When Michael Bloomberg was first elected eight years ago, I and many others thought such a wealthy mayor might assert his independence from developers who choose to serve their own self-interest at the expense of the city's long term needs. Six years later, the release of PlaNYC 2030 finally gave hope to that desire. The mayor put forth a vision that, despite some shortcomings, promised a framework for sustainable, equitable growth. For all the city's progress toward advancing those goals, however, it has taken several steps backward by continuing to build real estate projects that erode the walkable city. Mayor Bloomberg’s re-election provides an opportunity to correct these oversights and refine his administration’s legacy on building an equitable and environmentally sustainable city.

A rendering of the proposed Hudson Yards development on the far West Side. Only a hard-fought court battle against Mayor Bloomberg, the Department of City Planning, and other public agencies prevented this project from adding up to 20,000 parking spaces in Manhattan.

Unfortunately, creativity, innovation and commitment to the principles of sustainability stop with these few agencies. Other public servants charged with planning for the future of the city have abdicated that responsibility. The Department of City Planning, despite some exemplary work on open space design and enhancing opportunities for world-class architecture, has ignored planning for the New York City of 2030. Instead, it has focused on rezoning the city as if we still lived in the 1960s, using the language and planning concepts of that discredited era rather than preparing to meet the challenges and opportunities of the 21st century.

Together with private developers, the city's Economic Development Corporation and other quasi-government entities, the planning department has embraced outmoded redevelopment plans for Willets Point in Queens, Hudson Yards on the far West Side, Atlantic Yards in Brooklyn, and Columbia University's expansion into Manhattanville without any substantive regard to the principles and goals of PlaNYC.

These large-scale development plans fundamentally ignore the issue of sustainability. And they cast the form of the city in concrete for a century or more.

In these developments, the street is nothing more than square footage added to permit greater building heights and densities. Streets in these developments divide rather than integrate neighborhoods. Traffic lights are recalibrated, for instance, to facilitate the flow of traffic and hinder pedestrian movement by reducing crossing times. Perversely, these measures are dubbed “mitigation” in the environmental review process. Without them, the development would not be allowed to proceed. This is because the developments include more space for car parking than needed -- far above the norm in New York City -- creating more traffic and necessitating such "mitigations."

This runs against the principles of good urbanism and drains the life out of the city. The street is the common denominator of every neighborhood in New York. Streets, more than buildings, make up the city’s patrimony -- its "genius loci." When I grew up in New York in the 1950s, streets were our parks, our gardens, and our athletic fields. They facilitated activity, exercise, and civic discussion. They were places that fostered social interaction and social cohesion. They met needs that transcend any particular era. As we move deeper into the 21st century, we need to reintroduce these functions into our neighborhood fabric.

What does this mean in practice? At the Atlantic Yards site in Brooklyn, for example, development that enhances streetlife and improves the public realm -- development consistent with the principles of PlaNYC -- would not close streets, as developer Forest City Ratner intends to do. Instead, as proposed in the UNITY Plan, the street grid of Fort Greene would extend through the Yards, weaving into the Prospect Heights grid to the south.

The UNITY Plan for the Atlantic Yards site.

To build a sustainable city, we need to think and plan on a small scale, not just the mega-project scale. We need to engage more New Yorkers in the process of building neighborhoods, not just the politically connected or wealthy. The place where everything comes together, where we all meet and interact, and where sustainable planning must begin, is the street. The mayor has the intellect and the openness to understand this. He now has four years to reinforce what his administration has done well so far. Four years to change direction from past mistakes. Four years to focus on what has been ignored until now.

When it opened its doors this spring, the Gateway Center mall was plugged as a boon to the South Bronx. So invested was the Bloomberg administration -- along with city taxpayers, thanks to subsidies granted by the NYC Economic Development Corporation -- that the mayor himself participated in the grand opening of the center's Home Depot store.

