Clarence Eckerson Jr.
Recent Posts
Strong Towns’ Chuck Marohn: Why Suburban Growth Is a Ponzi Scheme
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Chuck Marohn cofounded the non-profit Strong Towns in 2009. Since then he has steadily built an audience for his message about the financial folly of car-centric planning and growth. The suburban development pattern that has prevailed since the end of World War II has resulted in what Marohn calls “the growth Ponzi scheme” — a […]
Salt Lake City: A Red State Capital Builds Ambitious Transit
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According to Congress for New Urbanism President John Norquist, the Salt Lake City area has the fastest growing rail system in America. And as Streetsblog’s Angie Schmitt pointed out last month, “It’s the only city in the country building light rail, bus rapid transit, streetcars and commuter rail at the same time.” Since the late […]
Streetfacts #4: Children Have Lost the Freedom to Roam
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Think of this Streetfacts chapter as a PSA about how, in just a few generations, we have tightly restricted American kids’ freedom to roam, play, and become self-sufficient. The percentage of children walking and bicycling to school has plummeted from almost 50 percent in 1969 to about 13 percent today. Although distance from school is […]
Streetfacts: Roads Are a Money Losing Proposition
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The majority of the roads and highways built in America are simply bad investments. Continuing this pattern will only ensure that wasteful projects consume larger chunks of our federal, state, and local budgets, without addressing the real need for transportation options. This Streetfacts chapter has a bit more math than usual, but we think we’ve […]
Voices From the National Women’s Bicycling Forum
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For the second year running, the Women’s Bicycling Forum kicked off the National Bike Summit in Washington, DC. About 300 people attended, and Streetfilms got to take their pulse on the state of bicycling for women and collect some suggestions about how to grow the number of women who ride. Here’s a sampling of what […]
Green Lane Project in New York: City to City Solutions
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The Green Lane Project is a partnership of six U.S. cities, including Chicago, working to implement next-generation protected bike lanes on their streets. This past fall, the Green Lane Project brought a few dozen transportation planners from those cities – John Sadler from Chicago went to learn about bicycle signals – together in New York City […]
Highlights from NACTO’s 2012 “Designing Cities” Conference
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The National Association of City Transportation Officials‘ 2012 Designing Cities Conference drew hundreds of city transportation officials from around the U.S. to New York City last fall to share ideas and learn about the latest innovations from places around the country. As you’ll see, the conference featured some nice twists on the usual fare and […]
Obama Becomes First Prez to Walk Down a Bike Lane on Inauguration Day
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The networks were busy tripping over themselves trying to point out all the “firsts” during yesterday’s inauguration ceremonies. But when Barack and Michelle Obama stepped out of the presidential motorcade to greet well wishers on Pennsylvania Avenue, they missed a huge one: Obama is now the first U.S. president to walk down a bike lane […]