Streetsblog New York City

Many American cities are warming to the idea of handling their stormwater runoff at ground level. In Indianapolis, they decided to work bioswales and stormwater retention into the newly opened Cultural Trail. The eight-mile biking and walking route loops through the heart of the downtown, and in this short, Karen S. Haley, the Executive Director of Indianapolis Cultural Trail, tells us how these green islands keep rainfall from overwhelming the sewer system and polluting local waterways.

Imagine if these treatments became standard for every U.S. city looking to improve water quality by reducing sewer overflows.

In May, the Indianapolis Cultural Trail, a bike and pedestrian path connecting some of Indy’s most popular cultural institutions, had its long-awaited public coming out with a ribbon cutting and celebration. It’s one of the biggest bicycling infrastructure achievements in North America, and yet it’s still practically a secret.

As you’ll see, the Cultural Trail runs eight fantastic miles through the heart of downtown and features beautiful stone work, green landscaping, and even bioswales to absorb stormwater runoff. There is great signage and trail design with an eye for maximum safety. In many places, parking and/or a car travel lane was converted to trail space. But most importantly, the trail features ample room for both cyclists and pedestrians (most of the time in separate environments) to get around downtown, whether they’re commuting, exercising, running errands, or just going for an afternoon jaunt. It’s fun and very safe and people of all ages using it.

Across the U.S., cities such as NYC, Chicago, and Washington are doing tremendous work installing miles of protected bike lanes with inexpensive materials. Although the Cultural Trail cost quite a bit, it’s nice to know that to find extensive downtown bike infrastructure made with beautiful, permanent materials, we don’t have to look to Europe. We can go check out Indianapolis.

Across the nation, many big-city mayors of both political parties are embracing bikes and livable streets. As you’ll see, Indianapolis’ Mayor Greg Ballard, a Republican, believes that making city cycling safer and more enjoyable will attract young people and families and benefit business.

Ballard has expanded the number of miles of bike lanes from one (in 2007) to over 75, and there are plans for 200 miles of bikeways by the year 2015. In addition, the city has seen the grand opening of the magnificent Indianapolis Cultural Trail (there’s a great Streetfilm coming on that shortly), which features eight miles of safe biking and walking paths.

Mayor Ballard also does it with his body and voice. He now personally leads four bike rides per year, encouraging people to get healthy, have fun and see their city from a different perspective.

Memorial Day 2013 marked a milestone in NYC transportation history: the debut of the city’s bike-share system, Citi Bike. At 330 stations, 6,000 bikes (of a planned 10,000) were available to more than 13,000 members who signed up for a yearly pass — and many of them couldn’t wait to hit the streets!

The press conference at City Hall was a media frenzy. Hundreds of reporters and cameras were on hand to watch Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan ring in the launch. Streetfilms was there at this historic moment and put together this fun four-minute film.

Think of this Streetfacts chapter as a PSA about how, in just a few generations, we have tightly restricted American kids’ freedom to roam, play, and become self-sufficient.

The percentage of children walking and bicycling to school has plummeted from almost 50 percent in 1969 to about 13 percent today. Although distance from school is often cited as the main barrier to walking and bicycling, many families still drive when schools are close to home. According to the Safe Routes to School National Partnership, driving accounts for about half of school trips between 1/4- and 1/2-mile long — which in most cases shouldn’t take kids much more than 10 minutes to walk.

There are plenty of factors at work here: Lack of sidewalks and safe walking and biking routes. The fallacy of “stranger danger.” School districts banning walking and biking outright. But all of these problems lead back to the original and biggest blunder: We continue to design our cities and towns for cars instead of for children, families, and human beings.

Look for more Streetfilms on this issue in the next year.

The majority of the roads and highways built in America are simply bad investments. Continuing this pattern will only ensure that wasteful projects consume larger chunks of our federal, state, and local budgets, without addressing the real need for transportation options.

