Urbification: Taking the sub out of Calif. suburbs

Increasing appeal

2011-12-13T07:05:00.000-08:00

According to the Urban Land Institute: "Living smaller, closer to work, and preferably near mass transit holds increasing appeal as more people look to manage expenses wisely."

Podcast: A bike coalition plans for the future

2011-09-22T11:35:00.000-07:00

The East Bay Bicycle Coalition's September member meeting let EBBC members give input on the EBBC's strategic plan. This recording captures the start and the end of the meeting, but not the middle which broke into small groups. The meeting took place at the Rockridge branch of the Oakland Public Library in Oakland, California. Listen. (Stereo recording, 1:04:55, 119MB)

Bicycle "streetscapes": Perception is not the same as real safety

2011-08-13T20:01:00.000-07:00

Advocates of "streetscape improvements" for bicyclists are fond of saying that such things as dedicated spaces for bicycling will add to the perception that bicycling on the street is safe. But now they are going too far -- saying that such facilities are, in fact, safer. But the jury's still out -- and it may be that while you're less likely to be injured while in such side paths, the absolute number of injuries to bicyclists will go up. So let's have some restraint, streetscape advocates, or else cough up some hard data.

Road safety is a major health issue

2011-07-08T18:40:00.000-07:00

The United Nations has declared 2011-2020 the Decade of Action for Road Safety. The Association of Health Care Journalists recently held a panel discussion about road safety.

Unhealthy? Sue land use planners!

2010-11-18T17:26:00.000-08:00

Amanda Thompson: "If there was such a thing as designer malpractice we would be in a lot of trouble right now. We have created a land use and transportation system that actually prevents a healthy lifestyle."

It stops graffiti. Should we know how it works?

2010-07-07T18:42:00.000-07:00

Governments around California and elsewhere are buying Merlin, an anti-graffiti detection system from Broadband Discovery Systems, but this press account says the manufacturer and police won't reveal how it works. Should the public have the right to know, since it is deployed in public?

Detroit Critical Mass report offers a poignant portrait of a city reinventing itself

2010-06-30T18:07:00.000-07:00

Longtime readers of this blog know I'm not a big fan of Critical Mass, but Chris Carlsson recently posted a poignant report from Detroit's March 2010 Critical Mass. I challenge you to read this and not be moved by American's motor city reinventing itself, and not entirely on four wheels. And wait until you read the blog post's comments about how Henry Ford shared the road before he drove a car!

Kudos to the California Budget Challenge

2010-06-08T20:46:00.000-07:00

NextTen has a really cool Web app that lets you balance California's budget, then send the results to your elected officials and to friends. Click on "Updated California Budget Challenge."

This kind of Web site makes me proud to be a Californian and proud to have done a bit over the years to promote technology that led to this sort of application.

Is Digital Revolution Driving Decline in U.S. Car Culture?

2010-06-02T21:43:00.001-07:00

AdAge says younger folks in the U.S. are driving less.

SB 518 parking reform bill amended into something entirely unrelated to parking

2010-05-20T11:24:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday, the California State Assembly amended SB 518, Sen. Alan Lowenthal's parking reform measure -- passed by the Senate earlier this year -- so radically that it now has nothing to do with parking reform.

Instead, the bill as amended now concerns the adoption of building standards for graywater systems.

So far, Sen. Lowenthal has not said anything publicly about this devastating turn of events for parking reform in California.

I've made an inquiry with his office, and will post here if and when I get a reply. (UPDATE: "No comment," says a spokesman.)

The way this played out suggests there is a lot I do not understand about the legislative process in California.

SB 518 referred to Assembly committee

2010-05-07T16:03:00.000-07:00

SB 518, which would help cities move from free parking to parking paid for by motorists, continues its trek through the California state legislature.

Yesterday, the bill, already passed in watered-down form by the state Senate, was referred to the Assembly Committee on Local Government. No date for a hearing has been set yet.

Periodic Table of City Planning Elements

2010-05-06T10:50:00.000-07:00

Planetizen's Periodic Table of City Planning Elements looks like a joke at first blush, but it could be an interesting way of representing the chemistry of communities.

Out-of-balance infrastructure

2010-05-04T13:13:00.000-07:00

U.S. PIRG: "Federal and state policies—which should provide strong guidance in the wise use of taxpayer dollars—often fail to achieve the proper balance between building new infrastructure and taking care of what we already have built."

Kaiser's questionable investment in free bikes

2010-04-24T08:36:00.000-07:00

Does anybody else find it outrageous that health care provider Kaiser Permanente is shelling out $450,000 to fund a free bicycle loan program in Denver? As I've written before, free bikes have a history of being vandalized or stolen. At a time when health care is still being denied to so many, or the premiums are so high, this is not the right way for a health care provider to be spending its money.

