The percentage of children walking and bicycling to school has plummeted from almost 50 percent in 1969 to about 13 percent today. Although distance from school is often cited as the main barrier to walking and bicycling, many families still drive when schools are close to home. According to the Safe Routes to School National Partnership, driving accounts for about half of school trips between 1/4- and 1/2-mile long — which in most cases shouldn't take kids much more than 10 minutes to walk.

There are plenty of factors at work here: Lack of sidewalks and safe walking and biking routes. The fallacy of "stranger danger." School districts banning walking and biking outright. But all of these problems lead back to the original and biggest blunder: We continue to design our cities and towns for cars instead of for children, families, and human beings.

Look for more Streetfilms on this issue in the next year.

Flashback to 2004:  there had been little to get excited about in nearly ten years on the car-free Central Park movement. Looking for a way to gain momentum and take advantage of a 100,000 signature campaign in progress, Transportation Alternatives (T.A.) hired me to produce a mini film called, "The Case for a Car-Free Central Park", which featured interviews with many prominent New Yorkers like Columbia Professor Ken Jackson and author Robert Brandes Gratz amongst dozens of everyday parkgoers testifying about how they felt about the issue of cars in the Park.

The film was the centerpiece of a T.A.rally attended by nearly 700 people.  The crowd reaction was dramatic and enthusiastic.  Just a few weeks after the rally, the city took substantial action.  From T.A.s website which features a great chronology of Car-Free Central Park:

2004:  Speed limit on the loop drive reduced from 30 mph to 25 mph. West 90th and East 102nd Street entrances and exits closed to cars. West 77th and East 90th entrances closed to cars. West 72nd street slip-ramp closed to cars. People reclaim overnight and early mornings in the park. Cars get to enter 7 am to 10 am and 3 pm to 7 pm. HOV 2+ rule on West drive during morning rush hours.

Although I had been promoting bicycle issues on my cable access show bikeTV since 1999, in many ways this was the first major activism victory in NYC transportation where film played a large role.  And a reminder: YouTube didn't get started until 2005, that makes it all the more impressive.

Thus, it's an absolute honor that "The Case for a Car-Free Central Park" was selected as a featured element at the Museum of the City of New York's upcoming exhibition "Activist New York".  Beginning May 4th, the program examines social activism from the 17th Century right up to the present. We're glad the curators realized the significance of this video in New York's history.

Make sure you go check out what surely should be an excellent exhibit.  And for now if you want to watch the entire 20 minute film, you can right here, for the first time ever available on Streetfilms!

The school curriculum includes regular field trips to the local "traffic garden." The City of Utrecht has used this facility, a streetscape in miniature, to teach kids the rules of the road since the 1950s. Students take turns as cyclists, pedestrians and car drivers, learning how to take other types of street users into consideration. The hands-on experience navigating the traffic garden gives kids the skills and confidence to get around the city under their own power as soon as their early teens.

So he tried bike commuting from Jackson Heights, Queens to Hell's Kitchen and loved it. As of May, he's lost an incredible 50 pounds (already five more than when he filmed with us!) and has  inspired many friends to start biking too.

Here are some words of advice Marcus has for all of us:

• "New York City is almost ideal for biking - it's pretty flat, and traffic isn't very fast - more like organized chaos."
• "By commuting, I have so much more energy during the day, and I sleep much better than before."
• "Most of the year, I commute in my work clothes. In the summer, I'll wear something cooler, and keep a few sets of clothes in a closet at my office - and have them dry cleaned over the weekend so I can pick them up on Monday morning as I get to work."
• "Riding in the winter is easy - as long as the streets are plowed, I'll go. My biggest mistake at first was wearing too much and overheating - biking keeps you much warmer than waiting on a cold subway platform!"
• "Queens is a great place to ride a bike - with the exception of a few major through streets, there are a lot of quiet neighborhood streets to ride on. The neighborhoods out here are wonderful and incredibly diverse."

Streetfilms would like to thank the Law Offices of Adam D. White for sponsoring this chapter in our My NYC Biking Story.

If you've never seen footage of the Copenhagen people riding bikes during rush hour - get ready - it's quite a site, as nearly 38% of all transportation trips in Copenhagen are done by bike.  With plenty of safe, bicycle infrastructure (including hundreds of miles of physically separated cycletracks) its no wonder that you see all kinds of people on bikes everywhere.  55% of all riders are female, and you see kids as young as 3 or 4 riding with packs of adults.

Much thanks to the nearly two dozen folks who talked to us for this piece.  You'll hear astute reflections from folks like Jeff Mapes (author of "Pedaling Revolution"), Martha Roskowski (Program Manager, GO Boulder), Andy Clarke (President, League of American Bicyclists), Andy Thornley (Program Director, San Francisco Bike Coalition) and Tim Blumenthal (President, Bikes Belong) and Yvonne Bambrick (Executive Director, Toronto's Cyclists Union) just to name drop a few of the megastars.

