We’ve been urging people to get out of their cars for years. Right now when our physical, emotional, and mental health are at risk it would be a great time to consider opening streets to walkers, bicycle riders, and any other modes of transportation that would enable people to get around and get fresh air and exercise. We can walk, jog, roll around our towns with 6′ between us, smile and wave, and remain a community. We can prioritize people over cars right now. **This photo is of a dead bollard at the corner in front of my house. It’s an intersection that kids use every everyday for school, and now for breakfast and lunch. Someone ran over it, then later another driver ran over it again and dragged it down the block. Let’s make streets for people NOW.
Guest opinion: We should open up neighborhood streets for social distancing
Posted by Jonathan Maus (Publisher/Editor) on March 16th, 2020
**This article is by Sam Balto, a Weston Award Winner and Physical Education teacher at Cesar Chavez Elementary School in north Portland. We last heard from him when he launched a guerrilla safety campaign using red cups to protect bike lanes.**
During our time of social isolation, our community still needs physical activity and fresh air. Our network of neighborhood greenways should be carfree while we are in a State of Emergency. This would allow for ample open space for people not using cars. People could enjoy safe social distancing without the threat of being run over by drivers.
You’ve read it here again and again: almost 40,000 Americans died in automobile-related crashes last year. Injuries from crashes are a national health crisis, as well as illnesses related to pollution and obesity. We’re spending more time than ever in our cars because our roads have been designed to prioritize driving above any other mode of transportation. Many are carrying unsustainable debt for their vehicles, not to mention the cost of insurance, fuel, and car storage (aka parking). It doesn’t have to be this way.
Polling shows that Americans want more options than just driving. The Green New Deal for Transportation can get us there.
In February 2019, Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY-14) and Senator Ed Markey introduced the Green New Deal to Congress, momentous legislation that, if passed, would set goals for future climate lawmaking. But the bill had one glaring omission: it was “devoid of the bold reimagining of federal transportation spending which encourages more roads, more driving, more sprawl, and more emissions,” as T4America director Beth Osborne wrote at the time.
The overwhelming majority of federal transportation spending is allocated for roads, leaving limited funds available for more sustainable modes like transit, walking, and biking. As a result, fewer than 10% of Americans currently live within walking distance of frequent transit. The collective “sidewalk gap” in U.S. cities easily adds up to tens of billions of dollars, and the Americans with Disabilities Act mandate to make streets accessible remains unfunded, leaving too many people isolated in their homes. Our roadways are designed to move vehicles at the highest speeds possible, with devastating consequences. More than 35,000 Americans die in automobile-related accidents every year, and pedestrian fatalities have increased by 35 percent
in the past decade. Americans are spending longer than ever in their cars – and taking on unsustainable levels of debt to pay for those cars. These realities are treated as a necessary part of the American transportation system, but it doesn’t have to be this way.
Strong Towns is an international movement that’s dedicated to making communities across the United States and Canada financially strong and resilient.
Throughout the past 5 years we’ve utilized tools and resources from Strong Towns. We’ve learned and shared ways to build a better, more equitable city for everyone. Now we’re facing the real, imminent challenges that face cities everywhere – it’s all about how to take care of one another. Let’s be the best we can be right now “to make our systems more bottom-up and responsive. To make them more humane.”
“What you imagine as overwhelming or terrifying while at leisure becomes something you can cope with when you must-there is no time for fear.”
— Rebecca Solnit, A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities That Arise in Disaster
“I think we are about to witness the best humans have to offer each other.
That’s what Solnit documents in her book. During times of stability, society seems to accept the grinding decline of these failed systems. Yet, during times of distress, leaders – especially at the most adaptable local level – step forward and fill the gaps left by incompetence and inflexibility. We need to support these people because, despite the scariness of the unknown, this is an opportunity to reshape the direction of our entire country. To make our systems more bottom-up and responsive. To make them more humane.
The outbreak of COVID-19, is one more strike against mass transit with public health agencies urging people to avoid public gatherings, and “social distancing. “It’s still early to know exactly how this will unfold, but without proper mitigation efforts from local governments, we could be feeling the effects of coronavirus on public transportation service for years to come.”