SB 518 moves directly to the California Assembly

2010-02-03T12:29:00.000-08:00

I didn't know that in California, the Assembly can directly consider a bill passed by the Senate. Seems more efficient than the U.S. Congressional method, where each bill has a counterpart (with a different bill number) and they usually have to be reconciled.

At any rate, Sen. Alan Lowenthal's office has informed me that SB 518, the parking reform bill passed by the California Senate last week, will probably be heard in the Assembly Transportation Committee in the late spring or early summer of this year.

In fact, SB 518 has already had its first reading in the Assembly. To read the proposed legislation in its latest, further watered-down language (though still very, very worthy of our support), look here.

Parking reform bill passes California Senate

2010-01-30T11:42:00.000-08:00

SB 518, the California parking reform legislation that Sen. Alan Lowenthal introduced in 2009, was approved by the Senate on Thursday. I had no idea it was even up for a vote on Thursday. Here's the webcast of Thursday's Senate session. The passage occurs around the 2:30:00 mark.

Bike-sharing: A questionable investment

2010-01-02T10:57:00.000-08:00

At a time when bike theft is epidemic, and bus service is being slashed left and right, is it wise to be spending a half million dollars to buy and operate a free shared-bicycle program in the Bay Area? The MTC program Safe Routes to Transit thinks so, and has the $500,000 courtesy of bridge tolls. But these programs have a troubled history. The bikes get vandalized or stolen. A highly-touted program in Paris has been especially hard hit. I predict a similar outcome, or worse, in Silicon Valley, where once I even spotted someone trying to steal my bike even as I watched him! Put this money instead into more bike lockers, or even shared bike cages like the innovative one now operating at Embarcadero BART.

Complete Streets: A dangerous image?

2009-11-25T13:42:00.000-08:00

Transportation for America is steadily moving forward its agenda which includees "complete streets." Quoting from TFA's Web site, "Complete streets mean those who have to walk each day don't have to risk their lives on roads that are dangerous by design."

But in pursuing this agenda, is TFA always serving the interests of bicyclists for better coexistence with cars on the streets that all must share? Maybe. But today I found a link to this image on the Complete Streets Web site, as part of its Flickr slide show.

Granted, the main purpose of this photo is to demonstrate the goodness of bus shelters for public transit passengers. But look at the photo more closely. We see a busy arterial street, engineered for a 35 to 45 mph speed limit. Beyond the bus stop, the rightmost lane is so narrow that the only safe thing for a bicyclist to do is take the lane...or, to ride on the widened sidewalk. It's common in the suburbs to see a sidewalk narrower than this due to low pedestrian traffic volumes. But this looks all too much like a side "path" where bikes are welcome, timid bicyclists will choose to ride, and aggressive motorists will expect all bicyclists to ride. In other words, a dangerous image for bicycling.

I intend to read the proposed legislation accompanying this TFA call for action, and as long as this dangerous image is associated with this legislation, I don't intend to support it. Too bad, because the provisions for pedestrians are laudable. It's what's left unsaid here that disturbs me. Do bikes belong on this street?

Stop signs and bicycles

2009-10-22T11:07:00.000-07:00

A meaningful debate about stop signs, traffic calming and the differences between bicycles and cars has landed at Slate.com. We need a lot more consciousness-raising like this before applicable state laws can be changed and not result in more car-nage.

The necessary evil

2009-08-04T17:01:00.001-07:00

Kudos to the Oakland Tribune for this editorial: Oakland's parking fee increases a necessary evil.

Distracted driving at 0 to 3mph

2009-07-23T09:41:00.000-07:00

Thumbing through a manual for a Ford car equipped with Microsoft Sync, I found this gem concerning sending new text messages through your phone via the Sync car interface: "This is a speed dependent feature. The vehicle must be moving less than 3 mph (4.82 khm/h) to use this feature."

This implementation of Sync helpfully comes with 15 predefined messages ranging from "why?" to "where r you?"

My advice to drivers: park it first, then choose "can't talk right now." There's enough distracted driving out there!

Parking worse than driving?

2009-07-16T15:06:00.000-07:00

A 2007 article from Slate: Why parking your car is more environmentally destructive than driving it. I found this in the epic comment-fest (552 and counting) following the SF Chronicle's July 14 story on Oakland's dramatic recent parking meter price increase.

Sprawl in reverse

2009-06-12T19:28:00.000-07:00

The Telegraph reports that many US cities may have to be bulldozed in order to survive.

SB 518 dead for this year

2009-06-05T14:19:00.001-07:00

SB 518 needed 21 votes to pass the California State Senate, but in a vote Wednesday, it only received 19. The Senate allowed Sen. Lowenthal to bring it up for another vote next year, but in the words of a Senate staffer, "the bill died for this year."

Here you can see the roll call votes of the 19 senators who voted yes, and the 18 who voted no.

