News & Notes

Street Science: All Eyes on the Street [Next American City]

The effort will mark Boston’s entry into the National Complete Streets Coalition, a national group dedicated to making city streets more accessible across America, and is strongly supported by the mayor. “Mayor Menino,” Ms. Zehngebot noted, “is behind this all the way and understands that the car is no longer king.” The Complete Streets Initiative, according to the group’s brochure, “will improve the quality of life in Boston by creating streets that are both great public spaces and efficient and sustainable transportation networks. The city is committed to designing streets that are: Multimodal: Safe, comfortable, and accessible to all users; Green: Reduce energy use, sustainable, and low-maintenance; Smart: Efficient and maximize technological advances.”

The Incrementalists [Metropolis]

New plans to modernize our aging rail intrastrcture
are modest, in the extreme.

Streetscape-draining front parking lots may soon be out (Washington, DC) [Greater Greater Washington]

New developments that put their parking in front significantly diminish the pedestrian environment. They also make it less appealing for other, adjacent projects to address the street, creating a vicious cycle away from an active streetscape, while new buildings with their parking in the rear start a cycle in the opposite, positive direction.

Connecticut highway tolls could raise $600 million annually [Mansfield Today]

In a recent published statement, Rep. Guerrera says, “You put up border tolls for $5 a trip, you’re talking $600 million a year in revenue. That’s $18 billion over 30 years. You can’t argue with that.”

The proposal also calls for earmarking these funds for repairing highways and bridges and other transportation incentives, and not putting them into the general budget.

“We know we have more than $3 billion in infrastructure needs in this state, just to repair what we have,” Rep. Guerrera says.