Ghost Town.

I played the "I have a joke" game on Twitter.

Kindly note that Speck, who once designed a street grid for New Albany, only to find most of it dropped into the garbage bin, "liked" my reply.

That's all I need to say about the topic, isn't it?

Jeff Speck: "NA hired a local engineer who un-protected our bike lanes."

Jeff Speck gave us hope, but Jeff Gahan gave us the same old boilerplate.

Recently when Speck returned to New Albany to give Gahan credit for what the latter failed to achieve with the two-way street reversion, do you think at any point Speck looked around at the actual paving project with bicycling infrastructure castration and said to himself, wow -- that clueless yokel left 75% of it on the cutting room floor.

It's actually political patronage politics which must be destroyed, not Carthage, but how would Gahan function in the the world without the money of special interests like HWC Engineering, which publicly laughed at Speck?

SHANE'S EXCELLENT NEW WORDS: Deaf Gahan has become Sardonicus, but what is to be our verdict?

At CNU 27 in Louisville, visiting New Urbanists got a tasty dose of Gahan's Big Lies.

What Bluegill wrote.

But hey; don't mind us. We just live here, and experience the sycophantic spin-doctoring every single day.

There are two references to NewAlbany below, clearly attesting (a) to certain intentional gaps in the glorious Gahan narrative and (b) to the power of political patronage-driven propaganda.

Did Gahan buy ads in the CNU27 program to ensure there’d be only one (his) side of the story? If so, let's hope he didn't use taxpayer dollars to spit-shine his own gleaming scalp.

A Week of Love and Struggle, by Lisa Schamess (CNU)

At CNU 27.Louisville, New Urbanists got a little verklempt

#SlowTheCars ... because Slick Jeffrey Gahan doesn't give a damn about pedestrian safety on Spring west of State.

A reader writes:

I just realized that the City County Building doesn’t even have a crosswalk on Spring Street! They don’t value any pedestrian’s right of way, do they?

Or, here:

Yes, it's the enduringly hazardous spot where West 1st Street crosses E. Spring to become Hauss (but there is no) Square (there).

Jeff Speck suggested a possible way to reformat one-way streets near the interstate interchange into two-ways, but Jeff Gahan chose to ignore this advice owing to his abject terror of offending drivers who race through this area on a daily basis. You see, Gahan and his team want New Albany to be walkable, though for only so long as drivers aren't inconvenienced.

If westbound drivers not increasing speeds to beat the light at Spring and State, they're doing it to avoid a stop at Scribner Drive -- precisely at the spot where a dozen legal offices and the public library lie directly across the street from both local and federal government buildings.

There is not even the pretense of a crosswalk at West 1st, and some of the most amusing (as well as harrowing) spectacles I've ever witnessed are government employees -- up to and including city council members -- precariously balancing their Big Gulps as they dodge flying cars and trucks to try to cross to the City County Building.

You can't help thinking: They see the problem, they experience the problem, years go past ... and absolutely nothing is done. Then, as we talk to them about walkability, the topic is greeted with blank faces.

I'll make it easy: if you fear for your life then no, it isn't walkable, no matter how many times Pinocchio Rosenbarger insists it is. Verily, If not for dysfunction, we'd have no function at all.

But this week on Friday, Gahan will meet Speck again -- and the lies will flow like cash-stuffed envelopes from HWC Engineering.

Gahan, Rosenbarger set to go full frontal Pinocchio about their urbanism credentials when the Congress for the New Urbanism 27 meets in Louisville June 11-15.

HWC dissolves into laughter: "For a More Walkable City, Replace Signals with All-Way Stops."

Randy at Destinations Booksellers can get you a copy of Jeff Speck's Walkable City Rules. Mine's waiting to be picked up when I get a minute. Gahan administration functionaries are encouraged to read the book and see how their master failed the city with his botched two-way "modernization"; for them, ordering on-line with a plain brown snail-mail wrapper might be the best course. Dear Leader would be very unhappy if he caught them thinking on the job, wouldn't he?

---

For a More Walkable City, Replace Signals with All-Way Stops, by Jeff Speck (Streetsblog USA)

Rule 76: Replace Signals with All-way Stops
In many places, stop signs are the safest solution.