America at War

2009-06-02T09:59:00.000-07:00

Michael Moore: "Just as President Roosevelt did after the attack on Pearl Harbor, the President must tell the nation that we are at war and we must immediately convert our auto factories to factories that build mass transit vehicles and alternative energy devices."

SB 518 passes Appropriations on 7-5 vote

2009-05-30T09:19:00.000-07:00

The California Senate Appropriations Committee passed SB 518 on Thursday by a 7-5 vote. Senator Loni Hancock, wife of Berkeley mayor Tom Bates, is now a co-author. It looks like the next step is a vote by the full Senate.

SB 518 goes to Appropriations

2009-04-30T07:31:00.000-07:00

SB 518, as amended passed out of the Education Committee on a 5-3 vote yesterday. It's been re-referred to the Appropriations Committee.

Glass-half-full observation: at least it hasn't gotten stuck in committee, so far.

UPDATE: The Appropriations hearing will take place on May 26.

SB 518: The April 21 video

2009-04-29T14:09:00.000-07:00

While we're waiting for the latest news from this morning's Senate Education Committee hearing on SB 518, here's the video (starting at 1:38:30) from the April 21 Senate Transportation and Housing Commitee hearing on the same bill (before it was watered down). The very real debate points scored by parking reformers testifying before the transportation committee will serve our cause well when we bring this issue back, or celebrate any substantive good that comes from the current bill as it inches forward.

SB 518 author weakens legislation; CCs still oppose

2009-04-28T07:17:00.001-07:00

Facing opposition from community colleges, Sen. Alan Lowenthal amended SB 518 on April 22 to weaken this legislation as it pertains to community colleges. Read the new legislative analysis. The Senate Committee on Education will hold a hearing on the amended bill tomorrow in Sacramento. The groups that originally supported SB 518 sent no new letters of support; the California Community College League remains opposed. This watered-down bill obviously portends a long process for parking reform in California.

SB 518: My day in Sacramento

2009-04-21T17:00:00.000-07:00

The surprise at today's state senate hearing on parking reform bill SB 518 wasn't that there was enough opposition to keep it in committee for now. It was that opposition was muted. It's as if state lawmakers are really starting to understand the need to make motorists pay for parking.

The bill now goes on to the senate education committee where some aspects opposed by the community colleges will get debated.

I recorded some video as an experiment but the Senate-recorded video is probably going to be the canonical video of record. I will point to it when it becomes available on the Web.

The state senate hearing room has no public Wi-Fi, so liveblogging isn't yet possible!

SB 518 legislative analysis is online

2009-04-18T20:58:00.000-07:00

The legislative analysis for SB 518 is online. As of April 15, positions of support are on record from the National Resources Defense Council (described as a sponsor), the American Lung Association, the California League of Conservation Voters, Genentech, Housing California, the Non-Profit Housing Association of Northern California, the Planning and Conservation League, and TransForm. No opposing statements were received. (I guess the California Drive-and-Park-Everywhere-for-Free Council has yet to be formed.)

America to suburbs: It's over

2009-04-09T21:29:00.001-07:00

Reuters: Is America's love affair with suburbia over?

SB 518 parking reform hearing scheduled for April 21

2009-04-08T22:01:00.001-07:00

SB 518, which would institute a variety of reforms aimed at curbing the proliferation of government-funded or government-mandated parking spaces, now has an April 21 date for its first public hearing, at the Senate Transportation and Housing Committee. If you think California's cities need a little bit saner parking policy going forward, attend the hearing at 1:30 p.m on April 21 in Sacramento at the State Capitol Building in the John L. Burton Hearing Room (4203).

Suburban bad times will get worse

2009-03-12T13:42:00.001-07:00

The ideas of James Howard Kunstler are breaking out of his little corner of the Web and infecting such champions of business as Fast Company. But the suburbs will see much worse than they have so far.

At last, a state initiative worth supporting

2009-03-03T08:59:00.000-08:00

Long Beach legislator proposes parking reform menu (posted by Greater Greater Washington).

The bill is SB 518. I'll be tracking it closely.

Obama: Sprawl is finished

2009-02-10T20:15:00.000-08:00

President Obama: “The days where we’re just building sprawl forever, those days are over.”

Infrastructure spending won't be so great under Obama

2009-01-27T08:41:00.000-08:00

Much of what passes for "change" out of the Obama administration is starting to disappoint me. Too much remains "the same." At least when it comes to transportation. The GreaterGreater Washington blog says that Obama economic advisor Larry Summers is "steering President Obama and the stimulus bill away from transit and other infrastructure spending and toward tax cuts."

UPDATE: Speaker Pelosi needs to receive some phone calls today to help improve the situation in the House. After you call, leave a record of your effort here.

New land-use law's message: build near transit

2008-12-01T08:08:00.000-08:00

Sayeth the Chronicle: "The ultimate impact will depend on how the legislation is put into effect."

No doubt, court battles await, first.

