Transit 2.0: The Developers Initiative
By Chris Dempsey, Director of Innovation, Mass Dept. of Transportation

Tues, April 6, 7-9 pm
@ LivableStreets office, 100 Sidney St, Cambridge [map…]

Open to the public. Suggested donation. Complimentary beer provided by Harpoon while supplies last.

Pull out your phone, check if your bus or train is on time, and come to the LivableStreets Alliance StreetTalk to learn how technology is improving public transit. The Mass. Dept of Transportation Developers Initiative is a ground-breaking program that hosts transportation data that can be used by third-party software developers to build websites, mobile applications, and other applications that deliver information more efficiently and effectively to users of the Commonwealth’s transportation system. Since the first developers meeting in the LivableStreets office, the initiative has led to the development of numerous innovative web and mobile applications. Chris Dempsey will describe how open source data and innovative collaborations are helping Massachusetts travelers better plan their trips or find the location of their bus.

Chris Dempsey is the Director of Innovation for the Massachusetts Department of Transportation (MassDOT). Before his current role, Chris was Deputy Chief of Staff and Special Assistant to the Secretary of Transportation. Prior to joining state government, Chris was a staffer on the Patrick-Murray campaign, responsible for the campaign’s volunteer, student outreach and internship programs. He is a native of Brookline and currently resides in Boston.

Hosted by LivableStreets Alliance. For more information: events@livablestreets.info, facebook, 617-621-1746

http://livablestreets.info/event/streettalk/transit-20-developers-initiative

No Zoning: Why Houston May Be Our Future…
by Zakcq Lockrem, Harvard Graduate School of Design Masters Candidate

TONIGHT, Wed, March 3, 7-9 PM
@ LivableStreets office, 100 Sidney St, Cambridge

Open to the public. Suggested $5 donation. Complimentary beer provided by Harpoon.

No Zoning: Why Houston May Be Our Future…
… and why that may not be such a bad thing. Deep in “Red Territory,” America’s fourth largest city is seldom used as an example of good planning ideas. Instead, it is thought of as an example of what not to do. Yet, as the only major American city without zoning, Houston is a prime example of how transportation planning shapes our cities, for both good and bad. Although 100 years of auto-centric planning have left Houston a sprawling metropolis, the addition of a single light rail line 6 years ago (and an aggressive plan for 4 more lines by 2012) has revealed an ally that advocates seldom trust in the fight for a denser, more walkable future: the market. By exploring Houston’s experience, we can learn a lot about the connections between transportation and land use, the role that zoning has played in creating our current auto-centered predicament (and what our alternatives are), and how to answer when someone tells us that Americans just don’t want denser living.

Zakcq Lockrem is a LivableStreets Alliance board member, a Master of Urban Planning Candidate at the Harvard’s Graduate School of Design, and a leader of the Boston Chapter of the Planners Network. Zakcq has work experience in transportation, infrastructure and housing, and has contributed to projects in West Africa, Mexico, California, Louisiana and around New England.

Hosted by LivableStreets Alliance.
For more information on the StreetTalk: web, event@livablestreets.info, 617-621-1746

Host: LivableStreets Alliance
Type: Education – Lecture
Network: Global
Date: Thursday, February 4, 2010
Time: 7:00pm – 9:00pm
Location: LivableStreets Alliance
Street: 100 Sidney Street
City/Town: Cambridge, MA

View Map

Description
Should Segways be allowed on sidewalks? Should all bicycles travel only in designated bike lanes? Should motorized scooters be treated as if they are wheelchairs? Where should rollerblades, skateboards, adult tricycles, bikes with trailers or kick scooters travel? The world of personal mobility is expanding. But all those other modes are having a hard time finding their place on the streets and sidewalks of our cities. It seems someone always thinks one or more of the alternatives is unsuitable. The solution becomes clear if one applies a universal — human centered — design approach to the problem. It isn’t simple, it is just clear. It ends the discussion about vehicles. It starts a discussion about people and how they can get around in the city. Barbara will discuss the concept of human-centered design and showcase examples of streets in South America, the US and around the world. A Q&A discussion will follow the talk.

