Mode Share

 

"This chart highlights the popularity of different transportation types in the Americas, Europe, and Asia, calculated by modal share.

Data for this article and visualization is sourced from ‘The ABC of Mobility’, a research paper by Rafael Prieto-Curiel (Complexity Science Hub) and Juan P. Ospina (EAFIT University), accessed through ScienceDirect.

The authors gathered their modal share data through travel surveys, which focused on the primary mode of transportation a person employs for each weekday trip. Information from 800 cities across 61 countries was collected for this study."

from:

https://www.visualcapitalist.com/how-people-get-around-america-europe-asia/

Car-Free Neighbourhoods

"Just off the coast of Toronto, Canada's largest city, you'll find a group of 15 small car-free islands. These are unique in Canada, because they have the only* car-free neighbourhood in the whole country. But just in case you thought you'd like to live here: you can't. There is a waiting list and strict rules for home ownership, which begs the question, why can't we build more of these places today?"

More Car-Free Neighbourhood examples can be found here:

https://www.fastcompany.com/90456075/here-are-11-more-neighborhoods-that-have-joined-the-car-free-revolution

Video of the week

Math proves it!

"Car-dependent suburbia is subsidized by productive urban places. That's why American cities are broke. But how bad is it, and who is subsidizing who?"

from: https://youtu.be/7Nw6qyyrTeI

Is it time to design for neighbourhood electric vehicles instead?

 "Half of the work of urban design is deciding where to store cars."

"When designing parking spaces, planners have a size of vehicle in mind—a design vehicle scaled for highway and freeway travel. Yet almost half of all car trips in the United States are for trips under 3 miles,1 which shouldn’t require getting on a highway or freeway. In an era of growing climate threats, we need to rethink what kind of vehicle is necessary for running local trips. It’s time to seriously consider a class of vehicles called neighborhood electric vehicles, or NEVs."

from:

https://www.cnu.org/publicsquare/2021/10/13/rightsizing-automobile-local-mobility

Bus stops

Some things are better when they're further apart?

Bus Stop Balancing from TransitCenter on Vimeo.

x

Tactical Urbanism

Transform Your City With Tactical Urbanism from STREETFILMS on Vimeo.

Amsterdam

Fun video of the week

from:
https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2016/07/a-1960s-cartoon-hilariously-mocks-americas-car-obsession/491558

From the archives

"101 smart transportation solutions that can make our cities better."

https://www.curbed.com/2017/9/20/16317036/best-transportation-ideas-cities-transit

Twitter user: 21st Century City

Top tweets that caught my eye:

"Autonomous vehicles would probably need more space, as they would have to drive around empty to find the next passenger."

from: https://twitter.com/urbanthoughts11/status/976859613990670336

or: 

"Snow to visualize the crazy amount of unused carspace."

from: https://twitter.com/bicivikingo/status/978034705298853888

or:



"If you design your city for people instead of cars, your city will thrive - in terms of business, safety, efficiency, people's mood, health & so much more"

from: https://twitter.com/urbanthoughts11/status/974329230887653376

30 years of building transit in China

"30 years of transportation data on display, makes the development of the past few decades seem all the more mind-boggling."

"The boom in China’s metro construction is likely to continue. In 2016, the national government also eased the rules on which cities could build metro projects, in the hopes of accommodating increasing urbanization. Previously, construction had been limited to cities with 3 million people and $1.53 billion in annual revenue."

from: https://www.inverse.com/article/31849-china-metro-gif-visualization

Urban space - with and without cars

from: https://stephenrees.wordpress.com/2017/05/13/smaller-lighter-greener-are-micro-evs-the-future-of-city-transport/

and:
http://i-sustain.com/30-2/

Street design guide

"One of the central arguments made by the guide is that most street design prioritizes private motor transport over not only every other mode of transit but also over use of street space that does not involve transport. In contrast, the guide lays out a hierarchy of user priority that sees pedestrians as the most important users to consider with cyclists and transit, people doing business and providing services and users of personal motorized vehicles following in descending order."