A satirical Web site with bite

2008-10-15T20:24:00.000-07:00

Hey, motorists, let's be careful out there.

Foreclosure Alley

2008-10-02T19:52:00.000-07:00

Funny how all the foreclosed houses in this video report are way, wayy out of town. Wait...it's not funny. It's inevitable!

Bikes taking more than their fair share of Bay Area transit

2008-08-19T10:35:00.000-07:00

I found this one of the most cogent observations about Bay Area bikes-on-transit that I've ever read:

"Bicyclists are over-represented among Bay Area transit users
_because transit is presently so sparse_. While they will always
be important users, it is silly to view all transit decisions
through the lens of bicycle usage, as though these users will
always be as over-represented as they are now. They won't be. They
will decline, percentage-wise... assuming well-planned transit projects move forward."

DVD review: Still We Ride

2008-06-09T10:36:00.000-07:00

Recently I was able to view Still We Ride, a DVD containing as its core a documentary produced in 2005 but now available for rental on Netflix. It documents the crackdown on New York Critical Mass that began at the 2004 Republican Convention and continues to a certain extent to this day. The 2004 footage of New York cops removing parked bicycles from sidewalks with power saws cleaving through U-locks, claiming the bikes were abandoned while their owners stood by helplessly, was a chilling chronicle of out-of-control police power. I'm not that enamored of Critical Mass, though, and take issue with Chris Carlson's statement that the July 1997 ride was "fun"; I saw lots of bad behavior by motorists and bicyclists alike, and haven't gone on a CM ride since.

The Still We Ride DVD also contains a video short on congestion pricing produced in 2007 that equates such schemes with your worst black-helicopter kind of paranoia, even ending with the streets cleared of cars and bikes so that George Bush and his friends can rule the streets on Segways. It's too bad to see some of New York's bicycling advocates lean so far into anarchism that they refuse to see how much sense congestion pricing makes. That kind of paranoia couldn't have helped the recent failed effort to commence congestion pricing in Manhattan.

Peak oil late-night comedy bit

2008-05-18T21:32:00.000-07:00

Who says peak oil can't be funny?

Oh. Wait a minute. It isn't funny.

The shortest route for cars may be down your street

2008-02-01T10:18:00.000-08:00

Nicholas Carr: "Dashboard maps are having some unintended consequences. In many cases, the shortest route between two points turns out to run through once-quiet neighborhoods and formerly out-of-the-way hamlets...a research group in the Netherlands last month issued a report documenting the phenomenon and the resulting risk of accidents. It went so far as to say that satnav systems can turn drivers into child killers"

The Battle for Britain's Roads

2008-01-24T10:37:00.000-08:00

Via Streetsblog, here's an excellent documentary from the BBC:

A phrase that struck me at the 56-minute mark: "Share and let live."

UPDATE: Google Video appears to have taken this down. Maybe the BBC will make it available. If you see it there, drop me a line and I'll update this post.

The ultimate speed bump

2007-11-22T21:47:00.001-08:00

There are some streets in Berkeley that could use one of these.

A bicycle boulevard balancing act

2007-11-15T16:57:00.000-08:00

The World Edition commissioned me to write a transportation article, and I chose the issue closest to me: how a rise in motor vehicle traffic could imperil the Hillegass bicycle boulevard in Berkeley.

Martian observation

2007-10-01T11:45:00.000-07:00

James Kuntzler: "A casual observer from Mars would have to conclude that President Bush perfectly represents a nation that shows such a thoroughgoing incapacity for thought, and such an aversion to the truth about its own behavior. A people so hopelessly unwilling to get its act together deserves to suffer."

Take the Walk Score test

2007-07-18T23:07:00.000-07:00

How does your neighborhood rate? Find out here.

Donald Shoup on the high cost of free parking

2007-06-14T09:45:00.000-07:00

Streetfilms.org posted a six-minute interview with Donald Shoup, author of The High Cost of Free Parking.

Bike-commuting bans don't stop her

2007-04-20T10:46:00.000-07:00

L.J. Williamson: "My son’s school has a written rule that students in grades K-4 may not ride their bicycles to school. My son and I cheerfully ignore this restriction."

Message to John Doerr: Reign in Carl Guardino

2007-03-14T09:35:00.000-07:00

At this week's mega-expensive TED conference in Monterey, uber-venture capitalist John Doerr is getting all choked up about environmental issues. "I don't think we're going to make it," he says, all verklempt in front an audience including his 15-year-old daughter.

John, we've never met, though we have many mutual acquaintences. But let me give you some advice, from one father-of-a-daughter to another: The most important thing you could do for the environment is to reign in Carl Guardino, now a commissioner on the California Transportation Commission, where it looks like he intends to ram through the incredibly cost-inefficient and wasteful BART to San Jose extension. According to some talk I heard at a recent meeting, Carl intends to come lecture the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) in a month or two, no doubt to get the rest of the Bay Area to help foot the bill for this boondoggle. Nothing hurts the environment, however, like a terribly wasteful public transit extension. It sucks up all available dollars that could be spent, say, preserving local bus service, upgrading Amtrak service to San Jose, or adding regional bus service, any of which would add far more new riders per dollar than BART to San Jose ever could.