In modeling the sprawling complex on the typical suburban big box slum, developer Related Companies seems to have made a tactical error. From a Times piece featuring Related honcho Glenn Goldstein:

Mr. Goldstein said that Related originally expected about 40 percent of the mall’s customers to arrive by public transportation, but so far a majority of customers had been traveling this way. Livery cab service is available for shoppers who make bulky purchases, and some stores, like Best Buy and Home Depot, provide delivery for a fee.

Who would have thought that a shopping center served by subway lines and city buses would attract so many transit-riding customers? Not Goldstein and company, whose 2,800 parking spots are proving to this point to be a lot of wasted space (likely in part because parking isn't free). Unfortunately, Related went all in with its auto-driven design by making entrance points unwelcoming to shoppers arriving on foot, as shown in these Streetsblog photo pool contributions from Jacob-uptown. Imagine how many more people would walk here if they had actually made this a walkable environment.

More pics, with commentary from the photographer, after the jump.

"The walkway is pitiful. Barely wide enough for two people standing still, much less walking past each other. It's sad how much space is dedicated to the horribly underused car entrance and how little space is given to pedestrians."

"Ped route to the big box stores through the parking garage."

"The awful mall actually has some nice wide sidewalks, perfect for vendors, street performers and all sorts of activity. Too bad they're under a highway."

Photo: Getty via Daily Intel

Among the outcomes so far: The conversion of 15 percent of the taxi fleet to clean-fuel vehicles, the construction of 79 new playgrounds, $100 million a year to increase the energy efficiency of government buildings, 20 pilot projects to clean up city waterways, hundreds of miles of new bike lanes. Ninety-three percent of the 127 initiatives are under way, Mr. Doctoroff said.

"The biggest achievement of them all," he said, is a greenhouse-gas inventory showing a 2.5 percent reduction in citywide carbon emissions, "at a time when greenhouse gases in cities around the nation continue to increase."

There is little doubt that PlaNYC is an ambitious and noble undertaking, despite the failure of congestion pricing -- which Doctoroff rightly cites as a direct cause of the current MTA funding crisis. But it seems a little specious to brag about reductions in greenhouse gas emissions when the Bloomberg administration has continued to vigorously promote VMT-inducing suburban-style parking, a contradiction not lost on City Room commenters like Chris, who writes:

What’s most frustrating is how Bloomberg and his advisors fail to make some very basic connections between their policies, for example working for modest transit improvements while promoting development that is very parking-intensive. Bronx Terminal Market is a prime example of this. Big box development with considerable parking availability which will do exactly what it is designed for- bring more cars, congestion, and pollution into the city.

So give credit where credit is due, but so many people wish Bloomberg would connect the dots.

Indeed. Even as he lobbied for PlaNYC and congestion pricing, Doctoroff himself was a prime mover behind the Yankee Stadium parking deal and greenhouse gas catastrophes like the Gateway Center. There's the legal battle waged by the administration to bring some 20,000 parking spots to Hell's Kitchen. And just last week Bloomberg celebrated the opening of driving-intensive commercial development at the Gateway project -- one day after announcing a new "green" buildings initiative. In fact, when asked point blank by Streetsblog about the connection between more parking and more driving, the mayor either didn't understand the question or chose not to address it.

Chris believes there's something "far more complex than just ignorance" at work here. We agree. The question is, will the Bloomberg administration safeguard the progress of PlaNYC by reversing its disastrous parking policies?

Mayor Bloomberg at today's Gateway Center grand opening. Photo: WNYC.

Yesterday the mayor unveiled a package of legislation designed to cut carbon emissions produced by buildings, to much Earth Day fanfare. Conspicuously absent from the proposals, however, was any mention of the driving that certain buildings induce and all the emissions that could be cut by reforming the city's off-street parking policy.

At the presser, Streetsblog correspondent Gideon Shapiro asked the mayor how parking and induced demand for driving fit into his ambitious green building plan. "If you want to make an impact in New York City," Bloomberg responded, "you deal with the buildings first," since buildings are the source of most of the city's carbon emissions. He acknowledged that "traffic strangles our city and pollutes our air," but tabled the topic of auto emissions as if it were a totally separate issue.

