Car-Free Streets

This post is part of a series featuring stories and research that will be presented at the Pro-Walk/Pro-Bike/Pro-Place conference September 8-11 in Pittsburgh.

The forecast for Saturday is bleak -- 100 percent chance of rain, lasting just about all day. Tomorrow also happens to be the first Summer Streets event of 2014 (as well as the first during the de Blasio mayoralty). Good thing the main attraction is in a tunnel.

Buenos Aires is fast becoming one of the most admired cities in the world when it comes to reinventing streets and transportation.

Six years ago, when Summer Streets was introduced, the New York Times asked: Will it work? This year, the question is: Why isn't the city doing more of it?

At St. Terese Academy in Seattle last week, students held relay races on 35th Avenue. It was field day at the Madrona neighborhood school, and thanks to a new initiative from the city of Seattle, the kids had some extra space to stretch their legs.

Last year, the city announced that much of Central Park's loop drives would go car-free all summer long. With temperatures warming, the park is again filling with people walking, jogging, and biking -- all sharing space with car commuters looking for a rush-hour shortcut. Will it happen again -- or expand -- this year? Negotiations are underway to bring a car-free summer back to Central Park, and meanwhile it's still an open question whether Prospect Park users will get similar summer traffic relief for the first time.

If you didn't spend at least some of your Friday ogling this post on the Architect's Newspaper Blog, you've been missing out. A/N Blog overlaid before and after shots of 25 Bloomberg-era NYC street transformations, allowing readers to "slide" between views.

It's been an on-again, off-again tradition for at least two decades: Turning the center lanes of the Grand Concourse into a car-free space for stress-free walking, biking and exercise. With an overwhelming vote of support from Community Board 4 earlier this week, it seems this tradition is poised for a return this summer.

Okay, New York. You've had two chances so far this August to get out of bed, off the couch, and outside to Summer Streets. This is your final warning.