The financial train wreck that is the BART-SFO extension is all the evidence you'll need, John, that Carl's extension needs to be scaled back. And you're just the guy who can ask him to do it.

Berkeley's disappearing open space?

2007-02-28T12:00:00.000-08:00

According to the editor of the Berkeley Daily Planet, Berkeley's open space is disappearing:

"Livable Berkeley seem to think that covering every square inch of the scant remaining open space in Berkeley, green or paved, with new construction will make more people want to live here and fewer people want to move to new subdivisions in former cornfields"

But when you look around, the kind of open space targeted by groups like Livable Berkeley are mostly parking lots. That's open space?

Otherwise, no one's advocating digging up public parkland, or other public property. The Planet objects to people building on their own private property when it creates a denser Berkeley, but by no stretch of the imagination is a suburban private property "open space."

In terms of visuals, the biggest change in the past 15 years was when Oakland and Berkeley homeowners rebuilt on the hillside site of the 1991 fire. No one's complained about that rebuilding even though visually it removes a huge portion of Berkeley's "open space" (never mind it's private property.)

Rarely does the Planet note that the biggest cause of increasing congestion in Berkeley in coming years will be construction of new parking garages at UC Berkeley in the center of town, and expansion of the Caldecott Tunnel at the southern end of town.

Congestion tax, anyone?

The parking fix

2007-02-12T08:54:00.000-08:00

Good Wall Street Journal story lamenting the end of "what may be one of the last great urban bargains," metered parking. Of course, what makes it great is that market forces are finally coming to bear on such parking. (Unfortunately, this story is behind a pay firewall. Look in your local library for the Feb. 3-4, 2007 issue and turn to page P1.)

Four stories vs. five

2006-10-04T18:34:00.000-07:00

David Mundstock, quoted by Will Harper in the East Bay Express: "You can't have a political philosophy based on four stories versus five stories." And yet, maybe, that's what the Berkeley mayor's race comes down to this year.

Street sweeping reminder service

2006-07-11T12:18:00.000-07:00

One thing that makes the increasingly urbified California city more civil is effective street-sweeeping. Two years ago, I suggested to family and friends that someone ought to start a service to automatically remind car owners to move their cars on appointed street-sweeping days. Now, that service exists, and it can remind you via email or via messages to your mobile phone. Here's an article about the service from the East Bay Daily News, June 15, 2006, which is not archived online:

Parking ticket woes inspire new Web site
Street-cleaning reminders for free

By Jamie Morrow
Daily News Staff Writer

Tired of street-sweeping parking tickets? So are two UC Berkeley undergrads.

Andrew Siemion, 25, and Suneet Upadhyay, 20, have created MyMotorMaid.com, a Web site that offers free e-mail and text message reminders of street-sweeping days so residents can avoid tickets.

"I had about $600 in parking tickets when I conjured up the idea of MyMotorMaid," Siemion said. "I was like, 'Man, this sucks.' I thought it sure would be great if there was some way I could remember street-sweeping days."

For some reason, Siemion said, every third Friday of the month just wasn't easy to remember.

"If I have anything else going on in my life, I won't remember," Siemion said.

After the idea, implementation was easy for the two astrophysics majors.

"We're both technical people, and we knew we could do it, so we thought we should," Upadhyay said.

Since many Berkeley students don't have cars, he thinks it will serve the city's residential community the most.

The service is free to users and doesn't host ads, Upadhyay said. And now that the basic programming is done, the site can serve many other cities besides Berkeley and the five other cities for which it's currently set. The site also includes links to the cities' street-sweeping schedules in case you don't know when to set your reminder.

Siemion sees Oakland and San Jose as the natural next cities to add, though interested residents from any city can e-mail them at maid@mymotormaid.com to request to be added.

"We intend to host it indefinitely," Upadhyay said. "It doesn't take that much work."

The city is happy to lose the money if it means cleaner streets, said Susie Monary-Wilson, manager of the city agency that collects parking fees.

"I think it's a great service," Monary-Wilson said. "Our goal is to really not have the cars there. It's really frustrating for the street-sweepers."

While he originally conceived the idea as a money saver, Siemion said that after resarching street-sweeping, he realized how good it was for the city and the environment.

"It makes me happy to know (the Web site) can also have a positive environmental impact," Siemion said.

Another kind of NIMBY

2006-07-06T22:05:00.000-07:00

I hope nothing like this ever occurs in the Bay Area. Maybe Prop. 13 makes it impossible.