For many years, cities inserted traffic signals at their intersections as a matter of pride, with the sentiment that more signals made a place more modern and cosmopolitan. Recently, that dynamic has begun to change, as concerns about road safety have caused many to question whether signals are the best solution for intersections experiencing moderate traffic.

Research now suggests that all-way stop signs, which ask motorists to approach each intersection as a negotiation, turn out to be much safer than signals.

This greater safety has multiple causes. Unlike with signals, no law-abiding driver ever passes an all-way stop sign at more than a very low speed, and there is considerable eye contact among users. People walking and biking are generally waved through first. And nobody tries to beat the light.

While it would be useful to have more data, the main study on this subject, from Philadelphia, is compelling. It recounts the 1978 removal of 462 traffic signals due to a 1977 state ruling disallowing signals at intersections with limited traffic. In almost all cases, the signals were replaced by all-way stop signs. The overall reduction in crashes was 24 percent. Severe injury crashes were reduced 62.5 percent. Severe pedestrian injury crashes were reduced by 68 percent.

While some pedestrians and drivers prefer signalized intersections, these data are too conclusive to ignore. Until a contradicting study is completed, cities should be compelled to conduct an audit of current signalization regimes to determine which signals may be eliminated.

When converting signals to stop signs, cities face the choice of two-way and all-way stops. Clearly, if one street contains tremendously more traffic than the other, a two-way stop makes more sense. However, there is no doubt that all-way stops should be used wherever they do not pose an undue burden, as they are 50 percent to 80 percent safer than two-ways.

Additionally, two-way stops hurt walkability, as they require people crossing the major street to dodge traffic. For this reason, it seems wise to leave signals in place in locations where an all-way stop is not justified.

One great byproduct of converting signals to stops is money saved: stop signs are much cheaper to install and maintain than signals. This fact is important to keep in mind as one considers the conversion of a downtown’s streets from one-way to two-way. The principal cost of these reversions is signal reorientation. However, while signals are almost always required where multilane one-ways intersect, they are often not required where two-lane two-ways intersect. Moreover, when two-lane two-ways cross at a four-way stop sign, there is often no need or use for left-turn lanes, and that pavement can be used instead for parking or cycling.

A word is also needed about the driver experience that accompanies the replacement of signals with all-way stops. It is true that, compared to a network of signals, a network of stops signs result in a drive that is interrupted by more pauses. But these pauses are all quite brief.

Never does the driver have to sit and wait for a light to turn from red to green. Such waits at signalized intersections are often 30 seconds long or longer, and, across a network, can add up to a lot of time wasted. Surprisingly, more stops can mean a quicker commute.

Finally, some air-quality advocates will argue against new stop signs due to the additional pollution caused by cars stopping and starting. This argument is accurate, but only in isolation, ignoring the smaller carbon footprint of more walkable places. As stop signs make places safer to walk, they can be expected to reduce overall driving, countering this impact.

There is no reason to conduct an expensive study on this subject. For each intersection with traffic that is moderate and fairly balanced, conduct a one-week test of an all-way stop configuration. If problems don’t arise, make it permanent.

Jeff Speck is writing about Vision Zero. Meanwhile Jeff Gahan is promoting Zero Vision.

Jeff Speck is on Twitter, and here's what he's been saying about traffic safety, political movements ... and Vision Zero. Expect Jeff Gahan to award a contract to HWC Engineering (cha-ching) to explain to him what vision means, zero or otherwise. 

---

Today I am tweeting from Rule 33. Adopt Vision Zero: Make a political movement around traffic safety. From #WalkableCityRules (1/4)

In every major American city, pedestrian deaths are a part of life. Often, the victim is a child. (2/4)

The news cycle is predictable: first comes the victim blaming, then the driver blaming—sober drivers are almost never punished—then perhaps a discussion about speed limits and enforcement. (3/4)

Through it all, the crash is called an “accident,” as if it was not preventable. Rarely is the design of the roadway itself considered. And never—never—is there any reconsideration of the professional engineering standards that created the hazard in the first place. (4/4)

