In this Streetfilm by Elizabeth Press, New Yorkers enjoy a block party on West 87th Street in Manhattan. The June event was one of dozens sponsored this summer by the New York City Streets Renaissance, many of them still to come. At over 3,000 block parties per year, New Yorkers mark their independence from traffic and pollution. How are you celebrating your car-freedom this 4th of July weekend?

Too good to be true, right? But that's the slant of the front-page headline in today's Times, "Politics Failed, but Fuel Prices Cut Congestion":

Soaring gas prices and higher tolls seem to be doing for traffic in New York what Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's ambitious congestion pricing was supposed to do: reducing the number of cars clogging the city’s streets and pushing more people to use mass transit.

The article reports that traffic on MTA bridges and tunnels within the city and the Port Authority's Hudson River crossings was down this spring by 4-5 percent compared with a year ago -- within hailing distance of the 6.3 percent drop sought by the mayor's plan.

Good news, but how much of the decline is due to the price of gas and how much to the toll increases that took effect around the same time?

Three days after the debut of Bx12 Select Bus Service, Bronx resident and Tri-State Transportation Campaign Associate Director Veronica Vanterpool rode the route from Co-op City to Inwood. On Mobilizing the Region, she reports that riders are becoming accustomed to the pre-payment system and rear-door boarding, with the help of bus drivers and New York City Transit personnel.

Vanterpool's trip was unobstructed -- for the most part.

Fordham Road, a dense shopping district, is one of the most congested areas along the route and it was refreshing to see cars backed up in Fordham Plaza while the bus cruised by in the empty bus lane. However, a few blocks ahead, our smooth sailing was interrupted by a NYCT van and two delivery vans.

Vanterpool says police are continuing to monitor the lanes, and that nearly 100 tickets were handed out on Monday, the first weekday of SBS service. Her ride was 48 minutes, compared to the pre-SBS average of 65. Vanterpool predicts that time savings will increase as passengers get used to the system's features, as long as "vigilant enforcement" of bus lanes continues.

Photo: Mobilizing the Region

Why have Danes again been named the happiest people on the planet? Early this year ABC News cited bikes as "perhaps ... the best symbol of Danish happiness," and in this clip from "Contested Streets" it isn't hard to see why. Here, livable streets guru Jan Gehl and others explain the many ways an increase in bike traffic (now one-third of all commutes) has improved life in the capital city of Copenhagen.

But it didn't happen overnight. Rather, it took four decades of gradual change to make Copenhagen the place it is today. As for replicating that success elsewhere, says Gehl: "if you don't have enough nice spaces, you can see these [become] overcrowded spaces. Then you should just make more spaces."

An increase in the number of traffic agents, called for in PlaNYC, was cut from the city budget approved Sunday. The agents were to patrol new bus lanes and ticket cars under the anti-gridlock law just approved in Albany. Previously, only police officers could write the tickets. Adding agents is now slated for fiscal 2010.

According to the 2008 PlaNYC progress report [PDF], the new hires had already been postponed, so this is the second year in a row that beefing up the number of traffic enforcement agents will be delayed. Makes you wonder if the money will be there in 2010, as hoped for.

Earlier this year, when Richard Brodsky was touting his version of a congestion mitigation plan [PDF], the Westchester Assemblyman championed better enforcement as a key alternative strategy to pricing. His plan, which he introduced in the State Assembly as bill number A10198, also included a provision for 100 additional traffic agents. (It did not, incidentally, include red-light or bus-lane cameras.)

The bill never came up for a vote. Now the city is having trouble funding the same number of agents (we have a request into the mayor's office to determine why this provision was singled out). Will Brodsky and the Assembly Democrats who stood with him in February back up their talk next session, and push for the enforcement measures in A10198? Inquiries placed to his office yesterday afternoon and this morning have not yet been returned.

[T]he van's driver stopped briefly to watch the boy writhe in pain on the road before driving off, police said Tuesday. The strange thing is, that up to that point, he hadn't done anything wrong, as far as police know.

"I can't imagine that he didn't know that he had hit someone," Detective Sgt. William Rand said.

Until the van's driver left the scene, the mishap did not appear to have involved any illegal act on the part of the van driver. "He should have stopped," Rand said. "This really would have been considered an accident."

So until he drove away from the scene, all the driver had done was run over and maim a child. It was a mishap. An accident.

Really, happens all the time.

Not to stoke the center vs. curbside lane debate, but here are a couple of shots of the Paris Mobilien Bus Rapid Transit system. As pointed out by Streetsbloggers, the Mobilien uses both types of lanes. And unlike New York's Select Bus Service, Paris BRT relies on preventative physical separation between buses and auto traffic, mitigating the need for more intensive enforcement measures like cameras, ticket agents and tow trucks.

