This is a 5 minute excerpt from our long form documentary “Close Encounters of the 34th Avenue Kind” in Jackson Heights, Queens, NY. It explores the work of Donald Appleyard and how his studies of three kinds of streets in the Bay Area determined how much connection, friends and knowledge of an area the average person would have based upon whether they lived on a low, medium or high traffic street.

Wherever you go in the world you can’t go wrong with making crowded business streets safer and more friendly to pedestrians. Here are five Streetfilms showing the different ways you can achieve that whether 24-7-365, seasonal installations, time limitations or just making designing for local traffic only!

My standing piece of advice for those who live in North America who pine to see the best-practice streets of dozens of places in Europe or want to educate colleague/friends what’s possible: just go to Montreal! It’s much closer! It’s fun, vibrant & welcoming to human beings not in cars!