---

The Swedes, those geniuses of driving safety, know better. For some time, the Swedish traffic safety profession has acknowledged that street design is at the heart of street safety, and modified its engineering standards with an eye to lowering speeds in urban areas. (1/3)

The results are astounding. Their traffic fatality rate as a nation is about one quarter of the US’s, but the biggest difference is in the cities. In 2013, Stockholm, with a similar population to Phoenix, lost six people to car crashes. Phoenix lost 167. (2/3)

Remarkably, Stockholm made it through 2016 without a single pedestrian or cyclist dying. Welcome to Vision Zero, the Swedish path to eliminating traffic deaths. (3/3)

---

Welcome to Vision Zero, the Swedish path to eliminating traffic deaths. Now a decade old, Vision Zero has become an international movement, and joining it in earnest means making a commitment to its goals. (1/5)

As of this writing, there are more than 30 “Vision Zero Cities” in the US, including Austin, Boston, Denver, Fort Lauderdale, Los Angeles, New York, Seattle, and Washington DC. (2/5)

Each of these cities has approached the commitment in its own way, but joining the Vision Zero network can be a key first step to identifying the elimination of traffic fatalities as an important goal and reorienting policy and investment around that goal. (3/5)

In New York City, for example, the Vision Zero program has organized the insertion (at last count) of 18.5 miles of protected bike lanes, 776 Leading Pedestrian Interval traffic signals, and 107 left-turn calming treatments ... (4/5)

... and also overseen a dramatic crackdown on speeding and failure-to-yield violations. The result? After holding fairly steady for three years, pedestrian fatalities dropped by a whopping 32 percent between 2016 to 2017, from 148 to 101. (5/5)

Here's Jeff Speck, explaining how slower downtown speeds have only a minimal impact on typical commute times -- and there's Team Gahan, ignoring him.

Jeff Speck was on Twitter. Here's what he had to say about commuting times in the context of lower speed limits. 

Here's Jeff Speck to explain how speed kills -- and there's Team Gahan, ignoring him.

---

Concerns about lengthened commute times should not be dismissed out of hand. There are many people who commute in and out of downtown each day who have no other use for downtown—at least, not in its current state. (1/6)

They brown-bag their lunches and don't linger after work for cocktails. Most are constrained in both money and time. (2/6)

Some of these people will never have interest in a safer, more vital downtown. Even if it becomes remarkably more appealing, with new public spaces and activities springing up, they will not make use of it. But these people are the exception. (3/6)

Almost everybody, at the very least, wants a downtown they can be proud of. And most suburbanites, when a downtown becomes a destination, will want to visit it on occasion. (4/6)

Moreover, these people’s desires need to be weighed against the desires of all downtown stakeholders. In most places, the majority of downtown workers care a lot about its safety and quality. All downtown residents certainly care. (5/6)

The same goes for merchants, property owners & other investors. It is in this context that the tradeoffs between commute time & safety need to be made clear, & the key question asked: would you rather have a downtown that is quick to drive through, or one worth arriving at? (6/6)

And this.

Citizens and city leaders should be presented with an honest choice. Where commutes will take a bit longer, we should to say so. But, given the whole story, most people have shown themselves willing to spare a minute or two for the good of their city and fellow citizens. (1/3)

This graphic by the transportation planning firm Nelson\Nygaard shows how slower downtown speeds have only a minimal impact on typical commute times. (2/3)

RULE 32: Discuss tradeoffs between speed and safety honestly, with an eye to downtown vitality, civic pride, and lives saved. (3/3) From #WalkableCityRules

Here's Jeff Speck to explain how speed kills -- and there's Team Gahan, ignoring him.

Jeff Speck was on Twitter, Christmas Eve. 

While many different factors influence the safety of humans in cities, none matters nearly so much as the speed at which vehicles are traveling. The relationship between vehicle speed and danger is, to put it mildly, exponential. (1/4)

The death risk to pedestrians from vehicles takes a dramatic upturn at 25 mph. (2/4)

The diagram above is one of many that can be found to communicate this relationship. Others show people falling out of buildings, with 20 mph equaling the second floor and 40 mph equaling the seventh. (3/4)

The basic message to remember is that you are about five times as likely to be killed by a car going 30 as a car going 20, and five times again as likely to be killed by a car going 40. (4/4)

Continued this morning.

