Livable Streets

Webster Avenue and Fordham Road, the Bronx

 Photo: Lars Klove, Sixth Avenue and 13th Street, Manhattan.

You may have noticed the new tab at the top of Streetsblog and StreetFilms with a link to NYCstreets. If you haven't checked it out yet, it's worth a look. NYCstreets is a place where people interested in improving New York City's streets and public spaces can find online tools, resources and, most importantly -- other people -- to help get organized and make change happen.

London retailers enjoyed a £100 million spending spree as Oxford, Bond and Regents Streets were closed to motor vehicle traffic for a day

Crashstat shows Fordham Rd. in the Bronx to be one of the most dangerous streets in New York City.

We're just catching up to this piece of good news in The Villager last week:

Recently, I had the opportunity to travel with comrades Karla Quintero of Transportation Alternatives and Streetsblog editor Aaron Naparstek to Bogotá, Colombia to document some of the amazing advances going on in the livable streets movement there. We spent an entire Sunday, from 5am 'til nearly 5pm, riding bicycles around during Ciclovía, a weekly event in which over 70 miles of city streets are closed to traffic and opened to walking, biking, running, skating, recreating, picnicking, and talking with family, neighbors and strangers. Ciclovía was simply one of the most moving experiences I have had in my entire life (no pun intended).

We do a lot of criticism here on Streetsblog, so in the spirit of the season we thought we'd reflect on what we in the livable streets universe have to be thankful for.