CNU Week: Sustainable Street Network Principles

I had planned to attend this years CNU21 in Salt Lake City but unfortunately won't be there.  It is one of those places where people interested in walkability, place making and quality development can go to nurture their inner geek.  This week, I'll be posting  a number of my favorite things about the new urbanist movement.

Let's call this Transportation Tuesday...  One of the most important aspects of our built environment is our transportation infrastructure.  Sidewalks, Streets, Roads, Highways, Railways, etc.. One of the most frustrating parts of good urban design is the fact that a DOT can crush a good development because the roads are poortly designed or because they won't allow proper widths due to a number of voodoo reasons that we won't get into here.  CNU has been working for a long time with the Institute of Transportation Engineers (ITE) through the CNU Project for Transportation Reform to come up with guidelines that will help build more people friendly places.  In 2012, the released their Sustainable Street Network Principles.

Here are the main points.  If you would like to dive into them, download the pdf.

Principles

1. Create a Street Network That Supports Communities and Places
2. Create a Street Network that Attracts and Sustains Economic Activity
3. Maximize Transportation Choice
4. Integrate the Street Network With Natural Systems at All Scales
5. Respect the Existing Natural and Built Environment
6. Emphasize Walking as the Fundamental Unit of the Street Network
7. Create Harmony With Other Transportation Networks

Key Characteristics

1. A web of streets and travel modes that maximize connectivity
2. Desirable places where multiple networks overlap
3. Inherently complex
4. Major streets designed and spaced properly
5. All streets safe and walkable
6. Wide variety of street types, each with a role in the network

CNU Week: The Best Books of the New Urbanism

I had planned to attend this years CNU21 in Salt Lake City but unfortunately won't be there.  It is one of those places where people interested in walkability, place making and quality development can go to nurture their inner geek.  This week, I'll be posting  a number of my favorite things about the new urbanist movement.

Next up for CNU Week are my top books that espouse what the new urbanist movement is all about.  Some are very accessible and others are wonky..

Suburban Nation: The Rise of Sprawl and the Decline of the American Dream - Andres Duany, Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, Jeff Speck

You take the blue pill, the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill, you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes. - Morpheus, The Matrix

Suburban Nation is THE red pill of the built environment.  It will change your views on a lot of things.  I guarantee that.  It gets a little wonky at time but for the most part is a very accessible read and it is highly entertaining and witty.

Walkable City: How Downtown Can Save America, One Step at a Time - Jeff Speck

This one is easily the most accessible of all the books listed here.  It came out last year and has done very well for a general audience.  It is packed with stats on why walkability trumps virtually every other measure when considering what is needed to build a great place.  Speck lays out the four requirements of a good walk and the 10 steps to get there.  Most places in the US have a long way to go.

The Language of Towns and Cities - Dhiru Thadani

This is really the encyclopedia of the New Urbanism.  I'm not sure how long Dhiru worked on it but it is a master piece.  It is not a book you read but you definitely want to flip through it and go back to it for reference.  It is well written and beautifully illustrated.  I mean, BEAUTIFULLY ILLUSTRATED.

City Comforts: How to Build an Urban Village - David Sucher

City comforts is a more fun version of the Language of Towns and Cities written from the perspecetive of a layperson to help people who love great places but need help illustrating the principles of great places to others.  There are tons of pictures and it's very fun to flip through.

Curbside Chat: A Candid Talk about the Future of America's Cities, Towns and Neighborhoods - StrongTowns.org (Chuck Marohn)

The Curbside Chat is where you want to go if you are a fiscal conservative and are wondering if this urban vs. sprawl argument has any substance.  Chuck Marohn of StrongTowns.org lays out some pretty compelling cases that our sprawl development pattern is going to eventually cost much more to maintain than the revenue it will produce.  It's a quick read or you can just watch a Curbside Chat on YouTube from RoswellNEXT's Town Hall Roswell in April 2013.

CNU Week: The Charter of the New Urbanism

I had planned to attend this years CNU21 in Salt Lake City but unfortunately won't be there.  It is one of those places where people interested in walkability, place making and quality development can go to nurture their inner geek.  This week, I'll be posting  a number of my favorite things about the new urbanist movement.

