Sarah Goodyear

Sidewalks blocked by construction are a problem everywhere -- perhaps even more so since the real estate bubble burst, and so many projects have been indefinitely halted. Today on the Streetsblog Network, Broken Sidewalk reports on the issue from Louisville, Kentucky. Apparently developers in that city routinely make no provision for the safe passage of pedestrians during construction -- and one local advocacy group, the Coalition for the Advancement of Regional Transportation (CART) is calling for change:

Today on the Streetsblog Network, a post from member blog VTA Watch, which covers the Santa Clara Valley Transit Authority in California. The blog’s author discusses the impact of upcoming service cuts on the people whose mobility, and ability to participate meaningfully in their communities, depends on public transit. The post also goes on to … Continued

Today on the Streetsblog Network, member blog Riding in Riverside sets out to explode the myth of the "wundercar" -- a vehicle powered by sustainable fuels that will allow us to hold onto our driving lifestyle and all its accoutrements, while saving the planet and feeling "green."

Today on the Streetsblog Network, we have a post from Andrew Faulkner, who writes a blog called The Exquisite Struggle in St. Louis. Faulkner writes about how for many people his age (he's 25), living in a walkable neighborhood is a high priority. He has set his life up so that a car is just one of several options he has for getting around.

Pretty much everyone involved in the movement for livable streets has by now read the reports and studies about the importance of street design in pedestrian safety. But nothing can bring the point home like what happened to the writer of the Streetsblog Network blog Imagine No Cars: He was hit by a car.

Steve Patterson, the writer of Streetsblog Network member blog UrbanReviewSTL, has long been a fan of anti-sprawl guru James Howard Kunstler. But Patterson takes issue with Kunstler in a post today about the new St. Louis Amtrak station, a multimodal facility that also serves as a bus depot and light rail link. Kunstler just named it as his "eyesore of the month."

If you are a person who rides a bicycle, how do you refer to yourself? As a cyclist? A biker? A bicyclist? Or simply as…a person? Who rides a bicycle?

We heard from a few people over the holiday break who were disgusted by the Jan. 2 New York Times op-ed from U2 front man -- and celebrity environmentalist -- Bono. In it, the pop star called for the "return of the automobile as a sexual object."

Anyone who's ever maintained a blog knows how easily it can burn you out. So we'd like to give a special welcome back to one of our Streetsblog Network members, WalkBikeCT, which has returned to the keyboard with a renewed sense of purpose after a few months of hiatus.

Today on the Streetsblog Network, member blog Sprawled Out takes on haters of New Urbanism -- specifically, Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel columnist Patrick McIlheran, who wrote a piece lauding a designer of subdivisions named Rick Harrison.