This threshold zone of 20 to 40 mph, is basically where it all happens—the difference between bruises, broken bones, and death. And 20 to 40 is roughly the range of speeds that we find cars traveling on the best downtown streets. (1/5)

Keeping cars on the lower end of that range, therefore, must be the central objective of urban street design. (2/5)

The speed of the impact itself is not the only factor. As cars move faster, the likelihood of a crash also rises. Drivers and pedestrians alike have less time to respond to conflicts, stopping distances lengthen, and the driver’s cone of vision narrows. (3/5)

As drivers move more quickly, their cone of vision narrows, making crashes more likely. (4/5)

These factors multiply the impact of speed beyond those indicated in the above graph. It is safe to say that a car traveling 30 mph is probably at least three times as dangerous as one going 25. (5/5)

Excerpts from Jeff Speck's new book, Walkable City Rules: "Many cities have a downtown speed limit of 25. All should—or lower."

2016.

Jeff Speck takes to CityLab to offer excerpts from his new book, and here are the ones I won't be covering in this post.

• Rule 9: Fix your codes -- Eliminate legal barriers to mixed use.
• Rule 53: Understand that cycling follows investment -- Topography, climate, and culture can’t compare.
• Rule 88: Make sticky edges -- Energize public spaces with active, deep facades.
• Rule 100: Don’t give up on sprawl --- It’s where most Americans live.

Click through to read them.

Here's one big thing worth a snip: "Street improvements should be linked to keeping speeding in check."

Not coincidentally, it's the one least understood by City Hall in New Albany. Shall we join together to reduce illegal speeding?

A Step-by-Step Guide for Fixing Badly Planned American Cities, by Jeff Speck (CityLab)

An excerpt from Jeff Speck’s Walkable City Rules, a step-by-step guide to fixing America’s cities and towns.

I published the book Walkable City in 2012. Since then, many of our leaders have realized that establishing walkability as a central goal can make cities better in a whole host of ways. That book did a decent job of inspiring change, but it didn’t tell people exactly how to create it. My new book, Walkable City Rules: 101 Steps to Making Better Places (released on October 15 by Island Press) is an effort to weaponize Walkable City for deployment in the field. An excerpt follows below.
—Jeff Speck

Rule 31: Focus on speeding

Street improvements should be linked to keeping speeding in check.

“It’s the speed, stupid.” Roughly half of this book addresses different aspects of the street and how they are designed and managed. Many of these points may serve multiple objectives and audiences, but they all aim back, in one way or another, at a single issue, vehicle speed.

While many different factors influence the safety of humans in cities, none matters nearly so much as the speed at which vehicles are traveling. The relationship between vehicle speed and danger is, to put it mildly, exponential.

The diagram below is one of many that can be found to communicate this relationship. (Other diagrams show people falling out of buildings, with 20 miles per hour equaling the second floor and 40 miles per hour equaling the seventh.) The basic message to remember is that you are about five times as likely to be killed by a car going 30 as a car going 20, and five times again as likely to be killed by a car going 40.

The risk to pedestrians from vehicles takes a dramatic upturn at 25 miles per hour, as this chart based on data on pedestrian casualties (collected by S.J. Ashton) shows. (The dashed lines are confidence intervals.) (D.C. Richards Transport Research Laboratory)

This threshold zone of 20 to 40 miles per hour is basically where it all happens—the difference between bruises, broken bones, and death. And 20 to 40 is roughly the range of speeds that we find cars traveling on the best downtown streets. Keeping cars on the lower end of that range, therefore, must be the central objective of urban street design.

The speed of the impact itself is not the only factor. As cars move faster, the likelihood of a crash also rises. Drivers and pedestrians alike have less time to respond to conflicts; stopping distances lengthen; and the driver’s cone of vision narrows. These factors multiply the impact of speed beyond those indicated in the above graph. It is safe to say that a car traveling 30 miles per hour is probably at least three times as dangerous as one going 25. Many cities have a downtown speed limit of 25. All should—or lower.

These limits simplify the conversation, because it is no longer necessary to talk about “slowing drivers down.” Who wants to be slowed down? That sounds like congestion. Instead, we can simply talk about “reducing illegal speeding.”

