Posts about Connecticut
Parking
Houston's cars vs. Rotterdam's bombs
The Overhead Wire illustrates the destruction that wanton parking lot construction wreaks upon downtowns.
Left is Houston "at one point." Photo from the book The City Shaped: Urban Patterns and Meanings Through History via Transit Miami. Right is Rotterdam after bombing in World War II, via Wassenaar Expat.
The Overhead Wire writes,
Europe had war, yet we dismantled our cities in a similar way in the name of progress. So much parking though, what has that done to the city's value? What has it taken away in terms of tax revenue from land and greater employment agglomerations? A study by Anne Moudon and Dohn Wook Sohn showed that offices that were clustered had greater values than those that weren't in the Seattle region. In addition to the spending on highways that expanded our regions to their current far reaches, how much real estate value did we destoy?The post concludes with a look at Hartford, CT's downtown before and after Interstate 84 blasted through, from a presentation by Norman Garrick to the Congress for the New Urbanism:
Public Spaces
Transportation across the nation: Mistakes of the '70s edition
Worst building & plaza ever. Photo by Joe Dunckley on Flickr.
New London corrects 1970s mistake: Everyone regretted the concrete redesign of New London, Connecticut's public plaza, "The Parade." Now, they're restoring it, reports the Courant. I hate to harp, but I can't help but think if it were here, we'd have landmarked the thing. Now, will Boston fix their 1970s plaza mistake? Via Planetizen.
Lemonade stands violate zoning: The mayor of Clayton, CA has shut down a produce stand run by an 11-year-old girl and her 3-year-old sister, selling extra vegetables out of their garden. Mayor Gregg Manning told ABC, ""They may start out with a little card-table and selling a couple of things, but then who is to say what else they have. Is all the produce made there, do they make it themselves? Are they going to have eggs and chickens for sale next?" Via BoingBoing.
California passes anti-sprawl bill: The California legislature passed a bill to allocate transportation dollars based on greenhouse gas emissions, according to the LA Times. Does this mean more transit, fewer roads, or just roads in denser areas? Will it work? California has a parking cash-out bill with loopholes the size of Los Angeles. But at the very least, the symbolic impact is important. Via T4America.
Parking
Cheers and jeers across America
Photo from the Associated Press.
- Barack Obama rode his bike for fun. Streetsblog LA writes, "it's refreshing to see a nominee on two wheels who is neither A) biking in the woods, nor B) straddling an $8000 Serotta while clad in spandex." (AP)
- A growing coalition is advocating for replacing New Haven's Route 34 freeway with a boulevard. (Mobilizing the Region)
- Salt Lake City plans to significantly cut its parking requirements. They're not getting rid of them, but it's a start; some people are still complaining, of course. (SLC Tribune via Parking Today)
- Tulsa built an arena but decided it needed no new parking. (Of course, that's because Tulsa already has gobs and gobs of it, but still.) (Parking Today)
- Even New York City blithely approves parking garages in the densest parts of Manhattan. (Mobilizing the Region)
- Los Angeles is still widening freeways. (North County Times via Streetsblog LA)
- Boston is paving over streetcar tracks. Is it still 1958 and I didn't notice? (Switchback)
Roads
New Haven next to boulevardize a freeway
In 1957, New Haven tore down a neighborhood near its waterfront to build a freeway. It created a barrier between downtown and Union Station, cut off streets, created dark shadows under huge ramps, and fostered more car-oriented and pedestrian-unfriendly development in the hospitals and huge parking garages that were built there.
Pre-freeway, post-freeway, and hopefully post-post-freeway.
The freeway never went anywhere, with other neighborhoods successfully fighting the destruction that the freeway wreaked on Oak Street. Now, Tri-State Transportation Campaign reports that New Haven is proposing to tear down the freeway, develop new mixed-use buildings in the space, and reconnect the street grid.
Why is Washington DC's Mayor instead intent not only on keeping those freeways that should be boulevardized, like the Whitehurst, but also rebuilding long-gone roads through our parks?
@ggwash
- Successful speed cameras require fair speed limits
- Amid scandal, don't lose sight of Gray's policy achievements
- Montgomery plans 160-mile, "gold standard" BRT system
- VDOT ignores own data, pushes widening I-66
- DC's parks are 5th best in the nation, says "Park Score"
- Bethesda gets new but terrible bike racks
- DC's divide need not be black and white
Greater Washington
District of Columbia