Barbara Knecht, R.A. is Director of Design at the Institute for Human Centered Design. She is also co-director of the IHP “Cities in the 21st Century” and a consultant to Westhab, Inc., an affordable housing and community development organization. Ms. Knecht holds a BA from UC Berkeley and a Master of Architecture from Columbia University. She was awarded a Kinne Fellowship, a Loeb Fellowship, and received a Graham Foundation grant. She serves on the Metropolitan Life/Enterprise Foundation Awards for Excellence in Affordable Housing, the Board of Directors of Care for the Homeless, and the Streetscape committee of the Municipal Art Society.

Free and open to the public. Suggested $5 donation. Complimentary beer provided by Harpoon Brewery.

Design Advocacy: Designing for how we move through space
by Shauna Gillies-Smith, landscape architect / Mark Pasnik, architect
Thurs, Nov 12, 7-9 pm
@ LivableStreets office, 100 Sidney St, Cambridge [ map...]

What do architects, landscape architects, and transportation planners have in common? What role does design have in transportation advocacy? Come investigate the movement of people and the ability of designed spaces to support and influence. See how architecture and landscape architecture can make cities more socially and environmentally sustainable.

Shauna Gillies-Smith ASLA, LEED AP will highlight landscape architecture and public art projects where the design and pedestrian experience determined the space. Shauna is principal of Ground Inc., a landscape architecture firm. Trained first as an architect and urban designer, her shift to landscape practice was motivated by the desire to reveal the potentials of surprise and pleasure in the urban experience.

Mark Pasnik RA, LEED AP will focus on a project that engaged students with alternative transportation ideals, but fulfilled them through facility design rather than traditional advocacy. Mark is the founding principal of over,under, a multidisciplinary design firm located in Boston’s South End, and director of pinkcomma gallery, which showcases contemporary design work from the Boston area.

“We shape our environment and thereafter our environment shapes us.” (Adaptation of a Winston Churchill quote)

Co-hosted by the Boston Society of Architects

StreetTalks are open to the public, $5 suggested donation, beer/sodas provided compliments of Harpoon Brewery and delivered thanks to MetroPed. Sponsored by LivableStreets Alliance. For more information, click here.

This just in box

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Mode shift: moving from driving to transit, biking, and walking

Wednesday, July 22, 7:00 – 9:00 pm
by Jason Schrieber, Principal, Nelson/Nygaard Consulting Associates

@ LivableStreets office space, 100 Sidney Street, Central Square, Cambridge [ map... ]

free and open to the public, donation suggested. beer/sodas provided compliments of Harpoon Brewery and delivered thanks to Metro Pedal Power!

What makes people shift out of their cars? Is it building more subways, bike lanes, and better sidewalks? Is it financial factors like a gas tax, congestion charges, and parking prices? Is it land use patterns like a mix of uses, local retail and where people live and work? Or how about the health and environmental benefits? Think about the factors that make you choose to walk, bike, drive or take transit. What would make you, or the people you know, take one mode of transportation over another?

Come to the StreetTalk to hear Jason’s perspectives on these issues related to the metro-Boston area, and get a visual tour of some of the great places in the world for getting around. Jason will reveal some surprising truths comparing the subsidy for transit versus that for driving. He will talk about several local initiatives aimed at helping us achieve “mode shift”.

Jason Schrieber has 14 years of multi-modal planning and design experience including changing parking policies to better balance cars and other modes of transportation. Jason previously worked for the City of Cambridge where he managed all planning activities for the City’s transportation department. Nelson/Nygaard: www.nelsonnygaard.com

What we can learn from Spain: Urban mobility planning in Barcelona
by Marius Navazo, Urban Planner, Barcelona, Spain
@ LivableStreets office, 100 Sidney St [ map...]

Thur, June 25 @ 7pm

What are the results of implementing better transit networks, traffic calming zones, and a bike sharing program? Are these measures always environmentally-friendly? Are they enough to create better places to live and enjoy? Learn about the development of urban mobility plans in Greater Barcelona and Catalonia, Spain. See what the Catalan Government is encouraging municipalities to do.

Marius Navazo is a geographer who has been working for the last 10 years in town and regional planning, focused on transportation and its impacts to improve cities from a social and environmental perspective. He has been working at the Catalan Government for the last 4 years, and now he is a freelancer working for different municipalities in the Barcelona area. Marius is currently a 6 month visiting fellow at the LivableStreets Alliance.

For more information about this StreetTalk, click here.
free and open to the public, donation suggested, beer/sodas provided compliments of Harpoon Brewery and delivered thanks to Metro Pedal Power!

StreetTalk!

Car-free Sundays in Bogota Colombia – How about more car-free parkways here in Boston?

Wednesday Dec. 10, 7:00 – 9:00 pm

Program includes 3 short StreetFilms on Bogotá, premere showing of LivableStreets Street Film on Mem Drive Sundays, and Special guest Renata von Tscharner from Charles River Conservancy. @ LivableStreets office space, 100 Sidney Street, Central Square, Cambridge [ map... ]

free and open to the public, donation suggested beer/sodas provided compliments of Harpoon Brewery!

Would you like to see car free days in Boston? Did you know that a section of Memorial Drive is car free every Sunday between April and November? Do you wonder what it would take to have a car free Storrow Drive? Did you know that over 70 miles of streets are car free every Sunday in Bogotá, Colombia thanks to their former Mayor, Enrique Peñalosa? And did you know that LivableStreets will be hosting Peñalosa in Boston in February?

Come watch StreetFilms about Bogotá, Colombia to see their street transformations and learn more about what Enrique Peñalosa did to start car free streets. Hear about advocacy efforts to get car free parkways. Learn about the history of the Memorial Drive car free days, and watch LivableStreets new film about it!

This event is sponsored by LivableStreets Alliance.

Street Talk!

Bicycle Planning in the Netherlands

Thursday Nov. 20, 7:00 – 9:00 pm
by Hans Voerknecht, International Coordinator of the Dutch Bicycle Council

@ LivableStreets office space, 100 Sidney
Street,
Central Square, Cambridge [map... ]

free and
open to the public, donation suggested
beer/sodas
provided compliments of Harpoon Brewery!

Learn about bicycle planning in the Netherlands from the International Coordinator of the Dutch Bicycle Council (Fietsberaad).

The Dutch rely ever more on the humble bike for transport as pollution concerns and high petrol prices give new impetus to traditional pedal power in the only country with more bicycles than people. The Netherlands, home to just over 16.3 million people, actually boasts some 18 million bicycles– 1.1 bikes per person.

Not even the wet climate seems able to put a spoke in the wheels of the Dutch, who weave through city traffic shrouded in plastic on rainy days, transporting anything from pets and children to groceries, musical instruments and plants on their bikes. Many a parent can be seen negotiating traffic with a child secured to each end of a bicycle with shopping bags and even a briefcase secured to the sides.

This event is cosponsored by LivableStreets Alliance and MassBike. Many thanks to Anne Lusk and the Harvard School of Public Health for bringing Hans to Boston.

Got this in the emails today, looks promising for you transportation wonks.

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StreetTALK: “Using Transportation to Transform Communities: Learning from the Anti Highway Movement of the 1960’s”

Details:
STREET TALK!
“Using Transportation to Transform Communities”
Thu. Sept. 25, 7 – 9 pm
by Ken Kruckemeyer and Ann Hershfang
LivableStreets | Event/activity
@ LivableStreets office space, 100 Sidney Street, Central Square, Cambridge map…

Learning from the anti-highway movement: A grass roots movement swept Boston in the 60’s and led to, among other things, the orange line subway and park known as the Southwest Corridor. Meet some of the individuals who made this happen and hear their stories.

Event is free and open to the public, donation suggested, beer/sodas provided compliments of Harpoon Brewery!
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In the years following World War II, America was becoming increasingly highway development oriented. In the 60’s and 70’s a grassroots movement prevented several major highway projects from destroying its neighborhoods, and instead shifted funding to transit expansion, which we now take for granted. This activism prevented the development of several major highway projects which had the power to destroy Boston-area neighborhoods.

It is due to the efforts of steadfast neighborhood champions like Ken Kruckemeyer and Ann Hershfang that the City of Boston and the State decided against extensive highway development projects and instead shifted funding to the expansion of public transportation; which we now take for granted.

