Stories tagged with "livable streets"

Summer Streets a Success!

Posted by Glenn on August 23, 2008 - 10:00am in The Oil Drum: Local
Topic: Environment/Sustainability
Tags: bicycling, livable streets, new york city, summer streets [list all tags]

For the last two weeks, NYC has experimented with an idea of making a major avenue in Manhattan car-free for no particular reason than for the enjoyment of residents and visitors. There were no streetfair vendors hawking $3 tube socks or blended drinks from noisy & polluting generators. Nor was there any excuse like the Marathon or a parade where only invited guests are allowed to run or walk down the middle of the streets.

This was different.

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Enjoying Life Close to Home: Fun Streets

Posted by Glenn on July 19, 2008 - 9:00am in The Oil Drum: Local
Topic: Environment/Sustainability
Tags: ciclovia, fun, livable streets [list all tags]

As we consider how to re-design our car-centric landscape, one idea that may be taking hold across the country is to close streets to automobile traffic at times and return that space to the people as a public space to be enjoyed.

We took a look at Bogata's Ciclovia earlier this year. Last month in Portland, they held a first ever "Sunday Parkways". What is "Sunday Parkways"?

What is Sunday Parkways?

6 miles, 6 hours, zero traffic~!

A circular route of city streets open to walk, bike, run, jump & skip - without having to watch out for cars!

A 6 mile "temporary park", connecting North Portland neighborhoods and residents.

A relaxed, non-competitive, FREE event featuring a variety of activities in 4 parks and along the route.

What you see here is people having fun close to home. The places we drive dozens or hundreds of miles to visit - quiet places without cars and trucks - can exist in our own front yards if we only have the will to say no to cars. Next Stop is my hometown: New York City.

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Intersection Repair: Building Community Over Automobile Throughput

Posted by Glenn on June 19, 2007 - 8:00pm in The Oil Drum: Local
Topic: Sociology/Psychology
Tags: community, intersection repair, livable streets, oregon, portland [list all tags]

Here in NYC, over the last month, we have seen a radical transformation in the upper levels of the city's department of transportation. Much of this has been because of the persistence of a few dozen transportation advocates who have successfully won favor within the Bloomberg Administration for their ideas of streets as public places requiring safe routes for pedestrians and cyclists and more access for mass transportation by taking back street space from personal automobiles. What we call: Livable Streets. Streetsblog (which I also write for) received some well deserved credit today by the NY Times' City Room.

In looking at what is going on around the country with the livable streets movement, I came across this excellent video of something called "Intersection Repair"

Intersection Repair

"City Repair" in Portland, Oregon hosts an annual Village Building Convergence where hundreds of people come together to build diverse projects for the benefit of their communites and to take back their streets via a process known as Intersection Repair.

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