Transportation
Colorado Town to Fund Transit…By Taxing Skiers
Here's a novel approach to funding transit only available to a lucky few communities that happen to be located on the side of a ski mountain: taxing lift tickets.
House Rejects Amendment Allowing Heavier Trucks
One of the nearly 270 amendments the House is considering in the $325 billion transportation reauthorization bill would allow individual states to allow heavier trucks to use highways. It was decisively defeated in a floor vote on Tuesday.
The New Speaker's First Test: The Transportation Reauthorization Bill
Congress began work this week on a 6-year transportation bill, the first since SAFETEA-LU expired in 2009. Overseeing the process of adding amendments to the bill will be new House Speaker Paul D. Ryan in his first significant test of leadership.
Street Harassment: An Issue for Planners?
Women and men experience public spaces differently. It is all too common for women to experience street harassment when in public spaces. Nina Flores explores the ways that this issue is being combatted in the online public realm.
30 Crossing Would Widen I-30 and Remove a Streetcar Line in Little Rock
Advocates at the local and the national level are voicing their concern over a proposal by the Arkansas State Highway and Transportation Department to widen the I-30 freeway in Downtown Little Rock.
Seattle Has a Low-Cost Plan for 250 Blocks of New Sidewalks
Seattle political leadership recently announced an ambitious plan to build more sidewalks with less money.
A Negative Review of 'Vision Zero'
The 'Vision Zero' movement to eliminate pedestrian deaths is fantastic. It is helping cities around the world create better, safer streets. The name and its embrace of absolutes dooms cities to failure.
Guess Where Americans Are Plowing Their Gas Savings
Gas prices are 80 cents a gallon less than a year ago and $1.50 less than April 2014. With this amount of savings, the economy should be improving from all the extra cash in consumers' hands. You'll be surprised where much of the savings is going.
How Parking Management Can Help Cities Grow Smarter
An excerpt from the introduction to "Parking Management for Smart Growth," by Richard W. Willson, Ph.D., FAICP. Here Willson argues for parking management strategies as a critical tool for communities to get more out of the space devoted to cars.
Survey Finds Support for Transit in Atlanta
Residents of metropolitan Atlanta showed signs of a strengthening economy, a fast growing region, and, perhaps surprisingly, strong support for public transit.
$500 Million in TIGER Grants Awarded to 39 Projects
The seventh round of TIGER funding was announced last week. Louisville provides a case study of how cities engage with the competitive grant process.
Why Biking and Walking Can't Be Lumped Together
Biking and walking are often assumed as two peas in a pod, when in fact it might be more helpful to think of them as apples and oranges.
Regional Planning Merger One Step Closer to Reality in the Bay Area
The Bay Area is one of the few metro regions in the U.S. with a separate MPO and COG, but that could change after voting members of both the Metropolitan Transportation Commission and the Association of Bay Area Governments agreed to a merger study.
Shell Gives Another Early Christmas Gift to Environmentalists
Shell Oil surprised the environmental community in September by announcing an end to Arctic drilling. What could come next? Shell is abandoning plans for the Carmon Creek oil-sands project in Alberta and taking a $2 billion write-down.
MTA Capital Plan Approved—Thanks to Compromise from Cuomo and de Blasio
A long, contentious political process has finally produced an approval for a massive capital investment program for the New York MTA. Some questions about funding remain, however.
Vision Zero Hero: L.A. to Hire an Artist for Traffic Safety Work
Applications are due on November 6 for a novel position in the world of traffic safety: artist in residence at the Los Angeles Department of Transportation.
$85 Million Transportation Bond Measure on the Ballot in Maine
A week before a Nov. 3 Maine transportation referendum on a *general fund bond issue to address roads and bridges, TRIP released a report showing that over a third of the state's bridges "are structurally deficient or functionally obsolete."
One Expert's Response to Misinformation from Bike Lane Opponents
Swatting down untruths and misinformation by bike lane opponents in St. Paul doesn't require a PhD, but it helps.
7 Costumes for the Most Contemporary Form of Transportation: Hoverboards
Depending on your opinion, hoverboards are some combination of expensive, annoying, or futuristically cool. Maybe these costume ideas will help you sort out your feelings on the matter?
President Obama Signs 3-Week Highway Bill and Railroad Safety Extension
A three-week extension of federal transportation spending and three-year extension for railroads to install positive train control was signed on Oct. 29, the date the current highway extension expired.
Pagination
FREE Course: Walkable City 1: Why Walkability?
After describing his path towards focusing on walkability as the essence of good planning, Jeff Speck marches through his five principal reasons for making more walkable places.
Reinventing Malls: Planning Alchemy—Turning Gray Fields Into Gold
The course focuses on the opportunities and imperatives that shape reinvention of mall sites.
City of Rosemead
Rutgers University, Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy
One Hundred Miles
University of Michigan School for Environment and Sustainability (SEAS)
Hunter College, City University of New York (CUNY)
The Architects Foundation
City of Cambridge
The Pocatello Development Authority
The Urban Renewal Agency of the City of Pocatello