Kid obesity steals headlines as Nat'l. Public Health Week begins

2006-04-03T13:38:00.000-07:00

So, do you think the SF Chronicle is covering National Public Health Week as it starts today? This year's theme is "Designing Healthy Communities, Raising Healthy Kids."

Nope. Instead, it's talking about obese children no longer fitting into their car seats.

Technorati tag: National Public Health Week

Clever auto-ad subversion

2006-03-31T10:35:00.000-08:00

It's great to see some critics of Driving Everywhere (in the biggest SUV possible) get some digs in, cleverly. (Here's how they did it.)

Start negotiating

2006-02-01T06:51:00.000-08:00

Mr. President, the problem isn't the U.S. addiction to oil. It's the addiction to a Driving Everywhere way of life:

In 1992 President George Bush snr signed the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change with the proviso that the American way of life was "non-negotiable".

Warning to motorists: You're about to hit a pedestrian

2006-01-30T16:18:00.000-08:00

Could this be the future: radio-tagging all pedestrians and cars to alert motorists when they're about to collide with a pedestrian? Motorists will still be able to say "I didn't see him," though.

2005-11-29T16:33:00.000-08:00

Last month's BusinessWeek story, "Living Too Large in Exurbia," is the canary in California's coal mine -- and America's, too. (link to story for subscribers):

"The American Dream of a better life away from the city is hardly over. But it could be in for a few tough knocks."

2005-09-15T13:38:00.000-07:00

Here's a brilliant idea: A photoblog dedicated to showing motorists who park where they shouldn't. For instance, putting a large vehicle in a compact space. Or a vehicle of any size in two spaces. Start such a blog in your town!

2005-09-08T23:37:00.000-07:00

Motorists are outraged about new "smart" parking meters that zero out any remaining time when a car pulls out of a spot. But I'm delighted! If such practice reduces the current practice of driving around to look for a meter with remaining time, think of the gasoline saved and air pollution reduction!

2005-08-31T14:01:00.000-07:00

The city of San Jose is discovering it needs to let businesses build up, not out. Housing will follow suit. Now the only question is, will the city be able to provide the needed mass transit, instead of mandating more parking spaces?

2005-07-22T11:18:00.000-07:00

Got cultural affirmation? Today's Oakland Tribune contained this straightfaced yet fatuous description of Subaru: "Subaru's standing as the car the rich can drive without attracting attention to themselves and the politically active Birkenstock set can drive while drawing cultural affirmation, will not be harmed by this newest rendition of the Forester." (No link available.) Huh? I don't get cultural affirmation from driving; driving lets me get from Point A to Point B when no alternative exists. (Full disclosure: Our family owns a Forester.)

2005-07-08T06:02:00.000-07:00

LawMeme has an interesting post on how to make traffic cameras respect privacy.

2005-06-15T09:49:00.000-07:00

Karma conserved. I was just thinking about how tragic it was that KRON-4 was running an infomercial during the World Environment Day closing ceremony (granted, only about 200 choir members showed up, not 1,000), when six days later KRON hosted a blogger meet-up, where I got to tell one of the station's consultants how blogging and podcasting offer a way for the station to correct this defect through widening the scope of the station's coverage. A personal note: I've been involved with KRON every other decade for a while. In the 1960s, I was on Mayor Art when I was seven; in the 1980s, I was on the top of the five o'clock news for a few minutes being interviewed about the IBM PCjr; and now the blogger meetup, which wasn't actually telecast, but for the first time, I got to sit in the anchor's chair, and that was worth it.

In this picture, I'm just to the left of the anchor desk. Although I run other blogs, I was proud to register Urbification first with KRON's forthcoming Bay Area blog directory, since Urbification is the blog most applicable to where I've lived most of my life. (Thanks to fellow SJSUer Steve Sloan for the photo.)

2005-06-03T07:07:00.000-07:00

If you're in San Francisco this coming Sunday, I'll be singing in a 1,000-voice gospel choir as part of the closing ceremonies of the United Nations' World Environment Day. Rev. Edwin Hawkins composed a special anthem for this and is conducting the choir. The two rehearsals I've attended have been excellent. You might remember Hawkins' breakout gospel hit, Oh Happy Day, from the 1969.

2005-05-27T09:03:00.000-07:00

BART's board decides to mandate parking charges at 10 more stations, and of course the SF Chronicle BART discussion board is full of livid people. But every now and then, the real issue pokes its head through the rhetoric:

The real reasons we are in this predicament are all around us. Its time
someone steps up to put the blame where it belongs.

Glad to be of service.

