Breakfast links: Full spaces, empty spaces

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Breakfast links: Full spaces, empty spaces

by David Alpert • March 25, 2009 7:35 am

Photo by Maria in Europe.

That's a few bikes: When more cyclists wanted to hang their bikes on streetcars, Stuttgart, Germany devised this creative solution. (Transit Miami, Jaime)

Another $2 mil for the empty garage: Not only did DC USA's mostly-unused parking garage cost $42 million in public money to build, but the 2010 budget includes $2.1 million more in operating subsidy. Are Harry Thomas and Michael Brown sure they want to wade into more municipal parking? (City Paper, Mike, Jaime)

To raze or not to raze?: Last week's Washingtonian wades into the preservation debate over Third Church. (Jaime) Ryan Avent and Tom Lee weigh in on DCist. Avent points out that the real issue is the value of land, both monetarily and in its contribution to a vibrant city. "Were it a mobile piece of statuary, there would never be any issue as to whether to save it or destroy it, even if most people who laid eyes on it thought it bland or hideous." But we can't put it in a museum, so do we devote that corner in perpetuity to this controversial work of art that's also a building?

Living in a city is better for the environment (but not so much in DC): A new report finds that overall, the greenhouse gas emissions of large cities are far below those of rural areas. However, DC has the worst carbon footprint of all major cities, according to the article because there's so much office space compared to few residents. (Could our power coming from coal plants have an impact too)? Despite all this, DC residents still emit less per capita than the average American. (New Scientist, Jaime)

Maryland's streets are especially dangerous: Baltimore Spokes points us to some statistics from the Maryland SHA Strategic Highway Safety Plan. Pedestrian fatalities comprise about 20 percent of all traffic deaths in Maryland, while the national average is 13%. In addition, pedestrians 15 years of age or younger are particularly vulnerable to being injured—over 30 percent of injured pedestrians are in this age group. What is SHA doing in response? (Stephen Miller)

Dean hates Metro delays, platform dawdlers: Howard Dean got stuck on the Metro recently and missed his appointment. He also hates it when people "saunter along the Metro platform while the doors are about to close." I'm with ya, Howard! (Politico)

We're lookin' at you, SEPTA: Jealous Philadelphians are looking at the juicy schedule data Metro posted and wondering, why won't SEPTA post theirs? (Avencia) ... As one of the first of many applications and visualizations to come from WMATA's recently-released schedule data, Tom Lee created a graphical plot of all Metrobus stop locations. (DCist)

PG to United: build your own soccer stadium: The Prince George's County Council has voted to oppose public borrowing for 75% of the cost of a new DC United stadium. The actual decision, however, is up to state lawmakers in Annapolis. (Gazette)

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David Alpert is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Greater Greater Washington and Greater Greater Education. He worked as a Product Manager for Google for six years and has lived in the Boston, San Francisco, and New York metro areas in addition to Washington, DC. He loves the area which is, in many ways, greater than those others, and wants to see it become even greater.

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"Maryland's streets are especially dangerous"--maybe people walk more in Maryland than they do in other car-friendly places? I mean, if 100 people walk in Maryland and 10 die, and 10 people walk in Arizona and 3 die, which is more dangerous?

On the garage: "the city expects greater use of the garage in the future: “We’re working on a couple of steps so that we get the biggest bang for our buck there.”" Wow, that is the best argument against parking that I have ever seen. We built too much parking. Instead of saying "wow, great, we didn't need as much parking as we thought," they're saying "let's generate more cars so we can fill up those extra parking spaces!" Of course the cars have to GET THERE, so let's generate more traffic for District and regional streets! Unbelievably stupid.

by Omari on Mar 25, 2009 9:34 am • link • report

Frequently, the DMPED's office gets things wrong, but not this time. It seems that Sean Madigan's statement that they expect greater use of the garage in the future refers not to implementing programs to encourage driving, but that the garage was designed to provide necessary parking for development that is planned or in the pipeline: future development whose employees, customers and residents obviously are not yet using the facility. After all, the underground parking can't be added later. This is planning and this is something that David has persistently ignored in repeatedly citing this as an example of excessive parking.

by Andy on Mar 25, 2009 11:36 am • link • report

Andy, so what is that development? Will that development then be relieved of on-site parking requirements? You can say this is planning, but where's the plan?

by Alex B. on Mar 25, 2009 11:41 am • link • report

Andy: to follow Alex B.'s reply to you - my understanding is that DCUSA's 1000+ parking spaces have nothing to do with "development that is planned" and everything to do with a combination of parking minimum requirements and the desires of the anchor tenants (and Target owns it's store while the others lease, so they certainly had more pull here). Also, to second Alex B., at this point in time, future development around DCUSA will be required to meet parking minimums on their sites, regardless of the hundreds of empty spaces at DCUSA. Sure, they can fight the minimums, but they certainly don't have to, especially if the fight will add cost to their projects.

It'd be great if future development is able to utilize the excess parking - but there are just too many assumptions there that can fall through, which lead us to "repeatedly citing this as an example of excessive parking." It was built to suit the perceived needs of the DCUSA tenants, those perceptions were wrong, and now we're being asked to foot the bill for upkeep that the parking facility should have been able to pay itself had it been better utilized.

by jaime on Mar 25, 2009 1:41 pm • link • report

Germany gets short shrift in the USA press despite their long and incredibly creative bike friendly cities , transit, long distance rail [ entire long distance rail cars are devoted to bicycles] and their towns and cities in general. The Dutch & Danes get all of the credit- but Germany - which has lower cycling percentages- in most likliehood- has the largest amount of cyclists and car-free people in Europe. I go there at least once a year- and am continuously blown away by the new and changing bicycle initiatives I have seen. They also invented the bike share concept- but this has NEVER been reoprted on in the USA. Deutsche Rail initiated a bike share program in the late 90's in many German cities. It was successful- and led to the French starting their own. Even hilly towns in Germany have tons of cyclists. Just go to Tubingen and see for yourself.

by w on Mar 25, 2009 3:42 pm • link • report

Deutschlander Verkehrspolitik uberalles!

by Bianchi on Mar 25, 2009 3:49 pm • link • report