Tom, who also writes the excellent blog How We Drive, was kind enough to drop by the Streetfilms office for a conversation about his vast research into the world of car and driver. Here's our ten-minute highlight reel of his talk with OpenPlans founder and Streetsblog publisher Mark Gorton. The interview covers subjects from the Invisible Gorilla to intense DriveCam footage of automobile crashes to the dangers of noise-canceling technology touted by car manufacturers. Whether you drive every day or not at all, you'll be enlightened about what happens inside people's heads once they're inside an automobile.

A large part of the responsibility for deterring deadly driving lies with New York’s District Attorneys. With the campaign to succeed Robert Morgenthau as Manhattan’s top prosecutor heating up, the next DA will have the opportunity to keep streets safer by holding reckless drivers more accountable.

Last month, Transportation Alternatives and the Benjamin Cardozo School of Law organized a forum on traffic justice for the three DA candidates: Richard Aborn, Cyrus Vance, and Leslie Crocker Snyder (who could not attend and sent a top staffer, Richard Socarides, in her stead). Streetfilms used footage of the debate to compile this selection of highlights. Watch and find out how each candidate pledges to deter dangerous driving if elected. As TA’s Peter Goldwasser said after the Q&A, “Once one of you is in office, we’ll remind you of the things you said today.”

In 2008, the City of New York launched its own Safe Streets for Seniors initiative based on TAs Safe Routes for Seniors. Focusing on 25 areas with high senior pedestrian fatalities, this program is paving new ground. Yet, some including seniors not in these zones are asking, is it enough? Stats released by Transportation Alternatives show that:

• People aged 65 years and older make up 12% of the population, yet they comprised 39% of New York City's pedestrian fatalities between 2002 and 2006.
• The fatality rate of senior pedestrians is 40 times greater than that of child pedestrians in Manhattan.

This video is an overview of what Transportation Alternatives, New York State Department of Health, NYC DOT, community groups, and elected officials are doing to promote safe streets for seniors.

Related stories:
Anti-Idling Laws Pass in NYC
NYC Street Memorial 2008

"An ecovillage is a human scale neighborhood where people know their neighbors and care about them. People can live close to where they work and play and have access to other essential services without use of automobiles. Together, neighbors try to minimize waste and pollution of all kinds. Residents and friends work together to create a healthy community socially, physically and economically.

Urban ecovillages work with surrounding neighborhoods and the city at large to bring a whole systems perspective to urban planning and community development activities. The L.A. Eco-Village Demonstration is part of an international network of sustainable neighborhood groups which seek to model healthier ways of living based on environmental sustainability and social and economic justice." (ecovillage.org)

In June 2006, she and her husband Dr. Carl Henry Nacht were bicycling home from dinner on the Hudson River Greenway in Chelsea when an NYPD tow truck turned sharply into the bike lane at 38th Street and 12th Avenue. Despite signs telling drivers to yield to pedestrians and cyclists, the tow truck did not slow down as it headed toward a riverfront tow pound. The truck struck Carl, injuring him severely. He died four days later.

Bicycling was an integral part of Carl and Mary Beth's lives. Their first date was done on bikes and they often took their bikes on vacation. A physician at St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital, Carl regularly used his bike to commute to the work and to make in-home visits to sick patients.

Rather than forsaking cycling after Carl's death, Mary Beth and her children Zoe and Asher got right back on their bicycles. Perhaps most important, Mary Beth has emerged as an outspoken and eloquent advocate for New York City cyclists. She now serves on the advisory council for Transportation Alternatives, where she is working to create and pass comprehensive complete streets legislation in honor of her husband.

Our first choice is a woman we have long admired who has often appeared here and on Streetsblog. Her name is Christine Berthet, and she is the co-founder of Chekpeds, the Clinton/Hell's Kitchen Pedestrian Safety Coalition. Together with Transportation Alternatives and the Project for Public Spaces, she was also instrumental in organizing the Ninth Avenue Renaissance, a movement to re-imagine neighborhood streets as a healthier place for people. She is an indefatigable advocate working hard for the community, organizing rallies, and is omnipresent at community hearings and testifying at City Hall.

According to surveys conducted in Hell's Kitchen: 75% of the people said that they were afraid for their safety because of cars... 5% because of crime.

Please join the 3rd Annual Ride, Walk and Rally to Remember this Sunday to honor those who were killed riding a bike or walking in NYC this past year.

"There's never a quiet time anymore. And there's never a clean time anymore. And there's never a safe time...it's always traffic first."

Sheldon Barr - Gallery Owner