Livable Streets

Ryan Russo is the New York City Department of Transportation's Director for Street Management and Safety, a newly-created job that he started in July. Previously, Russo worked as DOT's Downtown Brooklyn Transportation Coordinator where he was instrumental in designing and developing a number of improvements for pedestrians, cyclists and more livable streets (PDF file) over the last three years. Streetsblog caught up with Russo on Tuesday, a few hours after the City's big bike safety announcement:

It was noted on the Brian Lehrer show this morning that the City's Bicyclist Fatality and Injury Report (PDF file) identifies three specific locations or "clusters" where bicycle fatalities were unusually common between 1996 and 2005. A "cluster" is defined as "three or more fatalities within 1,000 feet." The three densest clusters were found on the east side of Manhattan north of Midtown, Park Slope in Brooklyn and Hunts Point in the Bronx. From page 11 of the  report:

As part of today's big announcement on bike safety improvements, the City is committing to undertaking the following actions. From the City's press release:

The press conference is underway right now in at Tavern on the Green in Central Park. Here are verbatim portions of the City's press release and a response from Transportation Alternatives. Stay tuned for more news and analysis:

Hell's Kitchen Miracle TicketA Clarence Eckerson Street FilmRunning time: 1:13 - 3.59 MB, QuickTime

With nothing much happening in the American League East this Fall, we've been turning our attention to Boston's burgeoning Livable Street movement instead. Last year a fellow named Jeff Rosenblum founded an organization called the Livable Streets Alliance that is setting out to do work similar to that of New York City's Transportation Alternatives. Jeff's group appears to be doing a good job of moving the issues up on Boston's civic agenda. Last week's Boston Globe ran a story on a City Counci member's efforts to transform a congested street in Little Italy into a pedestrian piazza and an op/ed arguing:

Chinatown businessman Jan Lee was cuffed and detained for photographing police officers' illegally parked cars in front of his shop.