Quote of the Week: The Experiment Part 2

We completed one life cycle of the suburban experiment using a pay-as-you-go approach. As we reached this point—around the mid-1970s—growth in America slowed. Although multiple factors were involved, one significant cause was our suburban cities were now seeing cash outflows for infrastructure maintenance. We’d reached the “long term” and the end of commitment-free money.

Our problem was not, and is not, a lack of growth. Our problem is sixty years of unproductive growth. The American pattern of development does not create real wealth; it creates the illusion of wealth. Today we are in the process of seeing that illusion destroyed and with it the prosperity we have come to take for granted.

It took us a while to work through what to do, but we ultimately decided to go “all in” using debt. In the second life cycle of the suburban experiment, the United States financed new growth by borrowing staggering sums of money, both in the public and private sectors. By the time we crossed into the third life cycle and flamed out in the foreclosure crisis, our financing mechanisms had, out of necessity, become exotic, even predatory.

Excerpted from the Strong Towns Curbside Chat

Chuck Mahron has one of the most logical yet blistering takes on our suburban development pattern out there.  The approach that he and the Strong Towns organization take is pragmatic and conservative.  If you don't subscribe to the Strong Towns Blog, I highly recommend it.  

Quote of the Week: Grids vs Arterials

Overall, a gridded street network of two-lane roadways can accommodate both pedestrians in addition to much higher volumes of vehicles as compared to the large arterial/collector single intersection.  The superiority in capacity even holds when the grid system is compared against the arterial/collector without any pedestrian  accommodations whatsoever.  This research presented results in terms of vehicle delay and vehicle level of service; while not ideal in terms of truly understanding the impact of these large intersections in a complete urban environment, these results should instead be used to clarify many of the misconceptions that conventional traffic engineers have with regard to such large arterials/collectors intersections.   

Additional benefits of the grid system include real-time route decisions, increased levels of walking and biking, reduced vehicle speeds, and  as some recent research is showing, safer roadways for all users.  Critics may point out that the grid system increases overall vehicle delays for through traffic.  The analysis done as part of this study agrees with this assertion; however, the analysis is limited in that it assumes all trips begin outside the grid, travel through the grid, and then exit the grid.

From Supersized Intersections vs Gridded Street Networks: Comparing Capacities & Pedestrian Accommodation

Each week we feature a quote or an excerpt that clearly illustrates the benefits of new urbanist thought. 

Friday Factiod: Density and Productivity

Economists studying cities routinely find that after controlling for other variables, workers in denser places earn higher wages and are more productive. Some studies suggest that doubling density raises productivity by around 6 percent while others peg the impact at up to 28 percent. Some economists have concluded that more than half the variation in output per worker across the United States can be explained by density alone; density explains more of the productivity gap across states than education levels or industry concentrations or tax policies.

Excerpted from: One Path to Better Jobs: More Density in Cities

h/t: Strong Towns Blog

Quote of the Week: Wesley Marshall on Cul-de-sacs

A lot of people feel that they want to live in a cul-de-sac, they feel like it's a safer place to be.  The reality is yes, you're safer - if you never leave your cul-de-sac. But if you actually move around town like a normal person, your town as a whole is much more dangerous.

Wesley Marshall of the University of Colorado co-authored a study that compiled data on 230,000 crashes over 11 years in 24 mid-sized towns in California.  The safest neighborhoods all tended to be built prior to 1930 on more traditional interconnected grids.  Read on at the Atlantic.

Friday Factiod: Transit Time Warp

Transit carries less than 4 percent of work trips in the Atlanta metro region today — down from nearly 17 percent in 1960.

via The Transport Politic

If transit carried 17 percent of work trips today... we probably wouldn't need to widen as many roads...

Why I'm a Car Hater...

30,797

I got to thinking about this when I read about two fatal auto crashes today in the AJC.  One was a pedestrian killed when crossing Roswell Rd in Sandy Springs earlier today and another was a crash in Milledgeville where two Georgia College freshmen from Gwinnett were killed.

First, let me tell you that cars are incredibly useful.. I have two.  I’m not getting rid of them.  I’ve owned 6 different cars in my life.  I liked them all and loved some of them.  We need them because we can’t function ‘normally’ without them.  But, the more I think about it, they all suck in ways that you don’t normally consider when you’re driving around.  Here’s why I hate cars:

