Today’s Headlines

  • $3.5m for Beach Bike and Handicap Path Stuck in Parks Dept Red Tape (News)
  • Sen. Schumer Says NYC Bridges Neglected Despite His Wife’s Assurances (Sun)
  • MTA Studying One-Seat Rail Ride to Upstate Stewart Airport (Sun)
  • Mayor Bloomberg’s SUV/Subway Commute Makes the National News (NPR)
  • Pave the Railways! Tri-State Region’s Road Network Must be Expanded (NYT)
  • Better Pavement Could Help Cool Cities (Planetizen)
  • Energize America: A 20-Point Plan to Wean America From Fossil Fuels
  • Filling Your Belly is More Energy Intensive Than Filling a Gas Tank (Times)
  • Label Food to Show How Far It Has Traveled to Your Plate (NYT)
  • Bush Pushes Climate Meeting But Shuns Solutions (Grist)
  • Jay Leno Shows Off His Clean, Quiet, 98-Year-Old Electric Car (NYT)
  • Comparing the Planning and Politics of the Pulaski Skyway to Atlantic Yards (AYR)
  • Luxury, Brooklyn-Style: Scaffolding Collapses Outside 4th Ave Condos (Curbed)
  • jmc

    Who is this guy from the “Reason” foundation and why has he had two NYT editorials in the past few months? Last month he wanted to build a gigantic series of subterranean tunnels under manhattan to carry express traffic. This month he wants to convert rail lines into premium toll highways and build additional elevated expressways. What is he smoking? We have enough trouble maintaining our existing infrastructure!

    Does anyone have the data which shows that we have more road lanes per capita than LA in the metro region? Also, isn’t part of the problem with our highway funding that we have too many highways to maintain?

  • a planner

    More lanes = more traffic = more pollution & urban heat island effects.

    This guy from Reason is so far off base, it is as if he his thinking is in the stone ages of planning.

  • I’d like to thank everyone who came out to celebrate the extension of car-free hours to 8am this morning. We had many long-time advocates for a Car-Free Central Park including Ken Coughlin and TA’s Paul “More Steely than Ever” White and a number of livable streets advocates.

    DOT Commissioner Sadik-Khan even stopped by and joined us for a few minutes on her (victory) lap. We thanked her for the additional hour and encouraged her to keep going and go for a full ban on all cars.

    We even turned around a few cars that tried to enter at 96th street even though the gate was still down, but then unfortunately some Parks Department/Conservancy workers lifted the gates at 7:40am. Clear signs are needed at all entrances about the new rules.

    We captured quite a few pictures and video of “School Safety” police vehicles speeding through the park.

    Glenn McAnanama
    President, Upper Green Side
    http://www.uppergreenside.org

  • Angus Grieve-Smith

    You know, I think Sam Staley’s sprawling subdivision is too car-dependent and needs a better connection to Dayton. Let’s tear up Route 725 and put in a light rail line.

  • Steve

    Thanks for helping organize, Glenn! Here’s some photos:

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/43954081@N00/

  • Sam Staley and his build-more-road antics are always a delight.

    More bridges over the Hudson! More elevated roadways! A tunnel under the Long Island Sound!

    But I particularly loved the notion of converting underused railways to highways.

    If the railways make appropriate enough connections to serve motorists, wouldn’t they also do as, just thinking out loud here, commuter railways?

  • Angus Grieve-Smith

    I just wonder why the Reason Foundation pays people in L.A. and way-to-go-Ohio to pontificate about New York’s transportation problems. They can’t find anyone who actually lives here that would be willing to endorse building tons of roads?

    I also wonder why the Times prints this crap. For every Reason Foundation “let’s pave New York!” op-ed, they should have ten by the likes of Aaron Naparstek (of course), Paul White, Charlie Komanoff and George Haikalis. You know, people who live here and have to deal with the transportation improvements that get built.

  • a planner

    “I wonder why the Times prints this crap.”