Mass transit has pretty much always had a bad reputation in popular culture – bus and subway riders in film are often depicted as poor and derelict at worst, and just short of miserable at best.
Ride share like Uber and Lyft has chipped away at transit ridership, flooding streets with more cars, and undermining struggling transit systems. “The legacy of these companies amounts to a warning to the public and policymakers: If you do not provide people with good transportation options, they will take bad ones.”
One way for people to avoid exposure during the outbreak of COVID-19 is to ride bikes, but in some cities like NYC, with “cyclists are reporting huge increases in biking this week” the conditions for bicyclists are not optimal, and the administration isn’t currently planning to focus on better bike infrastructure, as seen in this film: Streetfilms: Biking is the Way to Beat Coronavirus.
As spring approaches in Asbury Park we can get around within this 1.4 mile sq. city on foot, on bikes, and we can utilize other micro-mobility options as they become available. Supporters of Asbury Park Complete Streets Coalition can continue to lobby for more and better infrastructure for walking and biking in the city, now and onward.
Coronavirus is beginning to upend American life. The stock market is crashing, universities are cancelling classes or moving them online, conferences are being canceled, and airlines are struggling. Unsurprisingly, public transportation is also going to be greatly impacted. It’s still early to know exactly how this will unfold, but without proper mitigation efforts from local governments, we could be feeling the effects of coronavirus on public transportation service for years to come.
APCSC Panel Advocacy In Action: Initiative to Acceptance to Implementation
(Clip 1)
NJBWC Summit March 7th, 2020
For those who would like to learn more about bike and walk advocacy~
Here is the first part of the APCSC NJBWC Panel: Advocacy In Action: Initiative to Acceptance to Implementation
A great panel comprised of advocates from 5 Jersey Shore towns. Stay tuned for more…
This article fairly states that not all people who drive expensive cars are terrible, but …”the best predictor of whether a car would stop was its cost, researchers discovered. “Disengagement and a lower ability to interpret thoughts and feelings of others along with feelings of entitlement and narcissism may lead to a lack of empathy for pedestrians” among costly car owners, they theorized in the study.”
People who walk may not be able to afford a car, or may choose not to own one. Either way, people walking appear to be “less than”. People walking are labeled with the slightly less-than-human term, “pedestrian”, and have been literally pushed to the narrowest edges of the roadway since the early decades of the 20th century. People who walk must wait for light signals to cross the street waiting in precipitation, cold, or heat, allowing drivers priority, and don’t get me started on those”beg buttons” that only sometimes actually do anything. Road engineering focuses on Level of Service (LOS) for automobiles, and people walking have become marginalized.
It will take a real effort to change “windshield bias”, which refers to a decision-making prejudice in favor of, or deference to, a car driver’s perspective above all others. Drivers have been brainwashed since the early 20th century when automobiles began rolling off assembly lines, and the intention of the industry was to enable almost everyone to own a car – or to aspire to own one. When cars became available in colors other than black, the auto industry began to sell status. It wasn’t long until cars were designed to have personality. The drivers of certain vehicles began to identify with the cars they drove, and advertising continues to exploit that dynamic to great profit. Cars are even designed with the appearance of a face in front, which can convey power, anger, etc. Drivers themselves are ascribed more status if they drive a more powerful looking, expensive, or bigger vehicle. Manufacturers are making more bigger, taller SUVs and trucks, imbuing a sense of power in the driver.
“…everything about our car-focused world tells drivers that they’re the rulers of the road. Expensive cars only amplify that sense of entitlement to public space and aggression towards pedestrians who violate it.”
Study: Car Sticker Price is a Predictor of Driver Aggression Towards Walkers
The more expensive the car, the less likely the driver is to yield to a pedestrian in a crosswalk. But why?
By Kea Wilson
“…the more expensive the cars got, the more often the driver failed to hit the brakes. For every extra $1,000 on the sticker, the driver was three percent less likely to let pedestrians pass safely.
