Afternoon links: Irrational conduct on roads

Ur doing it wrong, traffic engineers

A traffic engineer admits that his standards are all wrong and he and his colleagues have been designing unsafe roads for decades. (Strong Towns via @tomvanderbilt)

Bikes should defer to irrational drivers

Responding to a couple letters from readers, Dr. Gridlock clarifies that while it’s true cyclists have just as much a right to road space as automobiles do, he would advise against exercising that right stubbornly in the face of an irrational motorist. (Post)

BART has farecard cheating problem

After media outlets in San Francisco described how to cheat BART to the tune of up to $10 per trip using negative balances, the number of people doing it quadrupled. But BART says there’s no reason to fix the problem. (The Transit Wire, Matt’)  (Tip: Matt')

How walkable is your VA or MD city?

Walk Score added walkability “heat maps” for the 2,500 largest cities in the US. In the DC region, that includes Alexandria, Arlington, Fairfax City, Herndon, Leesburg, Manassas, Vienna, Bowie, College Park, Frederick, Gaithersburg, Greenbelt, Hyattsville, Laurel, New Carrollton, Rockville, and Takoma Park. Unfortunately, walkable places like Bethesda, Silver Spring, Tysons Corner, and Reston aren’t included (yet) because they aren’t “cities.” (Neither is Arlington, though.)

Why is urbanism liberal?

Shouldn’t libertarians and conservatives love removing parking minimums, adding density, and market-priced road tolls? Market Urbanism argues that it’s because liberals are the ones arguing for these policies, and they use liberal-sounding arguments to do so. Plus, planners don’t use free market solutions that often, like eschewing both parking minimums and maximums. (I’d add that nobody really follows a completely coherent political philosophy.)

Revisiting the flawed Urban Mobility Report

While CEOs for Cities’ report charging the TTI’s highly regarded Urban Mobility Report is flawed is old news, there’s a new, shorter take on the criticism based on Sprawlville and Compact City. (Sightline Daily)

Bus driver recovers ghost bike

When a man boarded a Portland bus with a ghost bike, the driver, suspecting it was stolen, confronted the man, eventually convincing him to leave the bike on the bus. Now it can be returned to its memorial position. (Bike Portland, Matt’)  (Tip: Matt')