BEER WITH A SOCIALIST: "When you think of your favorite spot to grab a beer, what architectural features come to mind?"

Jeff Speck forwarded the following link at Twitter, and if you're like the lady who wrote to the newspaper the other day from an anguished but belated realization that someone had changed the street grid in New Albany without bothering to ask her permission, and demanded to know who was responsible, then kindly note: had Speck's revolutionary recommendations been fully embraced by Mayor Deafrey Gahan, this woman's tenuous grip on reality would have eroded even further by now.

Maybe not everyone should be allowed to drive.

However, this column is about beer, not mayoral incompetence or car-centric nut cases, so let's move forward to an interesting glimpse at one writer's selection of nine bars that every architect needs to visit.

To me, the essential ingredient for bucket-list bars is that they're located somewhere else, preferably in Europe, and have good adult beverages to drink -- namely, beer. As such, I've actually been to the Hofbrauhaus and Hirschgarten for lagers, and once walked past the American Bar in Vienna.

This said, taking the author's task as our own, it's hard to imagine a more worthy addition to the architectural list than this gem.

The bar at the West Baden Springs Hotel, just up the road from Nawbany adjacent to French Lick in central Hoosierland, is situated in the atrium beneath a 200-ft dome once dubbed the 8th Wonder of the World. 

Just saying.

The 9 Bars That Every Architect Needs to Visit, by Kaley Overstreet (Arch Daily)

When you think of your favorite spot to grab a beer, what architectural features come to mind? Is it the swanky furniture, themed artwork, or the heavily designed cocktail menu? Today, the aesthetics of bars are now as much a draw as the drinks themselves. From movie set inspired spaces to rooftops that offer spectacular city views, we’ve compiled a list of nine bars and beer gardens that every architect needs to cross off their list.

At Strong Towns: A Conversation with Walkability Expert Jeff Speck."

Here's the pitch.

Jeff Speck is a nationally-recognized expert on building walk-friendly, people-oriented places. His book, Walkable City: How Downtown can Save America, One Step at a Time, is beloved by planners, leaders and residents of cities big and small; and his planning firm, Speck & Associates, works in communities across the country.

We recently invited Jeff onto our webcast to chat with Chuck Marohn about how to build slower, safer streets and why this goal is so important if we want to live in prosperous, successful cities.

At the 27:54 mark, Speck name drops New Albany (along with Oklahoma City) as an unqualified success story for two-way reversions. Personally I find it highly qualified, but don't let this stop you from listening.

A CONVERSATION WITH WALKABILITY EXPERT JEFF SPECK (Strong Towns)

Questions discussed include:

• What have you seen change in our national dialogue about walkability and on the ground since publishing your book? (3:42)
• Why and how did you make your book accessible to a broad, non-professional audience? (5:34)
• Tell us about some of the innovative changes you're witnessing and taking part in in cities around America in terms of walkability. (7:25)
• Why have you shifted your goals from eliminating suburban development to reforming it or building new urban development? (14:16)
• What population density is required to support a walkable commercial center? (18:43)
• Can bus rapid transit be a viable transit option as opposed to light rail? (22:30)
• How do you make change around walkability issues when a majority of residents aren't politically engaged or involved in established government processes? (24:40)
• How can we convince municipalities to convert one-way streets to two-way streets? (27:54) Has tactical urbanism ever been used to accomplish this? (30:50)
• Why do we have to push a button to get a walk signal at some intersections? (33:08)
• Do you see the growth of ride-hailing services as helpful or harmful to our cities? (37:10)
• In your recent essay, 10 Rules for Cities Thinking about Automated Vehicles, you talked about the issue of induced demand, which goes counter to many of the autonomous vehicle boosters who argue that the proliferation of these cars will decrease auto usage overall. Walk us through your argument. (42:50)
• What is the best practical argument to persuade local leaders to reduce parking requirements? How should we be approaching this issue in our communities? (50:55)
• Many small towns seem set up for the worst kind of development. When you go into a small town hoping to change things, where do you start? (55:44)

More of the right stuff from Strong Towns: "Two chances to dig deep on why we need to #SlowTheCars."