That observation held true whether the pedestrian was white or black, female or male. Drivers were even less likely to yield for African-American participants — they only did so a shockingly low 25 percent of the time, compared to the 31 percent of drivers who braked for white participants. And they were least likely to yield for African-American men, confirming the findings of previousstudies.
The media promptly exploded with news of the study, and safe streets proponents across the country echoed the researchers’ speculation that the spendy-cars-drivers failed to yield because they “felt a sense of superiority over other road users.” But why, exactly, did BMW drivers feel superior to those poor schmucks out walking in 100 degree Vegas heat? Twitter users had one idea: because they’re all rich psychopaths who don’t care about poor people, and pedestrians are usually at least perceived to be poor.”
There is plenty of evidence showing that lowering speed limits and reducing the availability of parking makes roads safer for pedestrians, cyclists, and drivers, according to this survey. Research suggests that even high-density cities have too much parking that’s priced too cheaply. We believe that residents and visitors are wiling to support Asbury Park becoming a truly people-oriented city, by implementing plans to prioritize people over cars: Asbury Park Plan for Walking and Biking.
It’s not an easy process even in a small city, with overarching state regulations and outmoded engineering practices. City leaders and our Transportation Manager, with the support of Asbury Park Complete Streets Coalition are taking steps to enable visitors and residents to get around safely without cars by reducing speed limits, creating traffic calming devices, better infrastructure for biking and walking, and offering alternative transportation.
Boston University’s Initiative on Cities (IoC) was released on Tuesday, January 21, in Washington, D.C. The annual report collects data from interviews with more than 100 mayors across the country about their most pressing concerns and provides insight into the problems they’re grappling with.
Now in its sixth year, the 2019 IoC survey asked mayors for the first time about the extent to which they are taking up the call, from cyclist and pedestrian advocates as well as many transportation experts and urban planners, to reorient their cities away from cars.
Mayors Say Their Cities Are Unsafe for Pedestrians, Cyclists—but Cars Still Rule
Highlights from annual BU-led 2019 Menino Survey of Mayors
“When city leaders make it easier to park, they encourage car commuting,” the survey authors write, citing The High Cost of Free Parking (Routledge, 2005) by Donald Shoup, a UCLA professor. “This both worsens congestion and creates a constituency of regular drivers who demand more parking, resulting in a potent political obstacle to reforming urban parking systems.”
Although mayors broadly support bicycle lanes, they may not be aware of current best practices in cycling infrastructure design, according to the survey. While the most recent analyses show that painted bike lanes may make conditions more dangerous for cyclists, a striking 82 percent of mayors believe that painted bicycle lanes are a safe alternative when physically separate bicycle lanes are too expensive.
“The evidence suggests that paint alone—either in separate or shared bicycle lanes—does not improve cyclist safety,” the survey says.
A few mayors acknowledged the problem. “Painted bicycle lanes are useless,” one mayor told interviewers. “They’ve got to be separate.”
The US is the only Nation to dissociate from the Global Declaration on Preventing Road Deaths – because it supports the oil, gas, and the automotive industries. This administration denies the problem of road deaths, just as it denies climate change, and has withdrawn from the Paris Climate Accord.
The numbers of death-by automobile is staggering in the US alone – almost 40,000 last year.
“GLOBALLY, MORE THAN 1.3 million people per year are killed in road crashes, with a further 50 million people seriously injured. Such crashes are the leading cause of death for children and young adults aged 5–29 years.”
Carlton Reid Contributor Business
U.S. Only Nation To Dissociate From Global Declaration On Preventing Road Deaths
The U.S. has refused to sign up to a new declaration on road safety. The so-called Stockholm Declaration was issued at the Third Global Ministerial Conference on Road Safety held in Stockholm, Sweden, February 19–20.
Out of more than 140 attending nations the U.S was the only one that issued a dissenting statement.
Etienne Krug, director at WHO’s Department of Social Determinants of Health, said that if motorized road transport did not yet exist “no sane government would permit it.”
He said that the Stockholm Declaration could enable the world to “move quickly towards a safe, healthy, and clean transport system for everyone.”
