Tag: walking
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Grow Up, Boston
Boston is facing an identity crisis, and it needs to grow up – literally. Is it a global city, with ample night life opportunities, or a New England town, shutting down with the MBTA before midnight? In many respects, Boston’s identity is based upon its backbone – its outdated, stressed transportation infrastructure. Relatively unique to…
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Connect
It’s winter again in Boston. Anyone who was there last year during February and March knows what that means. The ability to move about the city could come to a screeching halt in the blink of an eye. . The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA, or the “T”) completely shut down last winter after repeated large winter storms,…
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Transit in the Desert: What Drives Ridership in Sprawling Phoenix?
Neither on-the-ground observation nor a basic data-driven analysis of high-transit use neighborhoods conclusively identify the factors driving transit use in Phoenix. Sprawl is so dominant as a residential pattern, however, that planners must focus not only on building transit-friendly neighborhoods but also on providing alternative transportation options in the decidedly transit-“unfriendly” subdivisions that make up Arizona’s…
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Enabling Communities to Build Their Own Plazas
All over the country more and more cities are catching on to the idea that public space can be created quickly and cheaply; expensive master plans are becoming a thing of the past. Typically a community partner—a business improvement district or non-profit community organization—can apply through the municipality to transform an excessive roadway into…
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A Love Letter To Flemish Cities
I’ve recently become enamored with the historic cities of Flandres, the Dutch-speaking region of Belgium. Whilst I used to only pass through Flandres in the past, often on my way to France, I first discovered Flemish cities on a study trip to the region in 2007. Wandering through places like Bruges or Ghent with a…
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Are we closer to utopia?
Last century, architects and urban planners had to deal with the fact that vehicles were rapidly increasing their presence in cities. To solve the relationship between cars and pedestrians, some proposed to separate them. A relevant example of these urban planners was Clarence Perry, who developed a concept in the early 1900’s called the “Neighborhood Unit”…