The first thing that comes to mind is the ultra geeky but incredible precient Charter Document.. below is the quick and dirty version.  The actual document is accompanied by essays on each of the 27 points.  If you enjoy this blog, it's worth a read and if you would like to support CNU, you can do so here.

Preamble 

The Congress for the New Urbanism views disinvestment in central cities, the spread of placeless sprawl, increasing separation by race and income, environmental deterioration, loss of agricultural lands and wilderness, and the erosion of society’s built heritage as one interrelated community-building challenge.

We stand for the restoration of existing urban centers and towns within coherent metropolitan regions, the reconfiguration of sprawling suburbs into communities of real neighborhoods and diverse districts, the conservation of natural environments, and the preservation of our built legacy.

We advocate the restructuring of public policy and development practices to support the following principles: neighborhoods should be diverse in use and population; communities should be designed for the pedestrian and transit as well as the car; cities and towns should be shaped by physically defined and universally accessible public spaces and community institutions; urban places should be framed by architecture and landscape design that celebrate local history, climate, ecology, and building practice.

We recognize that physical solutions by themselves will not solve social and economic problems, but neither can economic vitality, community stability, and environmental health be sustained without a coherent and supportive physical framework.

We represent a broad-based citizenry, composed of public and private sector leaders, community activists, and multidisciplinary professionals. We are committed to reestablishing the relationship between the art of building and the making of community, through citizen-based participatory planning and design.

We dedicate ourselves to reclaiming our homes, blocks, streets, parks, neighborhoods, districts, towns, cities, regions, and environment.

We assert the following principles to guide public policy, development practice, urban planning, and design:

The region: Metropolis, city, and town

1) Metropolitan regions are finite places with geographic boundaries derived from topography, watersheds, coastlines, farmlands, regional parks, and river basins. The metropolis is made of multiple centers that are cities, towns, and villages, each with its own identifiable center and edges.

2) The metropolitan region is a fundamental economic unit of the contemporary world. Governmental cooperation, public policy, physical planning, and economic strategies must reflect this new reality.

3) The metropolis has a necessary and fragile relationship to its agrarian hinterland and natural landscapes. The relationship is environmental, economic, and cultural. Farmland and nature are as important to the metropolis as the garden is to the house.

4) Development patterns should not blur or eradicate the edges of the metropolis. Infill development within existing urban areas conserves environmental resources, economic investment, and social fabric, while reclaiming marginal and abandoned areas. Metropolitan regions should develop strategies to encourage such infill development over peripheral expansion.

5) Where appropriate, new development contigu- ous to urban boundaries should be organized as neighborhoods and districts, and be integrated with the existing urban pattern. Noncontiguous development should be organized as towns and villages with their own urban edges, and planned for a jobs/housing balance, not as bedroom suburbs.

6) The development and redevelopment of towns and cities should respect historical patterns, precedents, and boundaries.

7) Cities and towns should bring into proximity a broad spectrum of public and private uses to support a regional economy that benefits people of all incomes. Affordable housing should be distributed throughout the region to match job opportunities and to avoid concentrations of poverty.

8) The physical organization of the region should be supported by a framework of transportation alternatives. Transit, pedestrian, and bicycle systems should maximize access and mobility throughout the region while reducing dependence upon the automobile.

9) Revenues and resources can be shared more cooperatively among the municipalities and centers within regions to avoid destructive competition for tax base and to promote rational coordination of transportation, recreation, public services, housing, and community institutions.

The neighborhood, the district, and the corridor

10) The neighborhood, the district, and the corridor are the essential elements of development and redevelopment in the metropolis. They form identifiable areas that encourage citizens to take responsibility for their maintenance and evolution.

11) Neighborhoods should be compact, pedestrian friendly, and mixed-use. Districts generally emphasize a special single use, and should follow the principles of neighborhood design when possible. Corridors are regional connectors of neighborhoods and districts; they range from boulevards and rail lines to rivers and parkways.

12) Many activities of daily living should occur within walking distance, allowing independence to those who do not drive, especially the elderly and the young. Interconnected networks of streets should be designed to encourage walking, reduce the number and length of automobile trips, and conserve energy.

