• Secretary LaHood floated an increase in the gas tax as a way to pay for a robust transportation bill. The idea was taboo under Bush, but now LaHood wants Congress to consider increasing it gradually over time. (Star-Telegram)
• An international study claims that “mass active travel,” i.e. walking and cycling, deserves priority over driving because it’s safer, healthier, and doesn’t ruin our air. Sure, except for the small matter that it doesn’t get you anywhere fast. (Montreal Gazette)
• It’s not just lobbyists trying to cash in on HSR–several foreign manufacturers want to build factories in the U.S. This might be a nationalist issue if we were capable of building our own trains. (NYTimes)
• Health risks associated with living near small airports haven’t been studied much, but maybe they should be: A report found high concentrations of organic carbon and sooty black carbon more than 2,000 feet downwind of a smaller airport. (NYTimes)
• London’s Tube is a “dog-eat-dog” world, where even pregnant women don’t get right-of-way. “Shocking overcrowding” brings out the “worst part” in people, and a psychologist says it’s “not advisable” to ride the most crowded trains. (Bloomberg)
• And in North Carolina, the transportation department will spend millions to add highway underpasses so animals–especially black bears–can cross the road. Wonder what the signs will look like! (StarNews – pic via)
Tags: gas tax, High Speed Rail
“Sure, except for the small matter that it doesn’t get you anywhere fast.” – why this little dig at walking/cycling?
Yeah, the dig at ped/cycle seems uncalled for and a bit childish. When traveling in somewhat dense urban environments, cycling can often get you to your destination faster than driving or mass transit. If you factor in the time people spend searching for parking spots the advantage becomes even greater.
This is not to mention the economic costs of car ownership and infrastructure. I think many people would gladly save themselves the avg of $6,000 a year that car ownership costs if they had other somewhat attractive alternatives.
Save the flippant comments for some trashy, partisan blog will ya.
” walking and cycling, deserves priority over driving because it’s safer, healthier, and doesn’t ruin our air. Sure, except for the small matter that it doesn’t get you anywhere fast. ”
It seems like this really has nothing to do with the reasons why someone would choose active transportation over driving, so it is not a counter argument. It is why Driving is better than cycling or walking, but it does not address the drawbacks to driving. It really the only reason, Looking at it as Pros and Cons. Cars are a) more expensive b) take more space c) more dangerous d) are not healthy e)air pollution f) noise pollution g) isolate people from natural environment
Also, you must not live downtown in a major city. I live downtown and work downtown in Toronto. Me biking can be faster than cars, TTC, walkers or other bikers. Its not faster than a car travelling on a highway 100km / hr…but thats clearly not the discussion
A lot of people have that line of reasoning when it comes to walking/cycling. Maybe not on this blog but speaking form my own circle of friends/acquaintances they do think that way. That being said we all do live in suburbs that don’t particularly cater to the walking/cycling culture so the car is what we turn to more often than not. I’m lucky that the suburb where I live has 2 grocery stores about a 1/2 mile from us. So we can walk there because there are sidewalks all the way there.
My wife works less than 2 miles from home, I won’t let her walk/cycle down to work in any event, its to dangerous, she’s bound to get run over because the side walk for one ends on both sides of the road where there isn’t development so she’ll have to either bushwhack it, or get on the road. I’ve walked to her work once and I’ll never do it again. There isn’t any public transport in the vicinity catering to that side of the suburbs down the parkway, so she drives. Wasteful? Most definitely, necessary? Unfortunately it is. Until we either solve the situation here in the suburb or move elsewhere denser and more ped inclined, it will stay that way, right now the economics of the situation won’t allow it.
They’re adding overpasses over I-90 in Washington State in the Cascade Mountains for animals too.
“That being said we all do live in suburbs that don’t particularly cater to the walking/cycling culture”
Speak for yourself there, I live in downtown DC and I am sure many other readers of this blog live in cities and eschew the burbs.
Also, cyclists should be using the road in most cases (unless its some 4 lane highway or something) so not having sidewalks should not be an obstacle to your wife biking to work.
I’m waiting for the author to explain that little anti-bike/ped jab as well. I live in New York. Ever hear of something called the Great NYC Commuter Race? Bike vs subway vs car? Guess which mode has won the last five years in a row.
I was irked with the dig at walking/cycling, too. We should be able to highly prioritize walking/biking infrastructure projects. Not only do they diminish the need for driving and mechanized transit (I’d rather we were able to walk to the grocery store than take a bus, etc.), but the type of infrastructure needed for bikes and pedestrians are vastly smaller in scope, and less expensive, comparatively.
So… what’s with you?
Hi everyone, thank you for sharing your concerns about walking/cycling. We at Infrastructurist are in full and undeniable support of the walking/cycling movement, and we back any grass roots effort to decrease driving and increase sustainablility in urban centers (we occasionally bike to work ourselves, when it’s not subzero outside). However, we are also realists: The number of people who do walk or bike is still grossly outnumbered by those who don’t, for a number of reasons. Stating that pedestrians and bikers should be prioritized higher than other modes of transportation, money-wise, isn’t realistic – it ignores the fact that millions of people still rely on roads and tracks to get where they’re going. We believe in spending money to keep these modes of transport safe and efficient, rather than pushing them into a back seat behind biking initiatives. That was the purpose behind the sentence.
Disagree? Tell us in the comments!
