Tag Archives: walking

L.A. becomes more pedestrian friendly with new crosswalk upgrades

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DTLA Bike Patrol officers demonstrate how to properly cross a crosswalk with a bike. Photo by Jose Ubaldo/Metro

DTLA Bike Patrol officers demonstrate how to properly cross a crosswalk with a bike. Photo by Jose Ubaldo/Metro

53 intersections throughout L.A. will be upgraded with continental crosswalks (a.k.a. zebra crossings, see above pic) by March of 2013, which is fantastic news for the thousands that live and work in L.A. Continental crosswalks provide higher visibility to advise motorists that pedestrians may be present, making for a safer walking environment. There’s also a set-back limit line to help reduce vehicular encroachment into the crosswalk area.

Cross with care! Photo by Jose Ubaldo/Metro

Cross with care! Photo by Jose Ubaldo/Metro

Mayor Villaraigosa joined Los Angeles Walks and local business owners this morning to announce the new pedestrian safety intiative at the corner of 5th St. and Spring St., the first intersection to be upgraded. The conversion of the 53 crosswalks is funded through Measure R monies set aside for pedestrian improvements by the mayor and City Council.

Eventually, LADOT would like to make continental crosswalks the new standard for all development and transit projects.

Every transit rider is a pedestrian

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Image provided courtesy of Los Angeles Walks

Ask anyone smart enough to get off the tour bus at Grauman’s Chinese Theatre and they will mention something many people don’t know about Los Angeles. This is a city made for walking. Albeit not along every street, but think about those stars on the sidewalk on Hollywood Boulevard. The fact is that the best way to see Hollywood, and countless other parts of the city, is on foot.

But that doesn’t mean walking doesn’t face an uphill battle getting the attention of policy makers, planners and others involved in shaping the built environment.

Enter urban designer Deborah Murphy, Safe Routes to School advocate Jessica Meaney and Alexis Lantz of the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition. Murphy, with the blessing of her sister complete streets advocates, recently started volunteer-driven Los Angeles Walks, to promote a more pedestrian-friendly Los Angeles. According to Murphy — though all of us are pedestrians to a greater or lesser degree — we have not been terribly well represented to date in the sprawling county we call home.

The group is holding a fund-raiser this Saturday night; details are after the jump.

When I spoke with Murphy about Los Angeles Walks, we kept the conversation focused on how every transit rider is a pedestrian. In turn this means addressing the so-called first mile, last mile problem — or how we get between the train and bus and our final destination.

For Murphy, promoting transit ridership goes hand-in-hand with having a good, safe trip to and from the bus stop or train station. The challenge for pedestrian improvements has been funding, with pedestrian projects receiving a fraction of the money allocated to road or transit construction. Less than one percent of the national transportation budget goes to pedestrians projects, according to Los Angeles Walks.

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Transportation headlines, Wednesday, April 4

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Here is a look at some of the transportation headlines gathered by us and the Metro Library. The full list of headlines is posted on the Library’s Headlines blog, which you can also access via email subscription or RSS feed.

 

The Lincoln Tunnel: How many Angelenos would drive everywhere if the 405 had a $12 toll? -- although it certainly doesn't stop a lot of New Yorkers from driving. (Photo by Joel Epstein/Metro)

SoCal group votes on foot-friendly transit plan (San Jose Mercury News)

The Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG) is expected to adopt a 25-year transportation plan later this week. The plan — an assemblage of locally-funded plans — is significant because it shows the emphasis being places on mass transit, transit-oriented development, cycling and pedestrian improvements across the six-county area.

After 100 years, Muni has gotten slower (New York Times)

On many bus and rail lines in San Francisco, travel times in 2012 aren’t much different than in 1912. In those days, streetcars had little competition — unlike today, in which buses and street-running rail lines have to jockey for space with cars. The Muni system has a program underway to speed some lines by adding bus lanes, reducing the number of bus stops and better synching traffic signals to keep buses and trains moving.

 

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Transportation headlines, Tuesday, March 27

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Here is a look at some of the transportation headlines gathered by us and the Metro Library. The full list of headlines is posted on the Library’s Headlines blog, which you can also access via email subscription or RSS feed.

Times Square IRT Station (Photo by Joel Epstein/Metro)

Rio + 20: what if transportation is an afterthought? (Next American City)

With the Rio 2012 Earth Summit approaching, sustainability experts are poring over a 19-page document that outlines ideas for the world’s commitment to sustainability. The document dedicates a good deal of space to the green economy and to the importance of local governance in creating sustainable communities. What it doesn’t do however, is talk much about transportation. This oversight has some in the sustainable transportation community expressing grave concern. Excerpt:

“The importance of sustainable public transportation in cities cannot be overstated. It is the backbone of any sustainable city. Without it, all of our cities are doomed to inefficiency, and to fail at their other goals of livability, economic prosperity and social justice. We need transportation to get to jobs, to schools, to access any number of opportunities within our cities.”

