Time Is Running Out to Become a Streetsblog Superhero — Give Today
This is it! The final days and the final giveaway of our spring pledge drive. So far, 221 superheroes have donated to Streetsblog and Streetfilms. To reach our goal, we need 179 more readers to step up and give by Sunday at midnight.
May 28, 2014
Be a Streetsblog Superhero and Give to Our Spring Pledge Drive
We’ve all seen the graphs: Driving and car ownership have passed their peak in America, while transit ridership and biking are on the rise. On the ground, however, city buses still move at a crawl, bogged down in traffic. Most streets remain too dangerous for most people to feel comfortable biking on them. And the traffic death toll continues to put our cities to shame compared to our global peers.
April 24, 2014
HUD Expected to Loosen Restrictions on Mixed-Use Financing Soon
As Smart Growth America showed us earlier today, the costs of sprawl are high. So it's a bitter irony that federal rules have made it more expensive to build compact, mixed-use development by tightly limiting the share of commercial space in projects that receive financing from the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
April 2, 2014
Should Streets Be Designed for Easy Double-Parking or Safe Bicycling?
After removing a downtown Providence highway segment, Rhode Island officials are figuring out how to redevelop 20 acres of prime city land. One outcome that local advocates are pushing for is a redesign of South Main Street with a two-way protected bike lane, reports James Kennedy at Transport Providence.
March 20, 2014
Parking Politics Take a Bite Out of Downtown Raleigh
Donald Shoup, the godfather of parking policy, likes to point out that city planners make decisions about parking based on the politics of avoiding on-street parking squabbles, instead of broad public policy concerns like the affordability of housing, the viability of transit, or the health of downtown. Today on the Streetsblog Network, Leo Suarez at the Raleigh Connoisseur has a story that illustrates Shoup's point really well.
March 18, 2014
Families of NYC Traffic Violence Victims Band Together for Safer Streets
On Sunday, New Yorkers who've lost loved ones to traffic violence gathered on the steps of City Hall in Lower Manhattan to launch Families for Safe Streets, a new initiative advocating for street designs and traffic enforcement that will save lives. In this moving Streetfilm, members of Families for Safe Streets talk about their goals and why they're speaking out.
February 25, 2014
Streetsblog Capitol Hill Is Now Streetsblog USA
I'm pleased to announce that our national news site has a new name: Streetsblog USA. Say it with pride.
February 4, 2014
Why TIME Magazine Got the Bixi Story Wrong
Major media have a habit of blowing bike-share problems out of proportion. Witness the 2009 BBC story that cast theft and vandalism as an existential threat to Velib in Paris. Five years later, Velib is still going strong. The most recent entry in the genre is Christopher Matthews' misguided story on the Bixi bankruptcy in TIME. Headline: "Why America’s Grand Bike-Sharing Experiment Is Failing."
January 22, 2014
Bixi Bankruptcy: What Does It Mean for American Bike-Share?
The Montreal-based equipment supplier for several American bike-share systems, including New York's Citi Bike and Chicago's Divvy, filed for bankruptcy protection yesterday. It's unclear exactly how the restructuring or sale of the company known as Bixi will play out, but the bankruptcy filing could accelerate the transition to more robust and reliable hardware and software. It also figures to be a messy process, though the company that operates Citi Bike expressed confidence today that it won't impede their service.
January 21, 2014
We’re Hiring: Streetsblog Is Searching for a Managing Editor
Streetsblog is looking for a talented journalist to shape and oversee coverage throughout our growing family of news sites.
January 17, 2014