Pedestrian Infrastructure

The Broadway tunnel, stretching from Hyde Street in Russian Hill to Powell Street in Chinatown, is one of the scariest places in San Francisco to ride a bike, and it's no walk in the park for pedestrians, either.

Last week Streetsblog spoke to walkability expert Dan Burden about how new design guidelines for urban streets can replace the suburban, car-oriented standards that have become the norm throughout America (read the interview here).

(Editor's note: This is Part 1 in a 3-part series on the Bay Area watershed)

One of the foundational documents in our country's history of car-centric street design is what's known as the Green Book. These engineering guidelines, which have been published in various editions by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) since the 1930s, are only "green" if you're looking at the cover.

With scores of people crowding the sidewalk and taking up one lane of traffic on Divisadero in front of Mojo Bicycle Cafe, Mayor Gavin Newsom, Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi and city department heads heralded a new "parklet" sidewalk extension as a piece of a growing trend of re-purposing street space for people instead of cars. The new trial parklet was built into the space formerly occupied by two parked vehicles, providing several hundred square feet of public space and benches, tables, planters and bike racks.

Hopefully you don't seethe too much about how many parsecs ahead of us New York City is in reclaiming space for people from cars, but we thought we'd share this momentous news from Streetsblog NY. Looks like Mayor Bloomberg has made a complete one-eighty from his position on traffic just a few years ago. The news actually gives us hope that Mayor Newsom, or his successor, will feel the Livable Streets spirit deep in his soul, too.

First Lady Michelle Obama took to the mikes this afternoon to kick off a national campaign to combat childhood obesity, emphasizing new initiatives to promote biking and walking alongside a strong focus on healthier food options in schools.

With the nation still digesting the State of the Union address, the Alliance for Biking & Walking picked an auspicious day to release their biennial Benchmarking report on America's bike-ped behavior. The group's bottom-line conclusion: federal transportation funding continues to disproportionately shortchange travelers powered by their own two feet.

As I climbed the steps out of the Lake Merritt BART station this morning I heard loud chanting. "Wow," I thought, "those bicyclists have really pulled out the troops!" But the demonstrators that greeted me across 8th Street in Oakland were pile drivers, iron workers, carpenters and other trades workers, chanting "Jobs for Oakland Now!" Not far from their boisterous demonstration in front of the main doors of the Joseph Brot Metro Center were a few cyclists showing their signs to passersby, "Bridge the Gap Now" "All the Way Across the Bay" and "Safety Path!" Across the street, Transform and Urban Habitat were also making their presence felt, opposing the Oakland Airport Connector that the building trades unionists were clamoring for.