13) Within neighborhoods, a broad range of housing types and price levels can bring people of diverse ages, races, and incomes into daily interaction, strengthening the personal and civic bonds essential to an authentic community.

14 ) Transit corridors, when properly planned and coordinated, can help organize metropolitan structure and revitalize urban centers. In contrast, highway corridors should not displace investment from existing centers.

15) Appropriate building densities and land uses should be within walking distance of transit stops, permitting public transit to become a viable alternative to the automobile.

16) Concentrations of civic, institutional, and commercial activity should be embedded in neighborhoods and districts, not isolated in remote, single-use complexes. Schools should be sized and located to enable children to walk or bicycle to them.

17) The economic health and harmonious evolution of neighborhoods, districts, and corridors can be improved through graphic urban design codes that serve as predictable guides for change.

18) A range of parks, from tot-lots and village greens to ballfields and community gardens, should be distributed within neighborhoods. Conservation areas and open lands should be used to define and connect different neighbor- hoods and districts.

The block, the street, and the building

19) A primary task of all urban architecture and landscape design is the physical definition of streets and public spaces as places of shared use.

20) Individual architectural projects should be seamlessly linked to their surroundings. This issue transcends style.

21) The revitalization of urban places depends on safety and security. The design of streets and buildings should reinforce safe environments, but not at the expense of accessibility and openness.

22) In the contemporary metropolis, development must adequately accommodate automobiles. It should do so in ways that respect the pedestrian and the form of public space.

23) Streets and squares should be safe, comfort- able, and interesting to the pedestrian. Properly configured, they encourage walking and enable neighbors to know each other and protect their communities.

24) Architecture and landscape design should grow from local climate, topography, history, and building practice.

25) Civic buildings and public gathering places require important sites to reinforce community identity and the culture of democracy. They deserve distinctive form, because their role is different from that of other buildings and places that constitute the fabric of the city.

26) All buildings should provide their inhabitants with a clear sense of location, weather and time. Natural methods of heating and cooling can be more resource-efficient than mechanical systems.

27) Preservation and renewal of historic buildings, districts, and landscapes affirm the continuity and evolution of urban society.

Sidewalk Cafe vs Street Tree

I'm not sure which way to go on this.  As a dyed in the wool new urbanist, I love sidewalk cafes and street trees.  The both add signifcantly to the public realm when done right.  Which is why I'm torn on the proposal by the owners of Salt Factory to expand their sidewalk cafe.  We will get an upgraded sidewalk in that spot, albeit narrower.  But, the cost will be the nice little tree that lives next to the road.  I'm never the one crying to save a tree when a worthy development comes along but this one gets me.  Trees define space and frame a street.  I think we will miss the little tree when it is gone and we will have four more tables at Salt Factory.  I think they should keep it as it is and add seating on their roof.  

Learning From Sloan Street Park

This is a cross-post from my monthly column, Community Design Matters, in The Current.

Sloan Street Park: Roswell’s only neighborhood park is surrounded by homes and townhomes, has a playground, a gathering space, a monument and even has a doggie poo station. image: Bing Maps

When was the last time you visited a park?  Here in Roswell and North Fulton, we are blessed with great parks .  In fact, the Roswell Parks & Rec department has been named Agency of the Year by the Georgia Recreation & Park Association a record eight times, last receiving the award in 2011.  Alpharetta also won the award in 2011 for the mid-size city category.  Some of the great parks in our area include Riverside, Roswell Area, Wills, Overlook, the Big Creek Greenway and the Chattahoochee National Recreation Area.

What do these all have in common?  They are destination parks. Most visitors drive to them. Now, there’s nothing inherently wrong with destination parks but when you lack the other types of parks, your city can certainly become boring not to mention difficult to navigate for some folks.  Think about this, can you walk to a public park in ten minutes or less?  If you are in the historic district, that answer is probably yes.  I’m fortunate to be able to walk to five and if you count the grounds at Barrington and Bulloch, seven.  Unfortunately, most of us don’t have that type of park proximity.