• Safety - They kill people.. they kill LOTS of people.  Driving a car on a daily basis is the most dangerous activity that most Americans regularly participate in.  Motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death for people aged 5-34 in the US.  Your odds of dying in a car crash in any given year are about 1:6500 (est.).  This equates to roughly a 1:83 lifetime chance of dying in a car crash.  Traffic fatalities vary greatly in a given year and usually range from 30k to 40k.  There were 30,797 in 2009.  Fortunately, US fatality rates have been declining in recent years.  Now, we’re all going to die but traffic fatalities are frustrating because most are preventable in some way.  My Solution: Build places that don’t rely on the car to function.
• Cost - Car related costs account for around 20% of most American families’ expenses.  That’s a lot of money to spend on a depreciating asset.  It does get you around but so do your two feet.  The average car costs about $8,000 per year to own and operate.  Most families own two.  So, let’s just say most families have one nicer car and one older car and conservatively call it $12,000 per year.  Let’s start the counter at the age of 25 and say we own a car through our 75th year.  That’s $600,000 in money that could be significantly reduced by cutting back on car ownership.  That’s not chump change.  Neither is this, the US spent $959.9B on road construction and maintenance in the 12 mos ending July 2011.  That’s almost a Trillion.  Let’s not forget the estimated lifetime medical costs from serious auto injuries.  This totaled roughly $99B in 2009, third behind cancer and heart disease.  That’s just the crashes that occurred in 2009!!!  That a Trillion in 10 years.  These are all budget busters.  My Solution: Build places that don’t rely on the car to function. 
• Health - Aside from safety, they are a health hazard.  Carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide and nitrogen dioxides all pose health hazards.  Additionally, car pollutants combine to form ozone which influences asthma, most notably in children.  We also need to consider the amount of time people sit on their rears commuting burning virtually no calories.  It’s no coincidence that as our sprawling development pattern has permeated the countryside, our waistlines have sprawled out in a highly correlated direction.  Finally, let’s not forget the hundreds of thousands of serious injuries that are sustained in car crashes.  These are all REAL problems that could be mitigated.  My Solution: Build places that don’t rely on the car to function.
• Sanity - Just watch drivers.  People get crazy when they get behind the wheel.  Observe yourself and you might find that you act differently too.  How do you react when a car suddenly gets in front of you on a road versus when a person suddenly gets in front of you on a sidewalk?  The car is a bubble that creates distance and mutes communication.  Speeds beyond 20mph take humans beyond speeds that we have evolved to function at.  This takes us into an environment that we aren’t as equipped to function in.  We don’t know how to react and we have no real way to communicate and thus we resort to anger or conflict.  We need to stop the insanity.  My Solution: Build places that don’t rely on the car to function.

To dive into these concepts in more depth, check out the book Traffic by Tom Vanderbilt.  It should be required reading for everyone on the road.  There are also some good facts on the CDC’s Motor Vehicle Safety page as well.

If we build places that don’t rely on the car to function, we’ll have a lot more good people around for a lot longer.  We need to stand up against widening roads, building unnecessary roads and decreasing connectivity.  Our congestion problems can be solved by getting people out of their cars, not by encouraging the same behavior that causes the congestion.  This will in turn save thousands of lives.

This post is in memory of all my family and friends who have died in car crashes.  

Quote of the Week: Timothy Lee on Mixed-Use, Zoning & Density

In the decades after World War II, urban planners across the country pursued a variety of aggressive “get people into their cars” policies. They used the power of eminent domain to push freeways through the heart of urban areas, destroying some neighborhoods outright and cutting others off from the rest of the city. They passed zoning restrictions that systematically discouraged high-density urban living. Many of these laws are still on the books to this day. In addition to restricting building heights and mixed-use development, these zoning codes almost invariably force developers to provide parking for new construction projects, whether the market demands it or not.

The results of these policies—convenient automobile access to the heart of the city, plentiful parking, inflated rents in the city compared to the suburbs, spread-out neighborhoods that are hard to traverse on foot—creates the illusion that people are freely choosing a suburban, auto-oriented lifestyle. But this is like saying the market has freely chosen to sweeten products using high fructose corn syrup while ignoring corn subsidies and sugar tariffs.

excerpted from Libertarians and the Urban Planning Culture War from Forbes

Quote of the Week: Chuck Mahron on Suburbia

We often forget that the American pattern of suburban development is an experiment, one that has never been tried anywhere before.  We assume it is the natural order because it is what we see all around us.  But our own history -- let alone a tour of other parts of the world -- reveals a different reality.  Across cultures, over thousands of years, people have traditionally built places scaled to the individual.  It is only the last two generations that we have scaled places to the automobile.

Chuck Mahron is the Executive Director of Strong Towns

You Spin Me Right Round...

The inside word is that the Grimes Bridge|Norcross St roundabout has been an incredible success in the roughly four months it has been open.  I was curious about the crash record of the new roundabout and learned that since it opened, there had been ZERO wrecks until just earlier this week when there was a fender bender involving a car in the round about hitting a car exiting the roundabout that was forced to stop behind a truck schoolbus that was stopped outside the roundabout.  

Is that really a roundabout related crash?  Who knows?  Let's just say it is.  That means one crash has occurred in four months.  That intersection was previously one of Roswell's most crash prone and if I am not mistaken was the most crash prone intersection that did not involve an arterial highway.  The annual crash total was in the mid thirties.  We can safely say that the crash rate at that intersection has been cut by ~90% at this point in it's life.  WOW!

Additionally, I've taken this route several times at rush hour and many times throughout the day.  The reduction in wait times has been amazing.  Double WOW! 

Kudos Roswell on a well thought out and well designed solution to what was a dangerous intersection.  There are other roundabouts planned in Roswell and North Fulton and we can only hope they have the same success as this one.

Fun Fact: Hammond Road Interchange

The new Hammond Road interchange in Sandy Springs will open tomorrow.  It's been a long time coming.  The Fun Fact here is that the project cost a whopping $18,000,0000.  That's roughly $12M for the bridge, $5M for the ramps, $500k for lighting, fences, etc.  Here's the link from the Atlanta Business Chronicle.