Let’s Make Room For Scooters

Let’s Rethink What a ‘Bike Lane’ Is

How about “light individual transport lane”? “LIT”

Andrew Small Aug 24, 2018

Let’s make room for scooters. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson – RC1178259840

“…trying to think of the correct new term for “bike lane” as we proliferate more vehicle types that run more or less at the speed and width of bicycles but are clearly not bicycles, such as electric scooters. The two logical terms seem to be narrow lane or midspeed lane. One way or another the two concepts will need to track with each other.

I wonder if this kind of language can make our sense of the role of these lanes more flexible, and thus less divisive.”

“I liked suggestions like ‘low-impact transport’ and ‘light individual transport’ because it can get an acronym: LIT.”

With scooters collapsing the distinctions that divide drivers, bikers, and pedestrians, she sees an opportunity to “ride that wave into government,” she says. “People love these things, so let’s make space from them.”

August 27, 2018August 27, 2018

Exciting News From August 22, 2018 City Council Meeting

Highlights from August 22, 2018 City Council Meeting

“…proposed improvements include an
upgrade of the traffic signal at Third Avenue and Pine Street to include walk signals, 6 neighborhood
roundabouts, 4 vehicle activated traffic calming signs, and bike lanes…”

August 25, 2018

Pedestrian Safety Survey

To supporters of Asbury Park Complete Streets Coalition:

The most important part of APCSC mission is to help make streets safe for everyone, especially the most vulnerable.

Please fill out this survey to help improve pedestrian safety in our community, and enter to win a free iPad!

Please take the survey by 9/5.

www.social.pedestriansurvey.org

August 24, 2018August 23, 2018

Friday Funny: Get Fewer People Into Fewer Cars

“Let’s create Better Cities. Let’s ride Together.”

Uber isn’t the only solution to reducing traffic in cities, but ride sharing can eventually lead to fewer people owning cars and less congestion.

Uber Thinks Inside the Box in Its Big New Ad About Car-Clogged Cities

By Tim Nudd November 1, 2017

“…80-second spot called “Boxes,” from Swedish agency Forsman & Bodenfors, illustrates the problem through metaphor. It shows drivers tooling around in cardboard boxes rather than automobiles—the better to humanize the devastating crush of traffic and the emotional toll of such a physical problem, while also keeping things lighthearted.

Watch!

https://www.adweek.com/creativity/uber-thinks-inside-the-box-in-its-big-new-ad-about-car-clogged-cities/

August 23, 2018August 23, 2018

Vision Zero #Slowthecars

Vision Zero is working in cities all over the US. “To actually make progress or commit to Vision Zero, it will really take a transformative shift in how your city is prioritizing safe mobility.”

Asbury Park is actively working on strategies to reduce automobile speed on city streets. Stay tuned for our initiative #slowthecars.

Vision Zero Network Hires Big Gun To Focus on Slowing Drivers Down Already

By Angie Schmitt Aug 21, 2018

About 30 U.S. cities have committed to Vision Zero, but that’s the easy part. Map: Vision Zero Network

August 21, 2018August 20, 2018

Empowerment For Girls On Bikes

Asbury Park Complete Streets Coalition would like to see kids on bikes all over the city. Girls may need to be encouraged with a program like this in Newark!

For Some Girls, Empowerment Comes With Two Wheels and a Helmet

By Liz Leyden Aug. 19, 2018

Kala La Fortune Reed, left, taught Kaneisha Marable, 8, to ride a bicycle in Newark as part of a program run by Girls on Bikes, a nonprofit founded by Ms. La Fortune that seeks to increase the number of girls who ride bikes.

“What can happen is a self-perpetuating cycle: If the number of women is much lower than men, if you’re not seeing role models, if you’re not seeing someone who looks like you, cycling is not going to be appealing to you,” she said. “But these kinds of groups, where you have the role models and it’s social and it’s fun, that can change the culture.”

August 20, 2018August 20, 2018

LeBron Bikes

Asbury Park Complete Streets Coalition would love to see kids all over the city riding bikes every day! We’re working with the city to make streets safe for everyone to ride a bike or walk.

The LeBron James Interview About Bicycles

By Jason Gay Aug. 6, 2018

‘It was a way of life,’ says the world’s greatest basketball player. ‘If you had a bike, it was a way to kind of let go and be free.’

… last week’s school opening was perhaps the biggest signal of what bikes mean to James’s life. In the announcement for The “I Promise” School—which will admit 240 third- and fourth-grade students and expand until it stretches from first to eighth grade—was this detail: James’s family foundation has pledged to provide a free bicycle and helmet to every student.

August 17, 2018August 16, 2018

Designing A Transit Village

Last summer Asbury Park was granted a Transit Village designation and the city will be continuing to invite community input. The city of Compton had a wonderful “methodology to help it’s residents and stakeholders explore their own lived experiences, needs, and identity to develop community based solutions for the station area.”

Empowered Through Design: How a Purposefully Rudimentary Activity Sparks the Imagination

Memory can be an intensely powerful tool when planning for the future.

August 16, 2018 James Rojas

Building imaginary station area dioramas with objects actively engaged participants in the design process, rather than leaving it all up to the experts. Participants were able to communicate, illustrate, and negotiate ideas with others that would have been difficult by using existing maps and words alone. In fact, maps would have limited the creative, brainstorming process and would have appealed to people who can read maps. The object’s tactile, visual, and spatial elements gave participants, especially the elders, the opportunity to quickly test their ideas and design interventions with others. Through this process, new ideas emerged and developed with the help of others. In a short period of time the scenarios begin to take form and fill out the tabletops.

August 16, 2018August 15, 2018

Transit Equity Is A Local Issue

NJ Transit and in particular Asbury Park train service is integral to equitable transportation. NJ Transit has a lot of work to do and APCSC is engaged in conversation about it.

Transit Equity Starts at Home, Not in Washington

A federal law has done little to advance transportation fairness for low-income communities. Progress is up to local leaders.

JULY 31, 2018

August 15, 2018August 11, 2018

Lazy Reporting Of Pedestrian and Bicyclist Deaths And Injuries

It’s a crash. “The word “accident” exonerates the driver – with the implication that injuries and deaths of people walking or riding bikes are preordained or unavoidable. (This is intentional in our car obsessed culture.) And the blame is placed on the walker or person on the bike, relying on testimony of the driver because the victim cannot tell his side..read this story which got more coverage than most.

How Lazy Coverage of Pedestrian Deaths Obscures Why Streets Are So Dangerous

Angie Schmitt Aug 8, 2018