12 Best Happenings for LA Peds. 2012

Sunset Triangle Plaza: Who would have guessed that a half-block of chartreuse polka-dots would get so much attention? An unprecedented collaboration between Streets for People, the L.A. City Planning Commission and the L.A. County Department of Public Health resulted in the city’s first street-to-plaza conversion in Silver Lake for only $25,000. The plaza itself needs some tweaks—the color’s still controversial, neighbors complained about the loss of parking, ugly plastic barricades showed up after a car took out a few planters—but the good news is that the process is documented, and any community can adapt (and improve on) the model for their neighborhood. -Los Angeles Walks

INTERVIEW: Jeff Speck, What Makes a City Walkable

(Sarah Gardner — Marketplace) What makes a city walkable? According to Jeff Speck, the author of “Walkable City: How Downtown Can Save America, One Step At A Time,” a walk has to be useful, safe, comfortable, and interesting if you’re going to get people out of their cars and onto the sidewalks. (See book cover next blog entry)

“The pedestrian has to have a fighting chance against being hit by automobiles,” says Speck, “but also the streets need to be comfortable in the way they’re shaped by buildings, and you can’t have a bunch of blank walls and parking lots to walk by.”
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Many cities are doing good things to make their cities more walkable, but Speck says most average American cities still have a long way to go to become truly walkable. Why? The car is still the driving force in city planning.

“A city is being planned not by its mayor,” says Speck, “but by a public works director who is responding to complaints (Waaaaaaaah!) about traffic and parking.” (and the personal entitlement to drive -LS)   -Transportation Nation

What Makes Public Space Successful?

Of course, a walking culture is better than an automotive one, better for our bodies and our souls. And of course, street life has to develop organically, from the proper urban conditions — "a citywide commitment to creating an environment that people want to live in," Speck notes, quoting Adam Baacke, assistant city manager for planning and development in Lowell, Mass. Of course, bikes and mass transit are a key part of the mix, as is a human sense of scale.

"It is often surprising to measure some of America's favorite and most successful public spaces — New York's Rockefeller Center, San Antonio's River Walk, San Francisco's Ghirardelli Square — and discover how small they actually are," Speck tells us. "Few are much broader than sixty yards across. And let's not forget Disney's Main Street, famously built at three-quarters scale."

The message is that a successful city has roots and causes, and among the most important of these is a sense of the street. Speck draws on Jane Jacobs, a favorite theorist, to make the point explicit: "Lowly, unpurposeful, and random as they may appear, sidewalk contacts are the small change from which a city's wealth of public life may grow."

And yet, the strength of "Walkable City" is that it's not a no-brainer, not in a culture in which it often seems we have done everything we can to make street life obsolete. Such a shift was partly a response to the urban decay of the mid-20th century, which led to freeways and other infrastructure projects that eviscerated neighborhoods. -David L. Ulin,  Los Angeles Times

Nobody Walks in LA

"NOBODY WALKS IN LA"

You won't see a cop walkin’ on the beat
You only see him drivin’ cars on the street
You won't see a kid walkin’ home from school
Their mothers pick them up in a car pool

“Nobody walks in LA” — refrain and motto? from 80's punk band Missing Persons (story Studio 360).

Los Angeles resident Alissa Walker makes her living writing about urban planning and architecture. She gave up her car six years ago and she walks, bikes, and uses public transit. And she’s not alone: a national study used by city planners estimates that 17% of all trips in Los Angeles County are made on foot.

Alissa adopted a car-free lifestyle in a life-changing moment when visiting Italy. "When I got to Italy, I walked directly off the train and into a gelateria, where a single serving of pistachio and stracciatella con brioche changed my life. The more gelato I ate, the more stories poured out of my fingers and into my laptop. Coincidence? I think not. I returned to LA knowing two things I didn’t know before: I really wanted to be a writer and I really loved gelato."-Alissa Walker, Gilatobaby.

Rate Your Town's Walkability

WALKSCORE:  According to them Laguna is rated 98/100 for walk-ability. Then why is the town saturated with cars and everybody is seen driving? Only George Carlin knows.

BIKESCORE: Coming soon when their website is finished, stay tuned. Meanwhile you can Tweet a request for a bikescore here.

San Diego Planners are Counting Bikes

SDSU Professor Sherry Ryan

Bicycling is fun. It's also an important part of city planners' vision of our future.

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Planners and government officials think researching who is biking where is worth the investment. That's just what San Diego is doing. SDSU Professor Sherry Ryan is standing by a bike counter embedded in the pavement. Full text at KCBS San Diego.

SPRAWL

A successful street, Norquist says, must serve as: a path on which people travel, a place that facilitates the buying and selling of goods and services, and a public gathering spot. In short: a street is analogous to a city itself. Read "What Happpens When You Legislate Against Vibrant Streets", Jeremy Rosenberg, KCET, Los Angeles.

Thanks to the thousands of people who turned out en mass to take part in London’s Drive to Work Day. See how we took over the centre of London creating gridlock today. (Thank you drivetowork.org for making our point.) -LS

The Parking Squid

It’s called “Parking Squid,” and we want these everywhere because who would dare steal a bike from the tentacles of a giant squid? Those things are scary! Funded by the Seattle DOT 1% for Art funds and designed by local business Decorative Metal Arts. (made locally?)  By Sarah Laskow at GRIST

WE WANT MORE PARKING Waaaaaaaaah!!!

The Planning Commission of Laguna Beach want you the public to solve our parking problems because they can't figure out how. Read the short invitation in the Independent article for some background.

Despite four YEARS of subcommittee meetings between city officials and local residents on this topic the PC refuses to abandon a car-centric approach to mobility. Now after 4 years of paid salaries and benefits the PC is asking the public again for help with their homework.

Maybe a suggestion from outside the ‘Bubble’ will help, PEDal of San Clemente offers this:
Fact 1: Laguna’s roadways cannot be widened.
Fact 2: Laguna’s roadways cannot accommodate more cars.
Fact 3: 20th century car-dependency created Laguna’s parking problems.
Fact 4: 19th century velocipedal technology moves more people.
Conclude:   Adopt a multi-modal transport system
(LS)