Okay, I’m glad to hear everyone felt the same way I did about the walking/biking dig. The fact is, it wasn’t that long ago that everyone lived near enough to work and play that they didn’t have to “get anywhere very fast”. In fact, the very concept of not being able to leave the house at all with out the car is only about 50 years old. And it is absurd. I 100% agree with the study. Cars should rank dead last in our cities and nations transportation plans. Every other method of transportation should have priority over the car in the future. Cities should be planned so that the family car should only be used once a week or so. Everything should be within easy access to basic necessities like grocery stores, schools, libraries, parks, etc. If you need to get to the mall, great take the car. But only plan for that once a week, tops.
Melissa, time to get outside of North America. Most of the people live in the world walk and cycle and don’t drive. The reality is that the number of people who walk and cycle greatly outnumbers those who drive. This will likely always be the case. There simply is not enough energy or resources on the planet for everyone to drive.
Perhaps the most completing reason to provide people in North America with great walking and cycling facilities is that, in doing so, we admit that we make a huge mistake by building a society that forced people to drive. This would hopefully encourage other countries not to make the same mistake,
Melissa, Thank you for clarifying the statement. However, I think all the posters are saying that we do not accept the status quo of auto-domination. And surely the status quo is not going to be changed without a change in government spending and policy.
“The number of people who do walk or bike is still grossly outnumbered by those who don’t” – this is simply a rationalization of current policy when in fact we are arguing for a shift in policy to vastly increase the numbers of people who walk/bike.
So most people take cars; therefore, we should spend money almost exclusively on cars. Well, in 1956, more people took trips on some kind of mass transit or walked. Should we not have built the Interstate Highway System because its proportions didn’t reflect current ridership? No, it was a necessary improvement for commerce and transportation.
But we’ve built ourselves into automobile dependency and not funded any alternative modes for decades. Now, it’s appropriate to actually spend some money, and give planning focus, to make it possible to bike the 3 miles to work. So, in order to actually move 10% of people away from their cars, an increase in funding alternative transportation is necessary.
Walking and biking should be prioritized over auto funding for the simple fact that it is an enormous savings in infrastructure costs. Planning for auto travel just increases the land area needed in our cities for roads, parking (think big box lots and 5-car garages), water/sewer/utility infrastructure, etc.
The problem in America is not just the funding priorities of autos v. walk/bike/transit, it’s also the land use policies. If we developed more compactly with higher densities and mixed uses, people wouldn’t want to drive because it’s just silly to do so. When I’ve lived in walkable neighborhoods in the US and abroad, I rarely used a car. I would spend more time/money searching for parking than just walking or biking.
And it’s also not completely correct to say that more trips in the US are auto trips than walking. Almost every auto trip begins or ends with a walking trip—even if it’s only a block or through a parking lot. Design still matters no matter how short the distance covered.
Also, for the record, I am all for funding all modes of travel in complete streets that work for all road users.
“…so not having sidewalks should not be an obstacle to your wife biking to work…”
Higgenbottom this isn’t Downtown DC or downtown anywhere. This is suburbia and I despise not having public transport within walking distance, which DART still must implement seeing as we pay tax for it.
The fact is the road that my wife uses is crossed by a highway. Between 5am and 7pm the traffic is outrageous. There are 2 schools in the 2 miles as well and none of the kids walk/cycle to school for the same reasons, it’s simply too dangerous. School buses here drive down every street and kids get dropped off in front of their houses. If the side walks where complete to her work, no problem, sharing the road here will get you run over.
I’m all for walking/cycling. I come form South Africa, it’s what you do there. I’ve lived in Europe, it’s what I did there. If the suburbs catered for pedestrians and cyclists with bike lanes and completed sidewalks a ton of people would venture out using those modes of transport. I jog every morning at 4am and the joggers,cyclists abound because they have use of the road without the risk of getting run over.
Melissa, in Amsterdam they’ve gotten the bicycle mode share up to the 40s. And in many US cities, especially old downtowns, military base towns, and college towns, walking has a mode share in the 10-20 range. So yes, bicycling and walking can be popular modes of transportation. They just don’t require spending billions in infrastructure, unlike motorized transport.
Worked on a 56 mile stretch of US highway 93 in western Montana. Working with the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes of the Flathead Indian Reservation, Montana DOT, and FHWA we included 42 wildlife crossings. This transformed the highway from a biological sink and ecological barrier to a “road that heals the land”.
Also want to share the correct attitude when it comes to bicycling, from the folks in Copenhagen.
http://www.copenhagenize.com/
Sincerely, Ints
You can always watch the guys on TopGear — a popular UK car program — ride a bicycle across central London faster than a boat, a car, and public transport:
http://videos.streetfire.net/video/117-Top-Gear-London-Race_181695.htm
“However, we are also realists: The number of people who do walk or bike is still grossly outnumbered by those who don’t, for a number of reasons. Stating that pedestrians and bikers should be prioritized higher than other modes of transportation, money-wise, isn’t realistic – it ignores the fact that millions of people still rely on roads and tracks to get where they’re going.”
Melissa, the problem that most of us had with the statement was the “won’t get you anywhere fast” part. Let’s think about this for a second. This blog focuses on large scale infrastructure projects that can literally take up decades between the environmental impact statement process, design-development, finding a way to pay for it, and then construction. There’s going to be an enormous amount of land use development and redevelopment in the US over the next coming decades. A good portion of that is going to be dense infill as well as compact new development. Given that land use and transportation are always inseparable in the grand scheme of things, the future will not necessarily see all modes used with the same frequency as they are today. Biking and walking would certainly be a whole lot more attractive in a world where things aren’t so far-flung as they are currently.
Basically, my point is that the turn of phrase used only applies in a world where things are unsustainably far apart to begin with, and that the current land use/transportation regime is not a permanent state of affairs.