2005-04-29T10:03:00.000-07:00

The BART budget crisis is a wake-up call for a lot of Bay Area commuters. Listen to this comment from the S.F. Chronicle's BART discussion board on the Web:

The American way of life is fast coming to an end. I'm talking specifically about the comfort we have of living in suburbia, 30 miles away from where you work, and wasting a crap load of resources in the process. It doesn't matter if it's gas or BART, this American Suburbia way of life is inherently wasteful. Yes, I know people feel like they need a four bedroom home and a two car garage to house a family of four, so they move to Antioch or Pleasanton to afford it and commute via car or BART, but don't you get it; it's EXTRAVAGANT. And it's a luxury the middle class american won't be able to afford. Think about how gas is going up. So you think, I'll take the BART, we'll, BART's getting more expensive, MUNI, CalTrain, all going up. So any way you look at it, if you have a 30 mile commute, you're screwed. You pay for it one way or the other. There is no solution until people realize this American Dream of buying a big ass house in the suburbs is a bad, bad, bad idea. We did this to ourselves.

2005-03-17T16:17:00.000-08:00

There's a new book coming out: The High Cost of Free Parking, by Donald C. Shoup, published by the American Planning Association. I'm ordering my copy today. I hope it helps escalate an important dialog in city councils and other decisionmaking bodies in California. I learned about it on a day when two close friends from my church were hit and hospitalized by a car while taking their morning walk. A high cost indeed.

2005-02-11T10:33:00.000-08:00

I grew up in the prototypical suburb of the 1960s, Sunnyvale, California. But this story shows just how dangerous Sunnyvale can be, in no small part due to its car-centric, suburban nature.

2004-12-30T10:35:00.000-08:00

As I watched two tow trucks doing their thing during the commute hour on Ashby Ave. in Berkeley yesterday, I was reminded just how much money cities gain from parking fines, citations and meters. There's enormous potential for entrepreneurs to connect the dots between busy, distracted motorists and services which could save them time and money in this regard. parkingticket.com is capitalizing on this in New York City. There's the BART Smart Parking trial here in the East Bay, which makes less sense but still offers someone a buck to make, maybe. And maybe the whole thing will also help keep cities honest, because if enough parking tickets get thrown out, the method of verifying parking violations will progress beyond the dubious practice of chalking tires -- more on that topic another time.

2004-12-03T16:13:00.000-08:00

Giving thanks for our overly-litigious country? Well, yes. It seems that fear of lawsuits is keeping Audi from introducing a car in the U.S. which permits drivers to watch videos while rolling at speeds of up to 3 miles per hour. Pedestrians, bicyclists and motorcyclists in Europe and the rest of the world: you've been warned.

2004-11-30T19:55:00.000-08:00

Now that rollerbladers have finally learned how to become fairly civil on bike paths, wouldn't you know it's time for another device, the Trikke, whose whole means of human-powered propulsion seems to depend upon weaving. If you're a bicyclist on a bike path, or a pedestrian on a sidewalk, this is about as welcome as a swarm of scooters, only more dangerous.

2004-11-10T10:24:00.000-08:00

My father passed away on Monday. The cause: Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD). This disease is the fourth leading cause of death in America. Please consider a donation to the American Lung Association.

2004-11-08T09:34:00.000-08:00

Geography gives people a funny impression of how a country feels. The recent presidential election is the latest example. For a more realistic view of how the country really looks, by population instead of geography, visit this page. Bob Herbert said it well: "The election's been lost but there's still a country to save."

2004-11-02T23:58:00.000-08:00

I was in Denver last week and picked up a copy of Westword, an alt-weekly. The cover story, Go With the Flow, offered a fascinating peek into how skateparks are designed, and mis-designed. The road to skateboarding, too, is paved with good intentions, but with mixed results.

2004-11-01T15:39:00.000-08:00

Michael Moore puts it best: "To Non-Voters: I understand why you stopped voting. Politicians suck. Nothing ever seems to change. You’re only one vote. Yes, politicians suck. But so do car salesmen – and that hasn’t stopped you from buying a car." Unfortunately true in today's America.

2004-10-21T13:17:00.000-07:00

Following upon my post yesterday, Trevor Bourget suggests an entire movement called Anarchic Cycling.

2004-10-20T11:34:00.000-07:00

Andrew Koebrick, president of the Minnesota Bicycle & Pedestrian Alliance, is an advocate of "stealth cycling" -- riding one's bicycle without lights at nighttime -- in order to avoid being attacked by belligerent motorists or pedestrians. Has it come to this?

2004-10-15T07:05:00.000-07:00

For better or worse, sentiments like this could tip a presidential election.

2004-10-14T13:52:00.000-07:00

The New York Times reports pedestrians talking on cellphones have become a major cause of "pedlock" and subsequent "ped-rage."

2004-10-13T15:50:00.000-07:00

Study: Living in the Suburbs Can Make You Sick. Apparently, it's healthier to live in dense urban areas including New York City, San Francisco and Boston. Just the latest in a series of such findings.

2004-10-09T14:41:00.000-07:00

A jury has decided that sidewalks are a necessary safety feature, which the city of Fontana discovered the hard way.

