New York City Wins the 2009 Sustainable Transport Award

4:53 PM EST on January 13, 2009

Madison Square: Before and After.

Take a moment to appreciate how far we've come in the last few years. New York City is being honored tonight in Washington D.C. as the first U.S. city to win the ITDP Sustainable Transport Award. Here is an excerpt from the press release:

New York City has demonstrated that political will, boldleadership and citizen engagement can lead to sweeping transportationreforms. In 2008, the city implemented key parts of Mayor Michael Bloomberg'slong-term sustainability vision, PlaNYC 2030. The laudable changes madethroughout 2008 have reshaped the experience of walking on New York Citystreets. The city has embraced biking and walking as investment-worthytransportation alternatives, while the traditional car-orientedmobility model is taking a back-seat....
In 2008, New York City took 49 acres of road space, traffic lanes andparking spots away from cars and gave it back to the public for bikelanes, pedestrian areas and public plazas. Protected on-street bikelanes were part of the 140 miles (255 kilometers) of bike lanesimplemented. Bike ridership increased by 35 percent from the past year.The city planted more than 98,000 trees, implemented a select busservice and introduced car-free Saturdays. The NYC Department ofTransportation recycles 40 percent of the asphalt used to repairstreets.

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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