How can our cities increase park access for all?  Well, what most of the cities of North Fulton are lacking is easy access to small neighborhood parks sometimes called pocket parks.  These are the types of parks where neighbors bump into each other while on a stroll.  The kind where kids can actually go without a parental escort, maybe gaining some confidence and independence in the process.  The kind that have buildings lining the edges defining the space and creating a sense of place.  Unfortunately, we’ve largely forgotten about public neighborhood parks out here in the burbs.  We forgot about them in favor of big yards and lawnmowers. We traded traditional neighborhoods with walkable parks for our easy, no hassle, happy-motoring access to all the happiness that stuff in strip malls provides us.  

Roswell is a great case study, we have no fewer than 22 parks in the city.  Of those there are 11 linear parks, 5 district parks, 1 national recreation area and six “small urban parks” as the city refers to them.  You might be surprised by their names; City Hall, Heart of Roswell, Sloan Street, Terramont, Town Square & Triangle Parks.  These are just our public parks.  The list does not include private parks such as those in Martin's Landing and other subdivisions.

Now, 22 is a respectable number of parks with a diverse range of types totaling over 900 acres.  Add to that Roswell’s commitment to preserve over 5,000 acres of greenspace (including but not limited to parks) and you have a city that is serous about parks.  Well, serious about destination parks.  We have the "small urban parks" but even those six can be a challenge to walk to which limits their utility.

Three of the six are adjacent to Hwy 9 and another is adjacent to Holcomb Bridge Rd.  For the most part, they don't serve a neighborhood and are actually smaller destination spaces.  Actually, only one of our public parks, Sloan Street Park, could really be considered a neighborhood ‘pocket park’ and not surprisingly, it’s the only one with a playground.

What makes it unique is that it is focused on the people that live and work around it while also being useful to all ages.  It should serve as inspiration for the next generation of parks in Roswell.  We can start focusing on building true neighborhoods with cozy walkable parks where neighbors can gather and kids can play with friends without calling it a ‘play date.’ 

Now, neighborhood parks sound warm and fuzzy but public money spent on parks would be better utilized by the private sector, right?  Wrong.  A well maintained network of public parks supports property values, boosts the local economy, increases social capital, improves public health and helps preserve the environment.  One of the best examples of a park creating value is our nation’s most famous park, Central Park.  Frederick Law Olmstead (also designed Piedmont Park) tracked the values of property adjacent to the park from 1856 to 1873 to justify the $13 million investment.  He found that values increased by an impressive $209 million in those 17 years.  

Beyond the economic case, the quality of life benefits are huge.  Simply being able to walk out the front door and stroll to your park is a luxury that is largely lost these days.  We’ve chosen to build our parks in places where it’s tough to walk.  Most of our parks have few homes fronting them.  Many of them are separated from residential areas by busy street on at least one side.  Neighborhood parks have homes and businesses that front the park.  People can walk right out into their park.  They meet their neighbors there and the best thing is that they can walk right back home when it’s time.  Sloan Street Park is just that kind of park.

We need more parks like Sloan Street Park to start completing our neighborhoods.  You should check it out.  It might not be special to you but then again, it’s probably not your neighborhood park.  Where can we build the next one?

Chuck Marohn Visits Roswell

Last week, RoswellNEXT hosted guest speaker Chuck Marohn of StrongTowns.org.  Chuck spoke at RoswellNEXT's Town Hall Roswell event and presented his Curbside Chat to an engaged audience.  The StrongTowns approach to fiscal responsibility when it comes to infrastructrue and economic development is one that every municipality in our country needs to hear.  

Chuck makes the point that the development pattern of the last 60 years has been wholly unsustainable and that with each life cycle of development, we have moved into a different, less sustainable method of financing it.  The first life cycle was financed with savings.  The second life cycle was financed with public debt.  The third life cycle shouldered an increasing and concerning amount of private debt on top of the increasing amount of public debt.  The obvious conclusion is that we are broke and the current way of financing our projects is not going to function as it has over the past 60 years.  The Federal and State aid programs that cities and counties have been able to rely on are goign to be increasingly less and less available.  

The main point of the argument and one of the biggest reasons that his message hits home to New Urbanists is that the traditional development model that was proven over centuries prior to the suburban experiment seems to be one of the most financially sustainable and resilient development patters.  Maybe our ancestors actually did know what they were doing.  

Here's a video of the talk.

Jonathan Copsey of NorthFulton.com had a nice recap of the event here.

