Contested Seats

10:05 AM EDT on July 24, 2006

A correspondent reports:

Last Thursday it was standing-room-only at the City Council screening of Contested Streets: Breaking NYC Gridlock. Over one hundred people packed the 75-seat hearing room at the invitation of Councilmember John Liu and other members of the City Council transportation committee. The new documentary film, co-produced by Transportation Alternatives and Mark Gorton, is proving popular with city leaders interested in how New York can follow the example of London, Paris and other big cities that are successfully taming traffic. The film features footage of London's congestion charge zone, Paris's new Bus Rapid Transit system, and Copenhagen's network of bike and pedestrian streets.

It is somewhat remarkable to see a powerful outer-borough Councilmember like John Liu on-board with the Livable Streets agenda. You've got to ask yourself: Who is New York City government is against this stuff anyway? Who is defending and maintaing the status quo of maximum traffic gridlock on New York City's streets? Perhaps today's previous post helps answer that question.

Aaron Naparstek

AARON NAPARSTEK is the founder and former editor-in-chief of Streetsblog. Based in Brooklyn, New York, Naparsteks journalism, advocacy and community organizing work has been instrumental in growing the bicycle network, removing motor vehicles from parks, and developing new public plazas, car-free streets and life-saving traffic-calming measures across all five boroughs. Naparstek is the author of "Honku: The Zen Antidote for Road Rage" (Villard, 2003), a book of humorous haiku poetry inspired by the endless motorist sociopathy observed from his apartment window. Prior to launching Streetsblog, Naparstek worked as an interactive media producer, pioneering some of the Web's first music web sites, online communities, live webcasts and social networking services. Naparstek is currently in Cambridge with his wife and two young sons where he is enjoying a Loeb Fellowship at Harvard University's Graduate School of Design. He has a master's degree from Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism and a bachelor's degree from Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. Naparstek is a co-founder of the Park Slope Neighbors community group and the Grand Army Plaza Coalition. You can find more of his work here: http://www.naparstek.com.

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