I sat among birds and flowers watching trains go in and out of the western portal of the city’s main light rail subway on Sunday, April 14. I didn’t have to worry about cars in the Portal Gardens, because there are none. I was visiting Philadelphia, sitting in the park by that city’s “West Portal” for the train tunnel that connects downtown (or “Center City” as they call it) with the western suburbs. Fortieth Street Portal station used to look more like West Portal in San Francisco, but Philadelphia closed the area to traffic back in 1983 (the Trolley Portal Gardens were added in 2018). The tr ..read more

Interstate highway construction is not slowing down despite its harmful effects on health and displacement of communities of color. (Transportation for America) Since we now know that widening highways doesn’t help congestion and creates noise, pollution and health problems for nearby residents, why are states still seizing property and knocking down homes to add new lanes? (Frontier Group) Transit systems are mostly built for commuters, and that will have to change for ridership to recover in the post-COVID world where more people work from home. (The New Urban Order) Fast Company interviewe ..read more

This week we’re joined by Jim Kumon, Principal at Electric Housing, to discuss his work as a developer and urban policy educator in the Twin Cities. We chat about his sustainable development project, what St. Paul learned from Minneapolis 2040 and how zoning reform and transportation intersect. Scroll down for a partial edited excerpt from our conversation, or click here for an AI-generated full transcript. Jeff Wood: So Minneapolis is in place, obviously there’s lawsuits going on, but then St Paul’s looking at similar things and watching from afar — what do they learn? Jim Kumon: That turned ..read more

Do you swear on your mother’s placard? With the Adams administration under fire from the U.S. Department of Justice, Deputy Mayor Meera Joshi on Tuesday made a flat-out promise to eliminate illegal police parking that violates the Americans With Disabilities Act, though she also praised the city’s past accessibility efforts that, um, only came after threats of federal litigation. First, the promise: On Tuesday, after Streetsblog reminded Mayor Adams that the US Attorney for the Southern District called NYPD parking practices a violation of the ADA, Joshi responded for the mayor that the proble ..read more

As a longtime bicycle courier, and one of Chicago’s most adventurous bike riders and writers, George Christensen did extensive cycling trips in Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe, North America, and South America. These included biking the length of three continents and one subcontinent, India. Starting in 2001, he eloquently documented his travels on his well-read blog, George the Cyclist. But tragically, on Monday night Christensen’s life was cut short at age 73, when a truck driver fatally struck him as he rode through the southeastern United States. Yesterday morning sources notified Streetsb ..read more

As Jeff Tweedy well knows, forcing a loved one to give up their keys because they’re a danger to themselves and others is always tough (New York Times). But it evades the question of how and why our car-centric society isolates seniors and others who can’t or shouldn’t drive. Millions of Americans are forced to stretch their household budgets to afford the ever-rising cost of car ownership. (The Atlantic) Suburbanites are projected to adopt electric vehicles more quickly than city-dwellers (Inside EVs). That’s probably a good thing, since EVs get more efficient the more miles they’re driven ..read more

When states raise speed limits on highways, speed-related crash hot spots spike on nearby neighborhood roads, a new study finds — but local communities aren’t preparing for those “spillover” effects, nevermind getting a say in how fast motorists should go on the interstates that rip through their communities. In an analysis of three U.S. highway segments whose maximum speeds were increased at some point in the last decade — I-85 in Georgia, I-84 in Oregon and I-75 and I-69 in Michigan — researchers found that all reported significant new “clusters” of speeding-related crashes within a one ..read more

“What a day to be celebrating the future of American infrastructure and to see it taking shape before our eyes,” remarked U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg at yesterday’s groundbreaking for Brightline West’s high-speed rail connection between Las Vegas and Southern California. Buttigieg praised the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law that contributed $3 billion to making this project happen, noting that the project spans not just two parties, but two states, and public and private sectors. Brightline West will be a 218-mile rail line from Vegas to the San Bernardino County city of Rancho ..read more

In cities across America, U.S. advocates are fighting to stop their DOTs from expanding downtown highways and amplifying the mistakes of the past. As the saying goes, though, those battles are always bigger in Texas — and so are the odds that locals face when they try to reimagine their neighborhoods around people rather than cars. In her gripping new book, “City Limits: Infrastructure, Inequality and the Future of America’s Freeways,” author Megan Kimble chronicles the ongoing movement to get the Texas Department of Transportation to rethink its destructive plans for three highways in downtow ..read more

Loopholes in the U.S. tax code for private jet fuel and buying light trucks and SUVs encourage fossil fuel consumption. (The Cool Down) A new report from Canadian advocacy groups calls for restricting or even banning light trucks and SUVs because they’re more harmful to the environment and dangerous to anyone they hit. (The Globe and Mail) A combination of closed spaces and an openness to diverse groups of people are why transit makes some would-be riders anxious and fearful. (WHYY) Oakland is installing speed bumps in bus lanes in an effort to keep out speeding, reckless drivers. (Oaklandsid ..read more