Back in October of 2006, Streetsblog's Aaron Naparstek noted what could be the most substantial difference between New York's plan and successful systems in Paris and Bogotá -- a sentiment echoed following this week's SBS debut.

While New York City's BRT system will be a significant advance over what we have now, the lack of physical separation has the potential to be a system-breaker. Without physical separation, that single guy in the double-parked SUV may still have the ability to delay the morning commute of 80 New Yorkers. Sure, Mr. SUV gets a $350 ticket (if he's not a government employee). You're still late for work. 

Concrete curbs don't know from the likes of David Gantt. They don't go away when budgets come up short. They enforce 24/7. Yet New York will depend solely on police and, should Albany someday grant permission, cameras to chase drivers out of BRT lanes. Will it work? If so, how well, and for how long?

Photos: Aaron Naparstek

"All attendees agree that the pilot is worth going ahead with," Dutton said in an email. "We worked through the area that we're going to recommend for the pilot and discussed issues like the meters' effective hours and time limits."

DOT had distributed flyers throughout the neighborhood explaining that the pilot program was contingent on a positive verdict at the meeting. Few people attended despite the outreach, which Dutton interpreted as a sign that opposition to the idea is not strong. "My feeling is that this indicates that residents are not particularly concerned about 'protecting' unreasonably low meter rates and that businesses don't fear changes to the way things are done," he said.

A resolution on the peak parking proposal will be finalized at a CB2 transportation committee meeting on July 8, and will go to the full board on July 24 for a final vote. If implemented, the pilot program is expected to begin in September.

Photo: misplacedparadox/Flickr

Paul Revere embarked on his midnight ride from Boston to Lexington more than a year before the United States declared independence. Nevertheless, with the Fourth of July around the corner, this toon from Tom Toles seemed appropriate today. 

We are in desperate need of significant transit improvements. We've got to have the facilities and we don't today, and then we need the fare-box and economic policies that reward people for taking public transportation. Some try to say that it should be "self-sufficient" or have a certain percentage return through the fare-box. We don't do that on our roads, and public transportation is much better for so many reasons -- not just the environment or the quality of life. We should be providing much stronger incentives for people to use public transportation, but first you need to have the facilities.

I'm a big, big supporter of dramatic change in public transportation. It includes more than just the bus and rail systems in our urban areas. It includes a commuter rail and inner-city rail -- the whole gamut of services that get people out of their personal vehicles. I don't want people driving their personal vehicles the way they are today.

Even in the era of $4/gal gasoline, not many elected officials would go on record with such heresies. But that may be changing. Gas tax "holiday" talk has all but evaporated over the past few weeks as pols promote transit as an answer to higher gas prices. And a column in today's Boston Globe predicts that Senator John McCain's dogged and sustained effort to undermine Amtrak could create an opening for  transit-friendly Barack Obama heading into November.

"Bicycle racks are available outside for the convenience of bike riders," said Maya Israel, a spokeswoman for Tishman Speyer. “Bicycles are not permitted inside, for the safety of all our tenants and visitors."

While the supposed hazards posed by bikes inside a building remain unspecified, the scarcity of protected space is a known deterrent to would-be cyclists. The lack of secure parking is one of the main obstacles New Yorkers cite when asked why they don't commute by bike, according to a 2007 Department of City Planning survey [PDF, p. 19]. Not to mention, as Times reporter Colin Moynihan implies, that it's hardly "convenient" (or secure) to park your bike outside when only about 5,000 racks are available for 131,000 daily riders.

The piece, which omits the New York Times Building's own anti-bike history, culminates with a quote from bike commuter Robert Kotch that skewers the policies of commercial property owners:

“They work inside these fancy buildings where there’s this inexplicable hostile attitude towards bicycles,” he said. “It’s an arcane policy that says bikes are like the bubonic plague.”

Bike-friendly zoning regs can't come soon enough.

Photo: ynotbike/Flickr

Crain's reports that, according to Rep. Jerrold Nadler of Manhattan, New York would receive $237 million for transit if the bill clears the Senate and the White House, marking the "first time federal money would be used to support local mass transit operating costs." Advocates hope that adoption of the bill would set the stage for a priority shift in next year's big transportation funding package, the successor to SAFETEA-LU.

H.R. 6052 would have included a provision requiring oil companies to make the most of their federal land leases before opening up new areas to drilling, but that measure died under pressure from House Republicans and the White House.

Here's more about the bill, including the House roll call.

Photo: mikek/Flickr

I was in Seville last week for the first time since February 2007, and in the intervening year there's been something of a transportation revolution in the city. It's most visibly evident in the Sevici bike-share bikes (bicis in Spanish) that are everywhere. The system launched in April 2007, and ultimately there will be 250 stations and 2,500 bikes spread throughout the city of some 700,000 residents.