Stop the Madness: Anxiously Awating...

I'm excited to announce that we soon be unveiling a brand new road sign at the Canton Street, Magnolia, Atlanta Street intersection.  I can't imagine one additional sign that is necessary at this intersection.  However,  the ceremonial removal of that black garbage bag will undoubtedly usher in a new era of safety at this intersection.  As an aside.. do we really need two sign posts here for GA 9 North and GA 120 East?  Stop the insanity.. seriously!

 

They forgot about the buses...

When the state of Georgia thought about how to ease congestion on Georgia 400, they did what most people would think of: just make the highway wider. As we all know, they converted the southbound, right shoulder lane from a lane that only buses could use (or regular cars in an emergency) to a lane that all cars can use between the hours of 6:30am and 10am Monday through Friday.

Has this alleviated the traffic problem? Has it even made it any better? Not by much...

And, what was the one thing that everyone forgot about? The buses... or more accurately, the bus schedules.

Before the change in lane use, the bus schedule gave 15 minutes for the 140 bus to get from Mansell Park-and-Ride to the North Springs Train Station. Assuming the bus would make the trip in 15 minutes, there is a 3 minute cushion between the bus arrival and the train departure. In a perfect world (i.e. Not Atlanta on a Monday morning), that gives you plenty of time to make the connection from bus-to-train.

However, now there is no dedicated bus lane on 400. The 140 bus has to drive (or, more accurately, idle) with all the other private and commercial traffic on the highway. That means the ride from Mansell to North Springs, on a typical traffic day, now takes longer than 15 minutes. If there is an accident, the ride can take as long as 25 minutes. On average, the 140 Bus misses the train about 50% of the time. That is a HORRIBLE ratio for a city that claims to be a "major metropolitan area".

There are several options for the City to consider as solutions to this problem:

1. Modify the bus schedules to account for the additional traffic. Change the time allotted to get from Mansell-to-North Springs, for example from 15 minutes to 20 minutes. Additionally, coordinate the new arrival times to leave 5-7 minutes between arrival and departure to allow for delays on bad traffic days. I am sure there are several other bus routes that could use this examination, but the 140 is the one most familiar to the writer.

2. Increase the frequency of trains during peak rush hour. I know people will scoff at this, but I am not asking for a lot here. The trains run every 15 minutes during PEAK time. That is 4 trains per hour. The suggestion I have it so make that one train every 10 minutes, or 6 trains per hour. And only for the 4 hours from 6am to 10am and then in the afternoon from 3pm to 7pm. This would be 8 hours a day with 2 additional trains per hour. Which would mean 16 additional trains per day. Doesn't sound like a big commitment. I'll openly admit that I am not aware of the capacity left in the MARTA train system, but I do ride past the train yards and see MANY cars sitting idle...

Without any changes to the MARTA system, people are arriving late to work because of late buses, missed trains, and an infrequent train schedule. In an economy that is just starting to get it's legs back, people can't afford to arrive late and face the possibility of losing their job. In a metropolitan area that desperately needs an improved mass transit system, the State has made it even less convenient to take your car off the highway and take mass transit.

Stop the Madness: Stop 4 Pedestrians x3

On Windward Parkway, they really love their pedestrians.  At least at the Marconi Dr entrance to the Ryder building they do..  First, we have a crosswalk which should be the first indication to anyone driving that a pedestrian has the right of way.  However, drivers obviously don't know the rules of the road any longer so we had to invent the little stand up signs to remind the drivers.  Then

Windward and Marconi Triple Pedestrian Reminder

I'm guessing there was an accident at this spot that influenced the decision to put three signs withn 15 feet of eachother.  It's my opinion that one well placed sign could probably do the trick and the other two could be better used at other parts of the intersection or neighboring intersections.  

Stop the Madness: Mowed Down

This is an update from our previous 4 of a Kind post.  Apparently, East Cobb drivers hate these signs as much as I do and they've been taking matters into their own hands to clean up our oversigned streets.  Seriously, these two signs were within a half mile of each other near the Avenue East Cobb.  Median Signs Beware!  Drivers in East Cobb don't like you.

This one didn't even have a chance.An up close look at the carnage.

I wonder how this one felt as the driver rolled over him.