"In the foreword to the guide, NACTO chair and former New York transportation commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan said, “For the last century, streets around the world have been built around automobiles. Wide lanes for traffic and little room for people became the rules of the road in most corners of the globe, dividing cities, stifling economic growth and creating dangerous congestion. This guide marks the next step toward changing the old road hierarchy, with designs that save lives, prioritize people and transit, reflect diverse communities, and better serve everyone on the street.”

from: http://architectureau.com/articles/Free-global-street-design-guide-launched/

The secret to life in the city?

"There’s one thing other than my wallet and my travel card I wouldn’t be without in a big city, and it’s my headphones. But I don’t actually listen to music that much: I just activate the noise-cancelling feature, and leave it at that. No sound plays into my ears – instead a quiet fills my head, as if the sounds of the world have been turned down. Until I got noise-cancelling headphones, I had no idea how loud the city always was, and just how hungry I’d been for silence. On public transport, using the noise-cancelling feature will soften the roar of engine and traffic. In the open-plan office, it eliminates the constant chatter and limits interruptions. On an airplane, it’s a revelation. I’m not alone in using state-of-the-art headphones not for music, but to tune out the constant drone of urban living – it’s becoming a modern life survival tool."



from: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/mar/16/noise-cancelling-headphones-sound-modern-life

The human scale

"Reconnecting America is a national nonprofit that integrates transportation and community development"

"Reconnecting America advises civic and community leaders on how to overcome community development challenges to create better communities for all. Reconnecting America develops research and innovative public policy, while also building on-the-ground partnerships and convening players needed to accelerate decision-making."

from: http://reconnectingamerica.org/who-we-are/

Running heatmaps quiz

"Smartphones and GPS watches now leave digital traces behind many urban runners, as they wind their way along the river or round the park. Can you identify the cities from the telltale tracks?"




from:
https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/aug/01/quiz-identify-world-cities-running-heat-maps-strava

Bike & visibility at night

"As part of an ongoing commitment to safer cycling in New York, the Citi Bike program is installing an innovative new safety feature -- the Blaze Laserlight on 250 bikes in early 2017."

Citi Bike + Blaze from Citi Bike on Vimeo.

8-80 cities and Pedestrians First!

"8 80 Cities improves the quality of life for people in cities by bringing citizens together to enhance mobility and public space so that together we can create more vibrant, healthy, and equitable communities."

from: http://880cities.org/

Pedestrians First from Knight Foundation on Vimeo.

What's in a name?

"A street is a road but a road isn't always a street. A road can also be an avenue or a boulevard—it's the general term for anything that connects two points. From there, the names of roads can be shaped by their environment and/or the form of the road. A drive is a long winding road that can be shaped by mountains or a lake. Place is a narrow road with no throughway. And just as there is no rule book to building a city, these roads and other don't always correspond with their described classifications."



"As Edwards emphasizes, there are exceptions, but here are a few of the meanings behind the most common names:

• Road — Anything that connects two points. 
• Way — A side street off a road.
• Street — A public way with buildings on both sides. These often run perpendicular to avenues.
• Avenue — Also have trees or buildings on both sides.
• Boulevard — A wide street in a city with trees or greenery on both sides. There's generally a median in the middle of a boulevard.
• Lane — A narrow road, often in a rural area.
• Drive — A winding road that has its route shaped by natural features such as a lake or mountain.
• Terrace — A road that runs along the top of a slope.
• Place — A road with no throughway.
• Court — A road with no throughway that ends in a loop or cul-de-sac.
• Plaza or Square — An open public space that's surrounded by businesses or streets."

from: https://www.thrillist.com/news/nation/whats-the-difference-between-roads-street-avenues

also: http://lifehacker.com/the-difference-between-streets-boulevards-avenues-an-1789115850

New study about bike shares

"Here's a remarkable fact: Not a single person has died using bike share in the United States."

"Bike sharing has seen explosive growth since 2007, with systems in at least 94 cities and more than 35 million trips taken. There have been some serious injuries, yes. But — knock on wood — we've seen zero US deaths from bike sharing so far1. Contrast this with the overall estimated cycling fatality rate of 21 deaths per 100 million trips."

from: http://www.vox.com/2016/4/3/11349856/bike-share-safety