Of the many outcomes of this moment, two visible successes are the:

(1) Prevented development of the “inner belt” which was a highway that would have cut clear through Cambridge’s Central Square and Cambridgeport neighborhoods

(2) Tossing out what was to be the multi-lane “Southwest Expressway” that would connect Boston to points south via the Roxbury and Jamaica Plain neighborhoods in favor of the mulit-use transportation corridor and green space we now know as the Southwest Corridor Park and MBTA Orange Line subway.

Click here for a short WBUR piece highlighting Ken…

Click here for more history…

Click here for an interview with Ann…

More about Ken & Ann

Ken is a private consultant specializing in the design of civil infrastructure, focusing on integrated public transport systems, pedestrian and bicycle facilities, and roadway and bridge design. He is also an adjunct Research Associate at the Center for Transportation and Logistics and Lecturer in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the MIT. Ken served as Associate Commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Public Works from 1983 to 1991. Mr. Kruckemeyer is an Architect with degrees from Princeton University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He was a Loeb Fellow in Advanced Environmental Studies at Harvard University.

Ann has extensive experience in all facets of the transportation business, including serving on the Board of the Massachusetts Port Authority and 10 Years on the Massachusetts Turnpike Highway Board, as well as founding Walk Boston, a non-profit membership organization dedicated to improving walking conditions in cities and towns across Massachusetts. In essence, her entire professional experience stemmed from her involvement in the Anti-Highway Movement.

This event is sponsored by LivableStreets Alliance

“Transportation reform for the US- are Americans ready?”
Thu. Aug. 21, 7 – 8:30 pm
by Gary Toth, Director of Transportation Initiatives for the Project for Public Spaces
@ LivableStreets office space, 100 Sidney Street, Central Square, Cambridge [ map... ]

free and open to the public, donation suggested, beer/sodas provided compliments of Harpoon Brewery!

“The decisions engineers make will affect people’s lives. The street can’t be looked at as just a vessel for cars. It’s a place with many uses. What we want to do is try to help foster sustainable, livable communities,” Toth says.

That’s strong stuff coming from an engineer with 34 years experience inside the highway bureaucracy. And it’s not just a line he throws out to soothe angry citizens’ groups–Gary Toth during his tenure at NJDOT actually changed the way engineers think. In the old days, NJDOT would give most street widenings the green light, but Toth is dedicated to halting this vicious cycle. Instead of funneling all traffic from every residential and commercial property onto the strip, NJDOT is encouraging towns to create networks of streets with mixed-use developments, dispersing traffic over the whole system. The idea is to create livable corridors rather than endless sprawl. Sounds simple enough, but it’s actually a revolutionary change in suburban transportation and land use planning. He notes how Kentucky, Utah, Florida, Vermont and other states are joining New Jersey in seriously studying Context Sensitive Solutions–the discipline’s name for looking at streets and roads as something more than simply a way to move traffic. “It’s becoming a national movement with 20 or 25 states already showing some signs of getting away from the same old myopia.”

Gary has left NJDOT to focus on bigger transportation reform in America. He is an integral member of the T4America Coalition, which is working to shape the content of the next federal transportation bill. He is currently one of the eight instructors for USDOT’s “Training Course on Transportation and Land Use.” He is also a member of the Sustainable Urban Design Working Group of the American Public Transit Association and a member of the Strategic Highway Research Program’s Technical Coordinating Committee for Capacity. He was also part of the Sustainable Transportation Study Team charged with creating a conceptual plan for presentation to the US Congress, which ensures that the surface transportation system will continue to serve the needs of the U.S. throughout the 21st Century. Gary works part time for the Project for Public Spaces as Director of Transportation Initiatives.

Gary was featured in the article, “Rethinking the Urban Speedway,” (pdf) (For decades, highway engineers focused on designing wider, straighter, faster roads. Now, moving traffic quickly is no longer the sole goal), Governing Magazine, October 2005. “The traditional engineering solution to road problems is to make the road wider, straighter and faster,” Toth says. “Well, wider, straighter and faster is not always better.”

This event is sponsored by LivableStreets Alliance

Click here for more information