However, the dissent from the U.S. could slow this progress, claimed Vancouver-based city planner Brent Toderian:
“The U.S. delegation using its stubborn car-only doctrine, and radical ideology of climate emergency denial as excuses to stand in the way of real traffic death solutions is sadly just par for the course for the Trump Administration.”
Further linking the U.S. dissent on road crashes to that on climate change, Toderian added:
“As with other important issues needing global leadership and partnership, the rest of the world must proceed without hesitation, with or without America.”
Amsterdammer Lotta Crok (10) was named the world’s first Junior Bicycle Mayor, representing the voices of some 125,000 children in Amsterdam (14 and younger). Katelijne and Lotta have been working closely together on various projects to boost cycling uptake and safety among children, campaigning for public transportation bike rentals (OV fiets) for children for example.
Lotta passed the torch to the new junior mayor on 4 July, during the ‘Bicycle Heroes’ event at NEMO Science Centre. This competition saw over 150 Amsterdam children, aged 8-11, submit their creative ideas for making cycling better – and safer – for all kids in the city.”
There have miraculously been no traffic deaths in our tiny city (pop. approx. 16,000) of Asbury Park in recent years, considering the huge numbers of drivers who appear in the summer season – it really is a miracle- But Asbury Park Complete Streets Coalition believes that we can prevent any future deaths and serious injuries if we reduce miles traveled, restrict cars from most streets in our main city center, and provide alternative modes of transportation. We can create a true city for people. #driversareguests #toomanycars
The city of Oslo (pop. almost 700, 000) has succeeded in lowering death-by-car to only ONE in 2019, and the city, and the Governor says even that is one too many: “Governing mayor of Oslo, Raymond Johansen, told SmartCitiesWorld: “We have a vision of zero traffic deaths in our city. When one person is killed in traffic, it is one too many. But this takes us closer to our vision. Safety is at the core of our transportation policy.”
Nearly 1.25 million people die in road crashes each year, on average 3,287 deaths a day. WHY? We know the reason is vehicles. #toomanycars. And yet traffic engineers still design roads to accommodate automotive traffic, and focus on Level Of Service (LOS), focusing on the movement of motor vehicles, which promotes dangerous, high-speed streets and sprawling land use.
Quoting Streetsblog USA from the article below, “Cities around the U.S. have been slow to follow up on such success…”
In the Planetizen article at the bottom of this post, you’ll see how reducing Vehicle Miles Traveled, or VMT (basically restricting traffic) will reduce traffic related fatalities and injuries. But as the article states, “some cities are making progress, (but) most jurisdictions are failing.”
Oslo’s governing mayor tells SmartCitiesWorld how the city is making its streets safer, and that autonomous vehicles could help with retaining and improving the results.
Beautiful cityscape of Oslo on a summer day, Norway
The sole death in Oslo was a man whose car collided with a fence in June.
According to the World Health Organisation, road traffic injuries caused an estimated 1.35 million deaths worldwide in 2016 and were the leading cause of death for children and young adults.
The most significant move Oslo officials made was devising a plan in 2015 to restrict cars from its square-mile city center and hike fees for entering and parking around the city’s core. Tolls rose in 2017 as the city removed 700 parking spaces and replaced them with 37 miles of bike lanes and pocket parks. The city center ban went into effect in early 2019 despite misgivings, but it was regarded as a model for other metropolises six months later. Cities around the U.S. have been slow to follow up on such success, though New York and San Francisco recently added a car-free thoroughfare to its transit mix.
Many jurisdictions have vehicle miles traveled (VMT) reduction targets, intended to reduce congestion and pollution. They can also provide large but often overlooked traffic safety benefits.
Although some cities are making progress, most jurisdictions are failing. U.S. traffic death rates declined during the last half of the the 20th century, reaching a low of 32,479 in 2014, but subsequently increased, averaging about 37,000 annual deaths during each of the last three years. New strategies are needed to achieve ambitious safety goals.
Although the United States has rigorous road and vehicle safety standards, and numerous traffic safety programs, it also has the highest per capita traffic death rate among developed countries. Why? Because people in the United States also drive more than residents in peer countries, as illustrated below.
