Transportation Policy

Via the blog of Stuart Hughes, a BBC journalist who lost part of his leg in Iraq while on assignment in 2003 and who is an avid cyclist, come a few interesting links regarding cycling in London. First, a BBC story on the skyrocketing popularity of biking both for recreation and commuting in London, a rise that has coincided with a decreasing injury and fatality rate for cyclists:

The PlaNYC team has released the technical report providing the detailed background data for the transportation recommendations made in Mayor Michael Bloomberg's April 22 Long-Term Planning & Sustainability speech. It's a big download -- 25 megabytes and 166 pages -- but if you are a New York City transportation policy wonk, it's totally worth it. 

With a new commissioner coming in to run New York City's Department of Transportation, now is a good time to begin a conversation about what the agency could be doing differently to make itself more effective. DOT has a tough job. It has conflicting, and sometimes contradictory, mandates from the mayor, city council and communities it serves. The agency is often asked to bridge deep differences in neighborhoods between those most concerned with parking and driving and those focused on better walking, cycling, quality of life and long-term sustainability. It's not unheard of for the same council members who demand better bus service to protest changes in parking rules that would reduce double parking and speed bus service. But there are things that DOT can do relatively easily and at low cost to improve its relations with the public and raise the level of the transportation discussion. Here are five of them:

After weeks of speculation, City Hall has announced that Janette Sadik-Khan, a senior vice president at Parsons Brinckerhoff, will be the new commissioner of the NYC DOT. This from a press release issued this afternoon by the mayor's office:

Would they get out of their cars if they could surf the Web on the bus?

"Transportation has always been the key to unlocking New York's potential."

Number of times each of the following words or phrases appears in the PlaNYC chapter on transportation: