Nearly everywhere in the livable streets world you look, the sneckdown phenomenon is growing - with hundreds of photos tagged #sneckdown on Twitter in the last month. Although the majority of news articles & blogging sites have done a commendable job spreading the word, there's still a bit of confusion about the origin of the term […]
On a Bixi bike excursion to get some ice cream in Montreal, my wife and I stumbled upon the intersection of Fairmount Avenue and Rue Clark, recently upgraded with colorful new street furniture, traffic calming treatments, and a two-way protected bike lane. The space is teeming with street life. When you arrive at this lovely […]
What’s a road diet? Quite simply, traffic-calming expert Dan Burden told Streetfilms, “A road diet is anytime you take any lane out of a road.” The first time people hear about a road diet, their initial reaction likely goes something like this: “How can removing lanes improve my neighborhood and not cause traffic backups?” It […]
As you may recall, many years ago I shot a Streetfilm taking about what winter weather can teach us. In many ways the snow acts like tracing paper on our streets and records road user movements: at each intersection where the snow ends up piled can teach us a lot about where people drive and […]
Transportation planners in Portland, Oregon are taking their famous bicycle boulevards to the next level. By adding more routes and stepping up the traffic calming treatments, the city is not only making these streets more attractive and usable for cyclists, but also for pedestrians, runners, children, and anyone else who gets around under their own […]
Today we're revisiting Appleyard's work in the second installment of our series, "Fixing the Great Mistake." This video explores three studies in "Livable Streets" that measured, for the first time, the effect of traffic on our social interactions and how we perceive our own homes and neighborhoods.
In this Streetfilm, you'll see some of the new street designs in London shopping districts and residential neighborhoods. In many cases, these traffic calming treatments -- including raised crosswalks, traffic diverters, and chicanes .
Up until this summer, speeding was the norm on Brooklyn's Prospect Park West. With three wide lanes inviting motorists to hit the accelerator, it was a street monopolized by car traffic. That changed in a big way in June, when NYC DOT converted one vehicle lane to a two-way bikeway separated from traffic by the […]
In Copenhagen, you never have to travel very far to see a beautiful public space or car-free street packed with people soaking up the day. In fact, since the early 1960s, 18 parking lots in the downtown area have been converted into public spaces for playing, meeting, and generally just doing things that human beings […]
Our interview with NYC DOT Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan translated into Spanish (with subtitles).
This video explores several traffic calming amenities Paris has installed. For example, there are areas in Paris where curbs have been removed and bikes, pedestrians, buses and taxis coexist. On wider roads bikes share the BRT lanes with buses and taxis. Counter-flow bike lanes expand the bike network. Raise crosswalks and neckdowns slow traffic and make pedestrians more visible at intersection.
Leading Pedestrian Intervals (or LPIs) are a traffic signalization strategy that allows pedestrians an exclusive 3 to 5 second signal (in some cases much longer) to begin crossing the street before cars get a green light. Consequently, they are also known by their sassier nickname, Pedestrian Head Start. But in my view the best variation on what LPI stands for comes from Christine Berthet of the Hells Kitchen Neighborhood Association who proposes: "Life Preserving Interval"
As one gentleman said to me while admiring the new greenery and traffic islands in Grand Army Plaza, "Wow, sometimes government does work!" It's easy to quickly forget how things were, but we here at Streetfilms aim to not let that happen. Check out these extraordinary before/afters; especially the new separated bike lane which safely shepherds riders from Prospect Park.
Learn the benefits of diverters in this traffic calming stop-animation.
Sometimes double-parked cars and street regulations form their own temporary traffic calmed conditions.
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