On the Merits of Roundabouts
I grew up in Orange, California, a city that decided to forgo the traditional town square in favor of a circle. The Orange Circle is a two-lane roundabout surrounding a park and a fountain that was funded, I kid you not, back in 1886 through local bake sales. Every teenager in town learned to drive […]
Read MoreActivating Alleyways
My former downtown office was adjacent to a pedestrian alley known throughout the city as Alley A. Shops, restaurants, and apartments open up onto the walkway and it’s become a lively pedestrian thoroughfare. It wasn’t always this appealing. Drainage was a huge problem and the alley became a skating rink during the height of winter. […]
Read MoreWhat makes a street pedestrian friendly?
Vox had a great photo essay on how people used streets at the turn of the last century. It was an interesting follow up to their article on the history of jaywalking and further illustrated how the public street is now seen as primarily a thoroughfare for car traffic. Before cars were so ubiquitous, “city streets […]
Read MorePlay Streets
On a recent post about restoring the downtown street grid, Matt Boehner, planner for our city’s Parks and Recreation Department, had a great comment about reclaiming streets. Without a doubt, the default use of streets has become cars and any other use is considered an exception to that rule. (In fact, Vox recently had a […]
Read MoreUnclear on the Concept
“Really one of the things I’m most concerned about is that you’re going to have a bench that is 6 feet away from a diner’s table.” Dear Mr. Mayor: I just read with horror of the city’s plans to put benches on the sidewalk outside my corner restaurant. I really must protest as this will allow people […]
Read MoreRestoring the Street Grid
Austin is adding nine new streets to their downtown, restoring the street grid and fixing what is called a “transportation dead zone.” According to the Austin American Statesman: (Director of the Downtown Austin Alliance Charlie) Betts noted that adding streets reverses what has been a sporadic trend of the downtown grid losing pieces of streets over […]
Read MoreThe End of McMansions?
Time Magazine had an interesting piece on how the era of the McMansions, houses that top out at over 3,000 square feet, may be ending. It seems that “from 1950 to 2004, the average size of an American home jumped from from 983 square feet to 2,349 square feet.” Now this number is finally dropping. In […]
Read MoreMake Your Own Street
I just discovered Streetmix, a nifty online app where you build your own street. I put a lot of thought into my street–making sure there were dedicated bus lanes, bikes lanes, and lanes that cars and bikes could share. Sidewalks were wide enough for two people to walk side-by-side and there was plenty of room […]
Read MoreThe New SimCity Baffles Urban Planners
In a fascinating experiment, Fast Company brought in teams of urban planners to tackle the new SimCity. All were supporters of New Urbanism, an urban design movement that focuses on sustainability, walkability, mixed-use developments, and connectivity. The results were disastrous. Although the planing teams began with the best of intentions, they instead ended up with coal-fueled cities, […]
Read MoreArts Districts and the Power of Swerve
We walk through cities everyday but rarely do we ask how this messy mix of buildings, people and infrastructure came to be. Who planned this? Planning used to be fairly straight forward. It came from a man with a vision. A planner would look at a public space, decide the best use for it, and […]
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