This Streetfacts chapter has a bit more math than usual, but we think we’ve made an entertaining and accessible profile of how government agencies routinely justify unnecessary road projects. The example we’ve chosen to illustrate the problem is a federally-funded “diamond-diverter” interchange in Colorado. The project as proposed may look like a pretty good deal for taxpayers at first, but after crunching the numbers, you’ll see that’s not the case at all.

Much of the inspiration for this piece comes from the outstanding work of Strong Towns, an organization that emphasizes obtaining a higher return on infrastructure investments. Strong Towns Executive Director Charles Marohn, Jr. has been getting his message out through what he calls curbside chats, and we’ll soon be debuting a Streetfilm that features his work.

A few years ago, it was a pretty big deal when on-street bike parking was installed in any city.  Though it is always welcome news, today it hardly merits a mention.

But you can find another milestone on the protected bike lane on Ninth Avenue (which was NYC’s first), where three bike corrals have been installed between 36th and 40th Streets. Replacing car parking in the floating lane with bike parking is definitely a first for New York City, and it’s quite possibly the first example in the United States.

We found that small businesses seem to love them already, as you can see in this short report.

If you walk on New York City streets (or frankly anywhere in the U.S.), you’re well aware of how much unlawful and dangerous driving happens on nearly every block: red light running, speeding, double-parking, you name it.

I first moved to NYC in 1991, and one thing that seems to have gotten much worse since then is the percentage of drivers who fail to signal their turns. I’ve lost count of the times I’ve been walking or bicycling and nearly been hit by drivers who didn’t use their directionals. Anecdotally, I would estimate that about 25 or 30 percent of drivers don’t signal.

So I set out to put my theory to the test where I live in Jackson Heights, Queens, taping the first 100 turning drivers I saw. I won’t spoil the final count, but this video is more evidence of the poor quality of driving across the city. Failing to use blinkers makes it hard for walkers, bikers, and other motorists to anticipate a driver’s behavior — this is basic Driver’s Ed, people — but so many people just don’t do it.

Every week we read horrible stories of drivers crashing into pedestrians or mounting sidewalks — and yet hardly anyone is ever charged or even issued a ticket. NYPD could be issuing plenty of tickets for drivers failing to signal turns on just about any block at anytime. They could start a crackdown tomorrow, it doesn’t require more legislation. It doesn’t require an officer to be stationed in a car with a radar gun. Just stand on the corner and pull people over. Simple.

NYPD credits cracking down on small crimes with helping to dramatically lower the city’s overall crime rate. If we started to show less tolerance for “smaller” infractions, might drivers in NYC eventually change their overall driving habits?

We continue our Streetfacts series by looking at the data on driving in the U.S. Per-capita driving has declined every year since 2005. That’s not a blip, it’s now an 8-year trend.

The reason? Neither the state of the economy nor changes in gas prices offer a satisfactory explanation. Social preferences and demographic shifts seem to be playing a role. Young people today are less likely to own a car or have a driver’s license than young people several years ago. At the same time, America’s growing population of seniors are no longer in their peak driving years.

Whatever the combination of factors, people are riding transit, walking, and bicycling more. Even Motor Trend is examining the shift away from cars.

The upshot is that we need to start making smart transportation investments that align with the new reality: Americans are driving less.

Welcome to the first of five shorts we’re calling Streetfacts. With Streetfacts, we’ll be highlighting developing trends affecting transportation and planning policy, as well as addressing the cost of “bad practices” that prevent us from shifting to a more balanced transportation network that supports more livable places.

As Streetfilms viewers know, many of the big cities in the U.S. are in the midst of expanding their bicycle networks by installing protected bike lanes. We’ve shown these projects in New York City, Chicago, and Washington, D.C., but some of the newest cities installing them are smaller cities you might not be aware of. Places like Missoula, Flagstaff, Indianapolis, Austin, and Memphis have either installed protected lanes or are breaking ground shortly.

Over the next five weeks, we’ll be publishing the rest of the Streetfacts series, which we hope will come in handy in your advocacy. And if they’re a big hit, we’ll take nominations for other topics and make another batch of Streetfacts later in the year.