I saw the bikes in use by locals in all parts of town, including the rather bleak office parks and university complexes on the west side of the Guadalquivir River. The cycles seem less popular among tourists, although they're a great way to get around the very flat terrain -- and, at 5 euros for a weekly membership with the first half hour of each ride free, and very reasonable rates for longer use, they're a good option.

One of the most amazing things to me was how quickly the city has put in an extensive bike-lane network. The green-painted lanes lead you for miles and miles through the city's neighborhoods, and as far as I could tell, they're all protected. In many places, this is done by putting the bike lane in the street shielded by a low concrete barrier -- enough to deter cars, but far less unsightly than the Jersey barriers used in some parts of New York. Elsewhere -- and here is the revelation, as far as I'm concerned -- the bike lane shared the sidewalk with pedestrians. Not once, in nearly a week, did I see this causing any distress to pedestrians or cyclists (although one resident did grumble to me, somewhat half-heartedly, about reckless cyclists).

New York City Transit's Select Bus Service made its prime time debut this morning on the Bx12 line, which connects Co-op City in the Bronx with Inwood in Upper Manhattan via Fordham Road and 207th Street. As we reported in March, NYCT's brand of Bus Rapid Transit lets riders prepay the fare at bus stops, resulting in quicker boarding times once the aqua blue SBS bus arrives. (Fare collection is limited to MetroCards and coins; credit card functionality still to come.) Contrary to reports that the fledgling service is universally despised, the attendant we spoke with said that, aside from some confusion over how to handle transfers, customers were adjusting well.

Changing motorists' behavior is another matter. In spite of the fresh terracotta paint and new signage, the lanes on 207th Street were full of parked vehicles. As pictured after the jump, even transit supervisors were helping themselves, to the point that the NYCT employee mentioned it as a hindrance.

Thank you, David Gantt.

(more...)]]> http://www.streetsblog.org/2008/06/30/bus-riders-warm-to-select-bus-service-drivers-love-red-parking-lane/feed/ http://www.streetsblog.org/2008/06/30/city-council-signs-off-on-400-car-garage-in-hells-kitchen/ http://www.streetsblog.org/2008/06/30/city-council-signs-off-on-400-car-garage-in-hells-kitchen/#comments Mon, 30 Jun 2008 14:45:11 +0000 Ben Fried http://www.streetsblog.org/2008/06/30/city-council-signs-off-on-400-car-garage-in-hells-kitchen/ [...]]]> Last week, the New York City Council approved a special permit granting developer Glenwood Management the right to build a 400-car parking garage at 310-328 West 38th Street. The decision was not unexpected, as the permit had already been approved by the City Planning Commission earlier this month.

The garage, situated near the mouth of the Lincoln Tunnel, will add more traffic to the already-congested streets of Hell's Kitchen, but its approval has strengthened calls to review similar permits more carefully in the future. "There are some positives," said Christine Berthet of the Clinton/Hell's Kitchen Pedestrian Safety Coalition (CHEKPEDS) in an email message. "The Borough President's office, the City Planning Commission, and the council all have special permits on their radar, and the commission indicated they are ready to do 'something about parking.' The Speaker is also interested in a long term action."

As a 2005 re-zoning leads to a surge in development around the West Side railyards, adopting stricter standards for the approval of special permits could prevent a concurrent boom in parking. The leniency of the current approval process, said Berthet, flies in the face of the city's goals for air quality and traffic reduction, and approving a flurry of permits now would saddle the neighborhood with parking facilities for years. "The special permit is like radioactive material," she said. "It remains toxic for a very long time."

Photo of traffic on 10th Avenue: SarahNYC/Flickr

We can't set this one up any better than Mr. Eckerson himself, so without further ado:

At just about any public gathering I go these days, there's usually at least one person who will come up and give me an enthusiastic "Bike Box!", based upon our earlier, popular Streetfilm. In my heart I hoped there would one day be a sequel to Bike Box, and it all came together last week while in Portland at the World Car-free Conference. Earlier this year, Portland's Office of Transportation installed many high visibility bike boxes that are filled in lime green to help cyclists avoid right hook collisions. (Note: NYC now has a few green ones as well.)

What we were unprepared for was being stopped by random cyclists who wanted to lend their collective "Bike Box!" exclamations. So watch and see all the fun improv as it flows.

Clarence and the Streetfilms crew are also looking for homegrown bike box videos to feature in the Streetfilms sidebar. To participate, post a vid of bike boxes in your city on YouTube and tag it "streetfilms."

Bike Box!