MTA Response to Pokey: Traffic Congestion = “Vibrancy”

11:12 AM EDT on October 25, 2006

The MTA's response to the annual Pokey Awards ceremony is always worth looking out for. Rather than using the publicity generated by the event to build political capital for some bus service improvement or another, the Transit Authority's response falls somewhere between defensive and infuriated. This year's statement is a doozy and reminiscent of Mayor Bloomberg's famous remark, "We like traffic, it means economic activity, it means people coming here." Here's what the MTA had to say:

The bus routes cited by the Straphangers' report as the slowest in the city, along with many others, operate in conditions of severe traffic congestion. Slow and unreliable bus service is very much a product of the city's vibrancy. Some routes must negotiate narrow streets while others serve heavily-traveled shopping areas. Some major routes even run past bridge and tunnel approaches, which are prone to traffic back-ups.

So, here's a question: Which urban environment looks more vibrant to you? This typical Columbus Circle rush hour scene...

Or this picture of a Friday afternoon rush hour that I snapped a couple of weeks ago on Copenhagen's inner city pedestrian street, The Stroget...

Columbus Circle photo by Hidden City on Flickr

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.

MTA Response to Pokey: Traffic Congestion = “Vibrancy”

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