Midtown

Last week saw the latest expansion of the public realm in Midtown, with the official unveiling of the long-awaited redesign of Duffy Square at Broadway and Seventh Avenue, the northern edge of the Times Square "bowtie."

Today marks the start of Transportation for America's "Build for America" campaign, which will work to influence the transportation funding legislation that goes before the next Congress in 2009. (You'll be hearing a lot more about it here in the coming months; we have received a grant from the T4America campaign to kick-start the development of Streetsblog.net, a national network of transportation policy bloggers.) It's a major effort to fundamentally change the way this country thinks about and finances transportation infrastructure — at the same time creating jobs, reducing dependence on fossil fuels, and helping the environment. Download a PDF of the plan here.

We were out last Friday taking shots of cars parked in the new Select Bus lanes on 34th Street -- you know, the ones NYPD has pledged to help keep clear. If only we had walked a few blocks west we might have hit the mother lode.

Broadway Boulevard takes center stage in a USA Today story on New York City's recent pedestrian improvements. Those who questioned whether people would sit in plazas near passing traffic have their answer:

DOT plans to use cameras to keep cabs and government vehicles out of the 34th Street lanes.

SBS lanes are the first phase of the 34th Street Transitway concept

After Summer Streets wrapped up last Saturday, I headed over to Times Square to check out the progress on DOT's "Broadway Boulevard" project. The new street geometry and surfacing are mostly in place, while plantings and furniture have yet to arrive. The bike lane was also fully functional, making this pedicab ride across 41st Street a lot more pleasant than it would have been a few months ago.

This weekend, on the second Saturday of Summer Streets, the first thing my wife Jennifer and I noticed as we ascended the ramp from 42nd Street to Park Avenue was the quiet. I mentioned to Jennifer that I had come across a blog comment likening the scene to the New York portrayed in the post-apocalyptic Will Smith movie "I Am Legend," minus the super-human zombies. Plot holes notwithstanding, that didn't do it justice. The absence of engine noise and incessant honking didn't seem eerie, or even surreal. Just blissful.