 

Leaving his footprints on the city (New York Times)

In a feat that would do Alfred Kazin, author of “A Walker in the City” proud, a former civil engineer, has set out to walk every street in every borough of New York City.  Thanks to a lot of couch surfing at the home of friends around the city, Matt Green, age 31, is spending only around $15 a day to make his estimated 8,000-mile trek. Green, who previously spent five months walking from Rockaway Beach in Queens, New York, to Rockaway Beach, Oregon, began December 31 on what he expects to be an over two year full-time undertaking. The article contains a nice video clip of Green doing “a really normal thing for a really long period of time.”

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Transportation headlines, Tuesday, Feb. 28

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Here is a look at some of the transportation headlines gathered by us and the Metro Library. The full list of headlines is posted on the Library’s Headlines blog, which you can also access via email subscription or RSS feed.

Colorful Pakistani Bus (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The American bus revival (BBC News Magazine)

Since voters, Congress and state legislatures can’t seem to get behind high-speed rail, someone has to pick up the demand for long distance and regional transportation. Into the void has stepped Greyhound and low-cost startups like Bolt Bus, which runs buses with fares starting at $1 between New York and Boston, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C. In September, when traveling between New York and Philadelphia, I opted for Bolt, which offers free wifi, over Amtrak’s Acela. The trip cost me $13 while Amtrak would have been $105. It didn’t take me long to do the math.

Looks like all systems go for Central subway (San Francisco Chronicle)

If all goes as planned, San Francisco will have a major new piece of transit infrastructure when the Central Subway is completed in 2018. The 1.7-mile project will link San Francisco’s commuter rail station to Chinatown, with key transfers to both the muni rail and BART that run under Market Street in downtown. The project is expected to cost $1.6 billion and earlier this month the Obama Administration recommended it receive $150 million in federal funds from the New Starts program — the project is expected to receive $942.2 million in funds overall in the coming years. The agency was also recently approved by the feds to buy two tunnel-boring machines and to build the starting point for the tunneling scheduled to begin in January. San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee is a major backer of the project, which will bring a rail project into the heart of San Francisco and Chinatown. The subway will also connect with San Francisco’s new T-Third Line which runs at grade south to Bayview and Candlestick Park.

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A health promoting L.A.

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CicLAvia - October 2011 (Photo Credit: Joel Epstein)

An article by Jane Brody in Monday’s New York Times explores how some developers, urban planners and public health researchers are taking a different view of sprawl versus thoughtful urban infill development. Brody cites the work of UCLA researchers and others suggesting that in creating car-centric communities we may be fostering obesity, poor health, social isolation, excessive stress and depression.

Researchers with UCLA’s Designing Healthy Communities program believe that, if built right, cities can help develop and foster our mental and physical fitness. Take for example the statistic that in 1974, 66 percent of all children walked or biked to school versus 13 percent in 2000. Explains the program director, “People who walk more weigh less and live longer… People who are fit live longer. People who have friends and remain socially active live longer.”

Rates of obesity and diabetes in L.A. County are nothing to be proud of while the asthma rates among children living near LA’s freeways and industrial areas, often one and the same, remain considerably higher than those in most rural and suburban areas.

The UCLA researchers support their call for a new, healthier urbanism by pointing to the usual illustrations of forward thinking and health promoting urban planning including New York City’s aggressive push to expand its miles of bike lanes and improve the public’s access to parks, and Copenhagen’s transformation in a generation into a more livable and extremely bike-friendly city. They also point to promising efforts, which Brody describes in her piece, including:

  • Metropolitan Atlanta which plans “to create an urban paradise from an abandoned railroad corridor over the next two decades, with light rail and 22 miles of walking and biking trails;”
  • Lakewood, Colorado where ”an abandoned shopping mall… was converted into housing, businesses and play areas;”
  • Syracuse, New York which “is converting an old saltworks district into a mixed-income, energy-smart housing and business area, giving residents easy access to work and recreation;” and
  • Elgin, Illinois “where an island park was created in the middle of the rejuvenated Fox River and a former Superfund site known as auto dealers’ row is now Festival Park… A Bikeway Master Plan will eventually connect all the neighborhoods, and easy access to the river has spurred investment.”

