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Trading a Park-and-Ride for a Public Plaza and Bike Parking
More cities should copy this idea for their park-and-ride transit stations: At DC Metro's King Street station in Old Town Alexandria, plans are underway to turn parking spots into a pedestrian plaza. This goes against the grain of typical transit agency practice. Despite the fact that park-and-rides are an inefficient use of scarce land, a recent survey by researchers Lisa Jacobson and Rachel Weinberger found that most agencies are looking to expand them.
August 2, 2016
Great Cities Don’t Take Late-Night Transit Service Away From Workers
What a sad state of affairs for transit in the nation's capital.
August 1, 2016
Study: Streetcar Tracks and Bicycling Don’t Mix
A new study out of Toronto confirms what cyclists in many U.S. cities have found out the hard way: Streetcar tracks can be a serious safety hazard.
July 29, 2016
67 Congress Members Tell Feds: Measure the Movement of People, Not Cars
The federal government hands states about $40 billion a year for transportation, money they can basically spend however they want. The result in many places is a lot of expensive, traffic-inducing highways that get clogged with cars soon after they're finished. Can measuring the effect of all this spending lead to better decisions?
July 28, 2016
Can a Major Minneapolis Transit Project Survive Regional Dysfunction?
The Twin Cities' Orange Line bus rapid transit project ought to be a slam dunk. According to Sean Hayford O'Leary at streets.mn, it will provide frequent service and travel times similar to the region's successful light rail lines, which carrying tens of thousands of passengers daily. At just $150 million to construct, the Orange Line will be a bargain.
July 27, 2016
Tim Kaine Took a Stand Against Cul-de-Sacs
Even though the Democratic Party's strongholds are in cities, we probably won't hear much about urban transportation and development policy at the Democratic National Convention this week. City issues seldom get much play when political parties are focused on scooping up swing votes in the suburbs.
July 26, 2016
This Week: Rally for Safe Streets on Staten Island’s North Shore
With major development projects slated for the north shore of Staten Island, activists are pressing the city to reimagine Richmond Terrace, where more than two hundred people have been injured in traffic since 2012, as a safe street for walking and biking. A rally to "Complete the Terrace" highlights the slate of events on the calendar this week.
July 25, 2016
Will More Bike-Share Systems Opt for “Smart Bikes,” Not “Smart Docks”?
When Portland launched its bike-share system last week, it became the biggest American city to go live with a "smart bike" model. The system allows users to drop off bikes anywhere within the service area, as opposed to the more prevalent "smart dock" model, where users pick up and return bikes only at fixed stations.
July 25, 2016
Elon Musk’s “Master Plan” Won’t Work for Cities
Earlier this week tech entrepreneur Elon Musk released his updated "master plan" for Tesla, including some thoughts on how autonomous mini-buses will supplant today's transit and "take people all the way to their destination." Like every Musk pronouncement, this one got a lot of buzz -- but it also drew some healthy skepticism.
July 22, 2016
Portland’s Long-Awaited Bike-Share System Gets Off to an Impressive Start
Tuesday was a very exciting day in Portland, as the city celebrated the launch of its long-awaited bike-share system, Biketown. The network makes 1,000 bikes available in an eight-square mile area of the city.
July 21, 2016