Sure enough, today we got another reminder that the Bloomberg administration is greening the city with one hand and fouling it with the other. The mayor presided over the grand opening of a Home Depot at the Gateway Center, a project of the city's Economic Development Corporation, touted as "a multi-level regional shopping center" that "will feature an innovative concept that creates dedicated parking fields for each level." It's basically a big chunk of auto-oriented suburbia plunked down by the South Bronx waterfront.

In a statement, the mayor mentioned Gateway Center -- with its 2,800 parking spaces -- in tandem with the new Yankee Stadium, which arrived recently with its own fields of parking. The connection is only fitting: If you build the garages, the traffic will come.

City Hall estimates that its green building plan will cut citywide carbon emissions by five percent. But a building plan without a parking strategy leaves out a big part of the equation. If the city fails to curb the boom in off-street parking, much of the energy savings from more efficient buildings will be wiped out as New Yorkers drive more than a billion extra miles each year.

The good people over at Next American City have extended an invitation to Streetsblog readers to the launch party for their Spring issue this coming Thursday.

Seth Pinsky from the New York City Economic Development Corporation will be their guest of honor. It might be a great opportunity to ask him why his agency so often assumes that massive amounts of off-street parking is necessary to encourage "economic development" in the most transit-oriented city in the nation. But don't be a party pooper, OK? Here are the event details:

Next American City is throwing a party in NYC in the Hines Gallery at the AIA Center for Architecture - and you are invited! Come celebrate the launch of Issue 22 with food, drinks and great conversation. Editor/Publisher Diana Lind will recap highlights from the new issue, including features on the financial crisis’s effects on American cities, municipal biodiesel programs around the country, an enormous swirling trash heap in the Pacific Ocean and transportation enthusiasts’ who are taking transit maps into their own hands. Plus interviews with Cary Moon, Richard Saul Wurman and Roope Mokka.

March 5, 6-8 PM
Hines Gallery, AIA Center for Architecture
536 LaGuardia Place, New York

Admission for non-subscribers is $15 in advance or $20 at the door and includes a free one-year subscription to Next American City, and entry to all NAC events & free food/drink.

After evaluating downtown streets, city staff reported their findings on public life. Photo: Shin-pei Tsay.

Calling the assembled city staff "the pied pipers of the new way of doing business," Sadik-Khan touted the city's transition to more human-centered street metrics. "The tools that we've used in the past have done a really good job of helping us measure cars and traffic," she said, "but as we're looking to improve the condition of our streets for other users of the system -- for pedestrians, for cyclists, for people whether they're walking around, riding around, chatting, strolling, having lunch -- we need a much more comprehensive approach."

After a powerpoint from team Gehl, everyone got a feel for what Sadik-Khan was referring to. Fanning out from City Planning's Reade Street headquarters, 11 groups headed to different sites downtown, timers in hand, to see how well New York's streets and public spaces serve the people who use them. The evaluation combines hard stats like pedestrian and cyclist counts with open-ended questions that touch on the quality of the public environment and how well it supports social activity. The same technique underlies much of the data presented in World Class Streets.

DOT Assistant Commissioner Andy Wiley-Schwartz, who heads up the Public Plaza Program, said that the day's events presage permanent changes. "We are going to be working on different ways of building some of these methodologies into our standard operating procedure," he said, "so that we are more versed in studying street life." DOT will both perform the evaluations on its own, he added, and insert the work into consultant contracts.

Many of the city's urban planning advocacy groups were on hand, including the Regional Plan Association, Project for Public Spaces, and the Municipal Art Society. The multi-agency get-together drew their praise. "I think it's great that DOT, DCP, and EDC are collaborating on this initiative to create more sustainable streets in New York City," wrote MAS's Elizabeth Werbe in an email message. "This inter-agency cooperation bodes well for the city, considering the expertise of Gehl Architects in providing innovative tools to measure the conditions that allow for the development of pedestrian and bicycle friendly environments, in addition to the analysis and methodology needed to translate these findings into recommendations that will improve the public realm."