2004-10-05T15:13:00.000-07:00

Press release: Drive Safely Work Week Campaign Keeps Employees Safe on the Road. Press coverage from The Pasadena (TX) Citizen, Insurance Journal, the Detroit Free Press, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, South Bay (NY) News, the Cincinatti Enquirer, Augusta (VA) Free Press, and Belleville (IL) News-Democrat. No coverage in any of the major California newspapers: I checked the San Francisco Chronicle, San Jose Mercury-News, Contra-Costa Times, Sacramento Bee, Oakland Tribune, and Los Angeles Times. Time for California to treat safe driving more seriously. The state certainly has its share of dangerous driving. Ironically, instead, California this week is promoting Walk to School Week.

2004-09-28T11:14:00.000-07:00

Turn Em In is a software program written for the Palm OS that quickly allows you to document unsafe driving behavior. With this tool, you can get the facts down quick, so the dangerous driver can be removed from the road.

2004-09-27T15:23:00.000-07:00

As Kryptonite struggles to respond to a whirlwind of bad publicity about their Bic pen-vulnerable U-locks, things are buzzing at a bicycle security discussion group I established a week ago.

2004-09-27T15:20:00.000-07:00

You can now rent a Segway in Oakland, California. The prices aren't cheap.

2004-09-16T13:54:00.000-07:00

If you own a Kryptonite U-lock for your bicycle, listen up. The Internet is buzzing with the news that it can be opened with a Bic pen. I've seen convincing video. Kryptonite's Web site doesn't acknowledge the problem, but this AP story says Kryptonite is accelerating the development of a new, pen-resistant lock. No mention of any refunds to customers. Can Kryptonite be held liable? Meanwhile, guard your bikes and get new locks. What a tragedy for everyday bicycle transportation use.

2004-09-13T16:42:00.000-07:00

And then Giuseppe Cannella invented the jet-powered wheelchair in 2004, and sidewalks were never entirely safe again.

2004-09-01T16:34:00.000-07:00

Earlier this summer at a technology conference, I heard about an innovative program in the U.K. to tie the cost of auto insurance to the miles driven by a driver. Norwich Union, the U.K.'s largest insurance group, has a Web page descibing this option. The program leverages the location services available in today's mobile phones to track drivers' movements. If this makes enough sense, and if privacy concerns don't torpedo it, we'll see the idea spread worldwide, having a beneficial effect on encouraging alternatives to getting behind the wheel of a motor vehicle.

2004-08-31T11:45:00.000-07:00

Mark your calendars. This year, Drive Safely Work Week is Oct. 4-8, 2004.

2004-08-12T09:57:00.000-07:00

Online debates about mass transportation sometimes devolve into a debate about personal rapid transportation (PRT). Now Ken Avidor, creator of the Road Kill Bill online comic strip, has created PRT is a Joke! to collect and debunk some of the many PRT myths. Favorite quote: PRT is "as realistic as crossing a sow and a centipede to obtain 100 hams."

2004-08-05T15:52:00.000-07:00

Pedestrian turn signals: Ever since those really bright mini-lights made their appearance, this product was inevitable. Now someone's gone and built it. (Courtesy of Gizmodo)

2004-06-28T18:40:00.001-07:00

An automaker has estimated that it could give away a car for free, like cell phones are provided, if the customer agrees to buy $220 worth of information services per month, according to Sun Microsystems. Drivers would still have a variety of expenses to pay, but it's very likely we will see this car giveaway become reality within a few years.

2004-06-25T13:30:00.000-07:00

The automobile kills COMDEX: This week, the organizers of COMDEX, a large, venerable technology show, announced they were postponing the show, but it may never return. Tech industry observers fingered many culprits, but I believe the murder weapons were evident during each show, stuck in traffic. COMDEX, which took place in Las Vegas, proved to be a nightmare to navigate around, because the streets around the conference and feeder hotels on the Las Vegas "strip" were choked with a mix of local traffic, taxis, rental cars and buses. When I attended COMDEX in 1997, I persuaded several staffers at BYTE Magazine to rent mountain bikes to get around. We used the bikes to get to appointments on time, which it's tough to do when you're stuck in a car in traffic during COMDEX. Others, including an IDC analyst, discovered this bicycling trick in ensuing years. But Vegas lacks bike lanes or wide shoulder lanes on its main drags, which makes bicycling a bit hairier. As for public transit, for years Las Vegas has been building a monorail to move city visitors around, but it's a case of too little, too late for COMDEX.

2004-06-14T19:24:00.000-07:00

Terracycle has nothing to do with bicycling, but instead is a company I heard about from a business associate of mine who serves on their advisory board. It's making "the world's first powerful, organic plant food to be created entirely from waste - from its packaging to the contents." I'm surprised I haven't heard about it yet here in Berkeley. I'm sure I will.

2004-05-27T16:47:00.000-07:00

Salon: "A new school of traffic design says we should get rid of stop signs and red lights and let cars, bikes and people mingle together. It sounds insane, but it works." That's what I'm talking about!