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Save traffic. Don't fund transit.

Dan loves traffic. But his lifestyle is under attack by politicians who are trying to "mitigate" traffic.

"In 2009, Congress will decide whether to continue to spend billions on highways and roads to generate more traffic. Or whether they're going to spend more money on trains and buses that suck the lifeblood right out of traffic."

Via Smart Growth America.

posted on Mar 7, 2008 12:32 pm (5 comments)

tags: comedy, traffic, videos

Google Maps: Bike There

There's a site with a petition for Google Maps to add a "bike there" option showing directions by bike, including bike lanes. Great idea, though the obstacle to Bike There is finding bike lane data. While we're at it, how about just a "walk there"?

Google Maps is probably my favorite Google product and the one I use most often (probably more even than search). But it's always been just a little car-centric. It took years after it originally launched to get transit stations on (mostly because the data providers don't include transit stations themselves), and while transit lines are drawn in in some international cities like Sydney, you have to go to other mashups like OnNYTurf (NYC) or MetroMapr (DC, Boston, Philly, Chicago) for maps that show subway lines. Why should the route a car takes be in fat yellow lines, but not transitways or bike paths?

Via The WashCycle.

posted on Mar 6, 2008 9:24 am (2 comments)

tags: bicycling, Google, maps, transit

Chiang Mai

I was surprised by Chiang Mai. It's an old city, dating back to 1296, and consists of an "old city" surrounded by a moat and a wall, with newer areas outside. Therefore, I expected the old city to have pretty, old buildings and dramatic public squares. But that's not the way it is.

Bad urbanism on the Potomac waterfront

In December, I got into an interesting debate on the Dupont Forum neighborhood list about my feelings concerning the Third Church landmarking. Lance, who considers the building a "masterpiece," asked if my desire to get rid of most 1970s-era buildings in downtown DC extended to more widely praised structures like the Watergate and Kennedy Center.

I replied:

The Watergate and Kennedy Center are, as mid-20th century buildings go, pretty nice, and I'm not in favor of razing them. However, they still do not represent good urbanism either, especially when considered in context with the Potomac River Freeway which was built around the same time (the West Leg of the 1971 Inner Loop plan, whose cancelled North Leg would have ruined Dupont). Both buildings are clearly designed for cars and with a more suburban sensibility, such as the way the Watergate has an interior park but presents a mostly blank wall to the streetscape. Most land around the Kennedy Center is used for getting cars in, out and around, than for human beings.

I added that I hadn't really had a chance to explore those sites in detail, which prompted me to take a walk down there for some photos.

"We Are Smart Growth"

You know Smart Growth—the philosophy of building "compact, transit-oriented, walkable, bicycle-friendly land use, including mixed-use development"—is getting popular when a business district's annual report bears the title "We Are Smart Growth".

That business district is Barracks Row, a street of shops along 8th Street SE in Washington near the Eastern Market station. Stefanie and I took the subway out to Eastern Market to check out the District's largest farmers' market and found a vibrant, mixed-use (and rapidly gentrifying) neighborhood full of interesting shops and really cute townhouses.

posted on Aug 28, 2007 11:07 pm (comment)

tags: Capitol Hill, photos, Smart Growth, Washington

Charleston

Last month, I visited Charleston for the Democratic debate. Here are my thoughts on the debate itself. The next day, I got to walk around historic Charleston. It has some beautiful old Southern houses, and some great commercial streets with historic brightly colored townhouses. For a small city, it has some pedestrian activity in the evenings, though the jobs aren't downtown except for those around tourism, so during the day the city is very quiet.

I also noticed (but couldn't get good pictures) that when you get just a short ways outside the city, the buildings deteriorate very quickly to run-down warehouses with poorly maintained sidewalks. The neighborhoods change from rich and white to poor and black quite quickly (and then surrounded by suburbs).