Another thing that bodes well, says Gehl, is simply the act of observing places close-up -- "to get people out there to see with their own eyes what's going on... by the end of the day, you know a lot about the city beyond the figures that you got."

We received two reports last night that the West Harlem Piers bike path -- a critical link in the Hudson River Greenway -- is finally open after several months of puzzling delay. (NYCEDC informed Streetsblog last week that the hold up was indeed due to problems securing materials for a safety rail.) Now the construction fence is down, and, as you can see in these photos from reader Paula Froke, cyclists are enjoying the unbroken stretch of greenway.

Streetsblogger Urbanis cheers the end of a long wait:

After raising a stink about it a few weeks ago, I was amazed to discover on my ride home this evening that the West Harlem Piers bike path was open -- yes, all the fencing was removed, and I sailed free and clear along the new bike path all the way to 135th Street, where it connects with the existing bike path running around Riverbank State Park. Not having to brave ten blocks of traffic on Riverside Drive was a dream.

More piers pics from Paula after the jump.

"Streets to Live By" marshals data from several cities to make the case for investing in livable streets in New York.

Today Transportation Alternatives released "Streets to Live By" [PDF], the report previewed last week in the Observer. It seeks to define what makes a street livable and to synthesize a broad range of data, culled from numerous cities, on the effects of policies that put pedestrians first.

This doc is a big one, and we're still sifting through it. An early impression: The evidence gathered here related to economic development, health, and social wellbeing suggests that a number of city agencies should be shepherded into the livable streets fold. From the report's recommendations:

Improvements that support livable streets, whether through new construction, street rebuilding or zoning amendments, should be the standard. Coordination and creative problem solving between these agencies, including the Department of City Planning (DCP), Office of Management and Budget (OMB), Department of Design and Construction (DDC), Economic Development Corporation (EDC), Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), and Department of Sanitation (DOS) would be best led by the DOT and the Mayor’s Office of Planning and Sustainability.

The report also names the Department of Health and the Department of Small Business Services as agencies that can forge stronger ties to a livable streets agenda, and calls for a livable streets training program aimed at the city's community boards. "We recognize that the jurisdiction of each agency only goes so far," says T.A.'s Shin-pei Tsay, "and we hope there can be greater collaboration between them."

This piece was written by Transportation Alternatives:

On December 1, 2006, Eric Ng was riding his bike up the Hudson River Greenway. He was on his way to meet friends. He never made it, because a drunk driver named Eugenio Cidron took his life. After leaving a party at Chelsea Piers, Cidron got behind the wheel of his car and drove it on to the Greenway. Eugenio Cidron sped down the Greenway, a car-free path, for a mile at 60 miles per hour, before crashing into Eric Ng and killing him.

A little over a year ago, the government agencies that have something to say or do with the Hudson River Greenway, along with Transportation Alternatives, convened a task force to develop improvements that will reduce conflicts between drivers and Greenway users, but today little has changed on the ground. The Hudson River Greenway was never designed to have high volumes of cars and trucks crossing it. Regardless of whether or not government knew this when the biking and walking path was built, it knows it now and is often guilty of aiding and abetting the increase on driving across the path.

There are over a dozen City, State and Federal government agencies that have some say in what goes on along the Hudson River between Battery Park and 59^th Street, but no one has taken charge. On the Greenway itself, it's a jurisdictional nightmare. The State DOT designed and built the Greenway and continues to be responsible for path redesigns. The City DOT maintains and times the traffic signals along the Greenway. The Hudson River Park Trust maintains the Greenway path. The NYC Parks Department tries to ensure design consistency between this Greenway and the ones it builds and maintains around the boroughs. There are myriad groups, including the City Economic Development Corp, the MTA, the Passenger Ship Terminal, Chelsea Piers and private ferry operators (who often drive buses across the path), that weigh in on the need for driveways across the Greenway.