L.A. has similar “successes” to point to including CicLAvia, new rail and bus stations and transit-oriented development. But if we want to rebuild the city as envisioned by the UCLA program, it may not be enough to say urban living is better with these amenities. The improvements will need to be demonstrated through quantifiable research. The Designing Healthy Communities program which aims to offer best practice models to improve public health by re-designing and restoring the built environment is very much a companion piece to the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health’s Project RENEW with its focus on policy, systems, and environmental change to improve nutrition, increase physical activity, and reduce obesity. The UCLA researchers’ findings and recommendations, if supported by the data, are an advertisement for transit, transit-oriented development and the complete streets principals that encourage walking and biking rather than driving. Brody’s article and the UCLA research, even as a work in progress, are worth a read and consideration by the region’s policymakers and planners.

Transportation headlines, Thursday, Sept. 29

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Here is a look at some of the transportation headlines gathered by us and the Metro Library. The full list of headlines is posted on the library’s blog.

Could Expo II work be undone if Westside group wins appeal? (Curbed LA)

A group of Westside homeowners calling themselves Neighbors for Smart Rail aren’t giving up on their dream of stopping the Expo Line to Santa Monica. Their original suit lost earlier this year but they are appealing and say they’re in it to win it.

Grapevine train route could save $4 billion (Bakersfield.com)

Building high-speed rail over the Grapevine instead of through the Antelope Valley could save up to $4 billion, according to a July progress report released Wednesday.

Coming to an intersection near you: the traffic circle. Yes, even in L.A. (NPR)

Roundabouts in the U.S. are on the rise. In 2007, there were about 970; in 2011, there are more than 2,400. Here’s why.

Ten communities earn ‘walk friendly’ status (Transportation Issues Daily)

Ten communities have been recognized by the aptly named organization Walk Friendly Communities for their success in working to improve a wide range of conditions related to walking, including safety, mobility, access and comfort. Surprisingly enough, one of them is in car-loving So Cal.

A lesson in "Being Pedestrian" comes to downtown L.A.

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The crosswalk dance across Flower Street offers a reminder of the short time window pedestrians are given to cross the street.

The crosswalk dance across Flower Street offers a reminder of the short time window pedestrians are given to cross the street.

Learning to drive a car is an almost universal right of passage for most Americans, and Angelenos are especially adept at understanding the unwritten rules of being a driver.

The act of being a pedestrian, on the other hand, can be foreign and scary – and something that many Angelenos don’t have to worry about from the bubble of their cars, far removed from the uncharted territory of the sidewalk.

However, as Los Angeles (with the help of Metro and other local agencies) redevelops and becomes more transit oriented, the lost art of walking will have to be rediscovered. This is where Being Pedestrian comes in.

A self-proclaimed “cultural tourism agency,” Being Pedestrian at first appears to be your typical downtown L.A. walking tour – the kind that spotlights the area’s historic architecture and shiny new developments. It turns out that Being Pedestrian is something completely different and completely new. It is the remedial lesson in urban walking that L.A. needs to survive its transit oriented future. Continue reading →

L.A. loves walking, and this weekend's Big Parade proves it

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Stair walk in L.A.Last November we told you about The Great Los Angeles Walk, an event cooked up by a local blogger that invited Angelenos to do something simple but revolutionary: walk in their city.

It has to signal some sort larger cultural change – maybe because the city is tired of being the butt of a tired joke, “nobody walks in L.A.” – that another local blogger has taken it upon himself to put together another walk through the city. Dan Koeppel’s Big Parade L.A. takes place this weekend and spans two days, 35 miles and over 100 urban stairways.

The walks starts on Saturday morning in Downtown at the bottom of Angel’s Flight and ends up at the Hollywood sign on Sunday. Along the way walkers will pass by such sights as The Los Angeles Central Market; Vista Hermosa Park; the Corralitas Red Car site; Echo Park Lake; Elysian Park; Richard Neutra houses in Silverlake; the Fairy Tale Bridge; and the Griffith Observatory.

What’s the point of all this? According to the The Big Parade website, to “celebrate something that has been evident from the start: that L.A. is best seen, experienced, and navigated – not just for fun, but as a day-to-day practice – on foot.”

Participating is free, and you’re invited to walk for as little or long as you like. Maps and timetables will be provided on the website on Thursday, June 10.

Dan isn’t shy about promoting use of Metro to get to the event, and the start of The Big Parade happens to be steps away from the Red/Purple Line Pershing Square Station. Just follow the signs to the 4th Street exit and you’re there at the foot of Angel’s Flight.

Taking a train and then walking – a revolutionary concept in L.A.

Go Metro to The Great Los Angeles Walk 2009

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On Saturday, November 21st, beloved local blog, Franklin Avenue, is holding its 4th annual urban hike across Los Angeles: The Great Los Angeles Walk 2009.

The walk, which starts in downtown and ends at the ocean, comes bundled with “no agenda, no cause, no special reason,” according to the organizers. It’s literally just a walk in L.A. Continue reading →