    Me too. If Sam Staley’s vision came true, the Times could sell more car ads.

  • If there were more mass transit, people could read the NYT instead of listening to radio in their cars.

  • glennQ

    Comment by Angus Grieve-Smith: “I also wonder why the Times prints this crap. For every Reason Foundation “let’s pave New York!” op-ed, they should have ten by the likes of Aaron Naparstek (of course), Paul White, Charlie Komanoff and George Haikalis. You know, people who live here and have to deal with the transportation improvements that get built.”

    10:1? Isn’t 1:1 fair?
    Maybe the auto-phobic need to stack the odds against the fact that people generally prefer using personal transportation?
    It is called tolerance.

  • Chris H

    I don’t know if you can say prefer. Most people in the united states don’t have a choice and most people who live in the suburbs never have much experience with public transit aside from school buses.

    Now, can you respond to my response to your comments in this thread and this other thread or are you just a troll who can’t back up his argument?

  • Angus Grieve-Smith

    GlennQ most definitely is a troll, or he wouldn’t be using loaded terms like “auto-phobic” and “personal transportation.” And he does keep ignoring others’ responses to him. If he keeps it up I’m going to start ignoring him.

    I generally prefer personal transportation to mass transit as well: getting places on foot, by bike and by skate. Sam Staley’s proposals and his favored lifestyle are quite openly hostile to that kind of personal transportation. It’s very handy for Glenn to restrict “personal transportation” to motorized personal transportation; another example of “if you can’t go fifty miles an hour and don’t weigh at least two tons, you don’t count.”

    “Auto-phobic” implies an irrational fear of automobiles, but there’s nothing irrational about it. According to the CDC, car crashes are the leading cause (26%) of “injury deaths.” I’m assuming that you wouldn’t call gun-control advocates “gun-phobic” or poison-control advocates “poison-phobic,” so don’t call us “auto-phobic.”

    My argument was that a 10:1 ratio is probably a more accurate reflection of the number of people in New York who want serious mass transit and pedestrian improvements as compared to the number of New Yorkers who want to turn the city into Scottsdale or Bellbrook.

    I tolerate the pro-auto people in my neighborhood very well, thank you. I don’t see why I have to tolerate the “paper of record” printing the wacky rantings of some out-of-touch tunnel fanatic in Ohio, just because they happen to be subsidized by wealthy donors?

  • glennQ

    Comment by Angus Grieve-Smith: “GlennQ most definitely is a troll, or he wouldn’t be using loaded terms like “auto-phobic” and “personal transportation.” And he does keep ignoring others’ responses to him.”

    Occasionally I may miss something Angus. I have responded to both posts. To lower yourself to name calling and petty threats is pretty unbecoming.

    Comment by Angus Grieve-Smith: I generally prefer personal transportation to mass transit as well: getting places on foot, by bike and by skate. It’s very handy for Glenn to restrict “personal transportation” to motorized personal transportation; another example of “if you can’t go fifty miles an hour and don’t weigh at least two tons, you don’t count.”

    You have me all wrong Angus. I never qualified “personal transportation” to motorized types. I have been an avid cyclist for my entire life. I have continuously been on some type of competitive cycling team since the 1980s!

    Comment by Angus Grieve-Smith: “Auto-phobic” implies an irrational fear of automobiles, but there’s nothing irrational about it. I’m assuming that you wouldn’t call gun-control advocates “gun-phobic” or poison-control advocates “poison-phobic,” so don’t call us “auto-phobic.”

    We’ll have to agree to disagree. I think the fear of cars (guns and poison too, for that matter) is irrational. Like anything else, there is a level of respect that must be given. But I read a lot of what sounds like fear. Maybe the sentiment is getting lost over the web, but I’ll call it auto-phobia when it looks like it.

    Comment by Angus Grieve-Smith: “I don’t see why I have to tolerate the “paper of record” printing [ideas from someone I disagree with]”

    We all do Angus.