Each day, thousands of people in New York City head to the Hudson River Greenway on bicycle and foot. It's one of few car-free places where people can commute, exercise and feel comfortable away from the risk of traffic and motorists on our streets. The Hudson River Greenway is supposed to be a safe and protected place, yet it is not. And despite fatal crashes like Eric's, little has been done to change this.

There are a host of improvements that will reduce motorist-Greenway user conflicts, including:

• Close unnecessary driveways where motorists cross the Greenway

• Install fixed bollards where streets and driveways cross to keep drivers from driving onto the Greenway

• Narrow driveways crossing the Greenway to slow and control motorist turning movements

• Install curb extensions on streets crossing the Greenway to make pedestrian and cyclist crossing easier and safer

• Install bike lane treatment where streets and driveways cross to make drivers more aware of the Greenway and pay attention to cyclists and pedestrians

• Coordinate signal timing between the bike traffic signals on the Greenway and the motorist traffic signals on Route 9A to avoid turning conflicts

• Lower Greenway traffic signal heads to same height as pedestrian signals

• Install shades on Greenway traffic signal heads to limit motorists' view of them and reduce confusion

• Display safety messages on overhead highway signage along Route 9A warning drivers to drive safely and be aware of cyclists and pedestrians.

In a 2007 survey of bicyclists, pedestrians and drivers along the Hudson River Greenway, more than a third of Greenway users reported cars driving on the Greenway. Transportation Alternatives has identified seven crossings where motor vehicles repeatedly violate the car-free path.

• Warren Street

• Chambers Street

• West Houston Street/Pier 40 driveway

• Christopher Street

• West 17th Street/Chelsea Piers driveway exit

• West 30th Street

• West 40th Street

• West 42rd Street

With the sentence of Eric's killer handed down, the NY State Department of Transportation and NYC Department of Transportation must rededicate themselves to the immediate implementation of safety improvements to ensure this tragedy is never repeated.

Photo: Emmanuel Fuentebella for Transportation Alternatives

In response to its "Request for Expressions of Interest," the New York City Economic Development Corporation has received proposals from 30 companies interested in implementing New York City's congestion pricing pilot project. "This large number and quality of responses clearly indicates that the market place believes that the implementation of the City's congestion pricing plan is feasible," EDC writes.

Technologically and economically feasible, that is. As for political feasibility... still working on that.

The entire list of companies can be found on EDC's web site along with proposals from 21 of them. We've also provided links below to download the documents. Nine of the firms' proposals were considered "business sensitive" and not made available for download.

We're inviting readers to start looking through them and letting us know if you see anything particularly notable. IBM 's proposal is probably worth a close look since they developed Stockholm's congestion pricing system. Likewise, I hear that Bern Grush's Skymeter is proposing a rather unique technology solution. I was surprised to see that HopStop, the online subway mapping company, submitted a proposal.

I'd have to say that the big disappointment here is that the proposal from the never-before-heard-from "Congestion Solutions Group" was considered too confidential to put online. A veritable Super Friends of congestion pricing, the Group includes Northrop Grumman, Parsons, PIPS Technology, Transdyn, Rafael Viñoly Architects, Halcrow and ACS (we assume that last one is the IT company and not the American Cancer Society).

Based on an initial analysis of the 30 proposals, EDC notes:

• Some proposed changes to the system suggested by respondents included implementing a cordon system as well as recommendations to alter the exact boundaries of these cordoned lines.
• Given the proposed technologies the expected amount of required hardware would not be extensive and could be integrated into the City's existing urban design
• Privacy issues can be adequately addressed by the encryption of wireless communications and strictly followed protocols to protect the public.
  
• Several firms expressed confidence in their ability to implement the system on the necessary timeline, although most identified it as a challenging timeframe. Some respondents suggested a phased-in approach to address the timeline concern.

