Improvements Nearing Completion
It looks like the street redesign around the Manhattan entrance of the Manhattan Bridge is nearing completion. Considering that Transportation Alternatives has been pushing for these fixes for years, that was pretty fast. DOT presented its plan to the local Community Board, to unanimous approval, in July; sketched out the lines on the street in August; and here we are.
December 11, 2007
Inom Tullarna: The Ancient Roots of Congestion Pricing
If you're a New York City transportation policy geek but you've had enough of congestion pricing realpolitik and can't bear to sit through another Kathy Wylde vs. Walter McCaffrey slugfest, Monday evening's New School panel may be just the ticket. Equal Tolls, Unequal Access? Congestion Pricing and Its Historical Antecedents brings together an unusual group of academic experts and urban design practitioners to examine urban boundary-making through the ages. New School professor Gustav Peebles has written the following article for Streetsblog:
December 7, 2007
Replace Penn Station Rats’ Warren With a Pedestrian Boulevard
Penn Station concourse under West 33rd Street
December 7, 2007
New Bleecker Bike Lane Already Blocked by Parked Cars
Streetsblog reader Dave Goldberg sends along a camera phone photo of the freshly striped Bleecker Street bike lane, shot between LaGuardia Place and Mercer Street. Goldberg notes:
November 28, 2007