New Haven's Bike and Pedestian Plan: The City that "Gets it"

Last night there was a meeting at New Haven city hall to discuss the city's bike plan. This article, from the New Haven Independent, summarizes the the meeting nicely. I can't say I agree with the headline though. I was there and found the general reaction among the audience members to be, on the whole, much more positive. Then again optimistic journalists tend to get fewer readers. Just ask Rush "I hope he fails" Limbaugh.

Great. Where’s The Rest?

So responded cyclists after the unveiling of a multi-year plan to make downtown friendlier to bikes and pedestrians.

Nelson/Nygaard Consulting Associates, a New York-based city planning firm, is finishing up a study of how to make downtown more amenable to bikers and walkers. More than 50 people showed up at the Hall of Records on Thursday evening to hear what they’ve come up with.

The consultants described a three-phase plan involving new bike lanes, improved walk signals, and new traffic rules. All of the ideas received the enthusiastic support of the crowd. But most agreed that it was just the beginning. The biking enthusiasts would like to see the extension of biking infrastructure to all areas of New Haven, not just the central business district.

The Plan

The Nelson/Nygaard study was funded by the South Central Council of Governments, an organization concerned land use and transportation issues.

Michael King (at center in picture at top), a staffer at Nelson/Nygaard, said that his firm’s plan for the city has three main goals: safer pedestrian crossings, a network of bike routes, and better pedestrian and bicycle connections to New Haven’s train stations.

To these ends, King presented a three-phase plan for downtown New Haven.

The first phase would prohibit right turns on red by cars; put in bike lanes or “sharrows” on most downtown streets; and paint “bike boxes” at intersections.

Phase two includes upgrades in pedestrian crossing signals and the conversion of some one-way streets to two-way in order to ease congestion.

The third phase would include more established bike paths on Elm, State, and Grove streets and the extension of the Farmington Canal bike route.

Full article here

To someone on the outside looking in, this may not seem significant. A small city is improving its infrastructure to accommodate pedestrians and cyclists. So what? What was so momentous about this meeting and about the plan it showcased was that it showed that the city of New Haven "gets it" as far as transportation and urban planning goes.

• They get that transportation is about moving people, not just people in cars.

• They get that streets are places, and that they should serve as true public space and not simply automobile conduits.

• They get that spending money to accommodate the two most economical and environmentally friendly forms of transportation isn't an expense, it's an investment.

• They get that it's not a battle, that drivers are also cyclists and pedestrians, and that people who enjoy walking and biking may own cars.
  

• They get that a livable city is a necessary condition for long-term economic success.

The plan laid out during last nights meeting was by no means perfect or complete. But it created a vision and set a tone that will serve the city and its residents well in the coming years. In many ways it was a formalization of the policies that local groups like Elm City Cycling, New Haven Safe Streets and CT Livable Streets have been lobbying for, for some time now. What these groups want, and what the city now seems to understand, is that the city's streets, its most plentiful and ubiquitous public spaces, should be re-engineered over time to become places that people increasingly want to be, and not simply travel through in a car or truck.

I look forward to continued work with the city, its consultants, and most importantly the community groups like Elm City Cycling that were advocating for these changes long before anyone else here "got it".

Bookmark this post with:

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
•