• Booz Allen Hamilton Inc (2.61 KB)
• Consensus Systems Technologies Corporation (286 KB)
• Consulting Stream (1.63 KB)
  
• Diamond Consulting Services Ltd (378 KB)
• FLEXTOLL (189 KB)
• HopStop com Inc (43.2 KB)
• IBM Corporation (.98 KB)
• KPMG (55.3 KB)
• Liberty Imaging (317 KB)
• Macrovision Corporation (.97 KB)
• MajescoMastek (3.05 KB)
• Mark IV IVHS Inc (8.11 KB)
• PA Consulting Group (2.33 KB)
• PBS and J (3.65 KB)
• Remington ELSAG Law Enforcement Systems LLC (1.25 KB)
• Siemens Team in association with Greenman Pedersen Inc PIPS Technology VESystems HowardStein Hudson KLD Associates DGD Associates (1.49 KB)
• Skymeter Corporation (1.23 KB)
• SpeedInfo (353 KB)
• Steer Davies and Gleave Limited (47.8 KB)
• TransCore LP (653 KB)
• Wilbur Smith Associates (782 KB)

And these firms submitted proposals that were considered too "business sensitive" to make available to the public:

• 3M, CSE Global Ltd., MSI Global Pte Ltd.
• Accenture, Thales, American Traffic Solution (ATS), Gideon GRC Consulting, Vertex
• Alcatel-Lucent
• Autostrade per l'Italia
• The Boston Consulting Group
• The Capita Group Plc.
• The Congestion Solutions Group (Northrop Grumman, ACS, Parsons, PIPS Technology, Transdyn, Rafael Viñoly Architects, Halcrow)
• Kapsch TrafficCom AG
• Raytheon Company

At a sparsely attended public hearing in Lower Manhattan, Margaret Collins of Save Our Parks told the New York City Industrial Development Agency (IDA) that a "barely contained rage" is simmering over the traffic the new stadium is expected to bring to the area. Surveys show that lack of recreational space and pollution are the top concerns in South Bronx neighborhoods, Collins said -- problems that were exacerbated when the Yankees seized public park land for its stadium complex, and which could yet worsen once its proposed 9,000 parking spaces are put to use.

Though the new facility will have 5,000 fewer seats, and will be served by a new Metro-North station, current plans call for it to have 2,500 more parking spots than the existing stadium. Three new parking garages (of four originally planned) will be financed through $225 million in triple tax exempt bonds, if the IDA approves such action, at a public cost of some $8,000 per space. A vote could come as early as next Tuesday, September 11. The IDA board votes in closed session.

Noting the low turnout for the hearing, Collins -- herself testifying with sleeping infant in tow -- pointed out that most affected residents can not make it downtown for a meeting in the middle of a workday. She warned that lack of public attendance should not be confused with lack of public engagement. 

"The community is not sleeping on this question," Collins said.

Speaking after an unusual plea for access was presented to the IDA on behalf of Bronx Borough President Adolfo Carrion, Jr., Collins bristled that politicians had signed on to the stadium project without knowing what they were agreeing to. Carrion, a vocal stadium proponent, has been denied what his office termed "vital information" regarding its financing, even though he, like all borough presidents, has an appointee who serves on the IDA board.

The IDA is the financing arm of the New York City Economic Development Corporation. The IDA board is made up of 15 members and alternates, including City Planning Director Amanda Burden and Deputy Mayor Dan Doctoroff.

While she was outnumbered by IDA board members and staff, Collins was not alone in testifying against the project. Joyce Hogi, who has lived in the vicinity of Yankee Stadium for 30 years, objected to the "snarling traffic" that "consumes" the area, and said the new garages would amount to "induced demand" for otherwise unneeded parking, "providing an incentive to drive into an already overburdened neighborhood." Of the new Metro-North station, Hogi asked, "We spend millions on public transportation and now we plan to spend millions to encourage them not to take it?"

Hogi suggested public moneys would be better spent on upgrades to the Melrose Metro-North and 161st Street subway stations, which would benefit surrounding neighborhoods year-round.

Bettina Damiani, director of Good Jobs New York, said that the parking subsidy, if approved, would bring the public commitment to the new stadium to a total of approximately $795 million.

Photo: Michael Dietsch/Flickr