Author: APCSC

Asbury Park is perfectly situated to be a people-centric community–it’s built in to our existing design!  At a little over a mile square, and with a developing and reconfigured Main Street, plus schools within walking distance within the city, we are set to be a model of what can be done with a small American city,.  We’ll join the most vibrant cities of Europe and forward-thinking cities in the US.

“Despite the lack of any substantial off-street parking, the sidewalks are alive and well with full storefronts and a steady stream of foot traffic. Unlike most commercial corridors, Millbrook embraces the kind of human-scale development often prohibited by local zoning in spite of nearly ubiquitous demand.”

“With the proliferation of form-based codes and rejection of parking minimums gaining steam, it’s clear there is demand for change. Towns seeking to become economically resilient and differentiate themselves as more than another series of congested strip malls and subdivisions can look to Millbrook as a model.

While Millbrook highlights the importance of mixed-use zoning and engaging with community assets, it also serves as a powerful reminder that great communities come in all sizes. Every town has the ability to counter the tradition of suburban development and embrace a new era of building great communities.”

Read more…

https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2018/1/22/3-lessons-for-building-a-great-community-from-a-very-small-town

There are a lot of Streetfilms resources for anyone who wants to get better bike lanes in their city!

START WITH A CORE OF DEDICATED VOLUNTEERS/COMMUNITY MEMBERS:  You simply can’t do it without some very motivated people in your city wanting to help manage and motivate your neighbors (and eventually push back against the sure to come NIMBY naysayers) The video below shows how it is done.

Read and see more…

http://www.streetfilms.org/great-strategies-to-get-protected-bike-lanes-in-your-city/

So much to unpack in this fascinating and enlightening article.  Worth an in-depth read!

The word “petextrian” is a preemptive attempt by automakers and their allies to invent a menace that’s a worthy successor to the jaywalker of a century ago.

Traffic crashes are the thirteenth most common cause of death in the United States, and the single leading cause of death for people aged eight to twenty-four. As with health care and gun violence, our record on road safety is now among the worst in the developed world, and it’s getting worse

“Everything we know from countries that have successfully reduced road deaths indicates that the most effective approach is to systematically redesign streets to prioritize safety over speed. The growing moral panic over being wired while walking takes none of this into account. Instead, Americans are increasingly being told that the solution is an arbitrary, punitive approach that has little evidence to back it up.

“Distracted pedestrian” laws aren’t really about the evidence, though. They are about maintaining the privileges of car culture as that culture is about to confront an enormous shift in the balance of civic and technological power—one that threatens to permanently upend the relationship between drivers and pedestrians.”

Read more…

https://thebaffler.com/latest/whos-afraid-petextrian-fraade

We know that streets are complete when they are safe for an 8-year-old or an 88-year-old…and the future is our children.  These kids at a nj competition are taking the opportunity to think outside the box and design age-friendly cities.

“By 2060, if not before, the United States is expected to have twice as many people over 65 than today, rising to nearly 24% of the population. Will our cities be livable for them? Maybe so, if their leaders follow some of the ingenious and thoughtful ideas that sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders presented at the Future City regional competition I attended in Piscataway, N.J. on Saturday.

Future City is an annual, project-based learning experience from DiscoverE, a volunteer movement aiming “to inspire the next generation of engineers and innovators.” It starts with a question for middle schoolers: How can we make the world a better place?”

Read more…

https://www.forbes.com/sites/nextavenue/2018/01/16/how-kids-would-make-age-friendly-cities/#3ec78e69183b

An interactive infographic from:

THE ASBURY PARK HOUSING AUTHORITY & THE CITY OF ASBURY PARK

AN UNBOUNDED VISION FOR THE WEST SIDE NEIGHBORHOOD

EQUITABLE AND SUSTAINABLE…

Read more…

http://asburyparkchoice.com/

Lawmakers support slowing vehicle speeds and often emphasizes the need to enforce speed limits.  In the interest of Vision Zero, all over the nation cities are implementing strategies like lowering speed limits and improved infrastructure to reduce and eliminate traffic fatalities, but enforcement too often disproportionately targets people of color.  APCSC focuses on equity in transportation and we are aware that education must be a main component for success in safe streets for everyone.

“According to the Oregonian, commissioner Nick Fish said the new 20-mph policy was a good start, but should be paired with police enforcement.

“There’s a big education piece, and there’s a huge enforcement piece,” he said. “Some people are not getting the message right now.”

Increased police enforcement, however, is one of Vision Zero’s more controversial components. As Josh Cohen wrote for Next City in 2016:

Equity-minded safer streets advocates have criticized Vision Zero’s emphasis on traffic enforcement because people of color get stopped by police at disproportionate rates to white people (a problem prevalent in Portland). And, as the high-profile deaths of Philando Castile, Walter Scott, Terence Crutcher and many others illustrate, those traffic stops can escalate in fatal ways. So there is concern that Vision Zero traffic enforcement could have unintended consequences in communities of color.”

Read more…

https://nextcity.org/daily/entry/70-percent-of-portland-city-streets-get-new-speed-limit?utm_source=Next+City+Newsletter&utm_campaign=9a8a3541e4-Daily_790&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_fcee5bf7a0-9a8a3541e4-44033881

Women all over the country make the decision to drive short distances rather than to walk, or they have no choice and walk on dangerous streets because infrastructure favors cars.  Asbury Park is working on street design that can make it safe and convenient for women to walk, especially with children.

“Poor street design, disparate land use, time constraints, lack of personal safety—all of these conspire to force women off their feet and into cars. We have built a transportation system that discounts women’s travel needs, and women—and our communities—are suffering for it.

To understand what we should be doing better, it’s important to understand how women’s travel is different from men’s travel. Women make more trips than men, but travel shorter distances. They travel more with children, and their trips are more likely to be household-serving (e.g., shopping, daycare, errands), rather than for work or leisure. Women are also more likely to trip-chain (stop at multiple locations along the way during one trip). In particular for women with young children who haven’t started school, gender drives travel patterns.”

Read more…

http://www.wherethesidewalkstarts.com/2018/01/sexism-on-sidewalk-how-poor-street.html

“We have seen a higher than expected number, in terms of ridership,” Transportation Manager Michael Manzella [at right] said. “One thing we have learned is that compared to similar sized cities with the same program, we are knocking all but one of them out of the park.”

http://asburyparksun.com/ap-bike-share-program-shows-higher-than-expected-return/

A study calls on Americans to do “everything possible” to address these preventable deaths

As Vox reports, the study’s authors attribute the U.S.’s high child mortality rate to its “fragmented” health care system, with insufficient preventative treatment due to lack of coverage and high childhood poverty rates in certain regions. Access to guns is highlighted as a “disturbing disparity” as teenagers are 82 timesmore likely to die from gun violence in the U.S.

But the motor vehicle deaths are cited as particularly preventable, because other countries are succeeding in preventing them, according to the study. Road fatalities have decreased universally over the last few decades due to campaigns targeting drunk driving and new safety innovations in cars.

Read more…

https://www.curbed.com/2018/1/10/16871152/traffic-deaths-children-vision-zero

Kate McKinnon of SNL parodies an auto industry lobbyist, Veronica Moss in this hilarious video.  You may not recognize her (with dark hair) as she talks about her “land boat” (her Hummer), and murmurs sweet phrases to her Lincoln Navigator.  She uses lines from car commercials as she strokes and kisses her SUV steering wheel…”there aren’t enough roads”!

For those of you new to @Streetfilms, Kate McKinnon has been in 3 of their films!

https://vimeo.com/12499634