Posts about Roads
-
Drive-through apartments
In Robert Heinlein’s (fairly bad) book I Will Fear No Evil, cities have become so dangerous that residents drive their cars directly into their buildings, up car-sized elevators, and right to the doors of their apartments. Early in the book a significant figure is murdered because she tries to use the pedestrian entrance. Now, via Streetsblog, such a building is under construction… Keep reading…
-
The federally tilted playing field on transportation
The Washington Post recently ran an article exploring the impact of the Federal Transit Administration on transit projects. Fierce competition for the FTA’s limited transit funding and strict criteria mean that states are forced to make many changes, wise or unwise, to their projects to qualify. Virginia had to drop plans to put the Tyson’s Corner segment of the planned… Keep reading…
-
Grander Army Plaza
Brooklyn’s Grand Army Plaza could be a terrific public square. Qt the northern end of Prospect Park, it was designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux to be a gateway to Prospect Park, and features a beautiful arch modeled on Paris’s Arc de Triomphe. Keep reading…
-
Conservatives for congestion pricing
“I can’t believe I’m saying these words,” wrote Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer, “but I applaud the Bush Administration for their forward thinking on the issue of congestion and thank them for their willingness to work with local governments to address their unique problems.”… Keep reading…
-
“Improvement”
Before: Keep reading…
-
Closing the bowtie
Times Square is one of the most crowded pedestrian areas in the city. As I covered over a year ago, the Times Square Alliance, the local business association, suggested closing the cutover between Seventh Avenue and Broadway - the “bowtie”, to create additional pedestrian space between the two avenues. … Keep reading…
-
Good riddance ugly planters
Times Square is crowded. At almost all hours, the sidewalks are full of pedestrians. But that didn’t stop a bunch of buildings from installing large planters or other barriers after 9/11. They ostensibly kept potential terrorists from driving up to the buildings, but more often (i.e. almost constantly) kept potential pedestrians from having room to… Keep reading…
-
Freeways that never were
In the 1950s and 60s, urban planners were busy constructing freeways across America, through plains and mountains where they were needed, and into the centers of cities where they bulldozed vibrant communities and hastened sprawl and urban decay. Keep reading…
-
Gowanus tunnel?
In The Power Broker, Robert Caro describes the Gowanus Expressway as one of Robert Moses’ first of many terrible highway projects. He ran the highway right down the center of Sunset Park, completely covering the then-vibrant Third Avenue despite the neighborhood’s pleas to run it closer to the waterfront. The Gowanus needs to be replaced, and since the… Keep reading…
-
Bravo Gale
For many reasons, some known, some not known, the New York City Department of Transportation is still mostly stuck in the SimCity Classic phase of urban planning thinking, closer to Robert Moses than Jane Jacobs. While they did recently suggest, to the surprise of many observers, converting a segment of Willoughby Street in Downtown Brooklyn to be pedestrian-only, DOT Commissioner… Keep reading…