We could have had Speck Stout; we got Gahan Lite. I went for a walk last night after dark, and observing the traffic on Spring Street, I'd say that the #SlowTheCars hash has yet to be rendered null and void by reality on asphalt here in New Albany. As we said when two-way streets finally were implemented last year after the mayor's ruinous five-year delay: It's the end of the beginning, and no more.

Does Team Gahan get it ... yet?

---

When we build our streets for the people who live on them—and not the cars those people might or might not drive—amazing things happen. Our streets get safer. Our children can play a little more freely. Our municipal debts begin to shrink. Our city businesses get richer—and so does our entire quality of life.

Of course, so many of our towns aren't built that way at all. But that doesn't mean it's too late for your community.

We've just announced two chances to really dig in to why it's so crucial to #slowthecars—and what each of us can do about it.

On February 1st, Strong Towns members like you can join Strong Towns president Chuck Marohn for an interactive webcast edition of his Gross Negligence presentation, which explores why slowing our neighborhood streets isn't just a public safety issue—it's an opportunity to reverse decades of professional negligence. Click here to register now.

And on February 15th, any Strong Towns fan can sign up to hear nationally recognized expert and bestselling author of The Walkable City Jeff Speck in conversation with Chuck—and have a chance to ask Jeff your questions. Here's where you can register.

Space in both webcasts is limited, so register now. We can't wait to see you there.

Grid Control, Vol. 24: Deliver me this.

Courtesy of JP. Who's up for delivery etiquette lessons?

Three downtown streets have been reverted to two-way traffic. Barring a few details, Spring, Pearl and Bank are finished. Market will be next, and then Elm.

All we know for sure is that the whole of the grid modernization project is to be completed by September 30, and until then, any conclusions offered by me or any other observer will be strictly provisional, subject to experience over a period of subsequent months, not hours (whether the viewpoint is ecstatic or embittered).

I'm bullish, though to put it simply, a counter-productive arrangement that took decades to institutionalize cannot be rebooted into sensibility overnight. Our current civic position is the end of the beginning, and we need to be looking ahead to the next steps -- a few short-term tweaks, and a lot more long-haul thoughts and plans.

In the aftermath of two-way traffic reversion on Pearl and Bank, I've heard a few comments about the potential for downtown business deliveries to be disruptive.

Something like this: a truck pausing 25 minutes to unload during the morning on Bank or Pearl when traffic is at its very lightest somehow serves as sufficient panic-stricken reason to abandon the whole notion of 24-hours-per-day grid reform over an area far wider than two or three downtown blocks.

I've heard this fear/annoyance factor mentioned for years, and Jeff Speck covered it in a street study as yet unread by so many sidewalk superintendents.

Trucks sometimes load and unload on these streets—especially Pearl Street—and the removal of the second lane will make this act more difficult. Before a two-way conversion, the City must work with business owners to identify alternative loading zones within a reasonable distance, such as nearby alleys and parking lots. One hopes that merchants will be incited to support this effort by the data surrounding two-way conversion and retail success.

A similar challenge was faced by the City of Lowell, Massachusetts, population 108,000, when the two-way reversion of its downtown streets was proposed four years ago. At that time, it was said that the main retail corridor, Merrimack Street, could not accept eastbound traffic because its second westbound lane was needed for truck deliveries. Eventually, a servicing plan was completed, and just this past summer the full downtown two-way reversion took place—including Merrimack Street. Deliveries now occur in certain designated locations, and the entire transformation came off without a hitch.

The point should be obvious. Indubitably, downtown deliveries are something to be considered and addressed, but they're hardly the sort of destructive phenomenon to justify (even more) apocalyptic arm-waving by the naysayers, primarily because whether the street runs one way or two, a truck parked in the middle of it is an obstacle.

If automobile drivers operate at safe speeds and pay attention, if truck drivers aren't narcissists, and if suppliers work with businesses -- if the obstacles are reduced and systematized as much as possible -- then it stands to be a minor issue, at best.

Naturally, the devil's in the "if," so I looked around a bit and found this article detailing the downtown experience in Columbia Missouri -- not pertaining to a post-reversion situation, as in New Albany, but the everyday problem of deliveries in an urban grid.

City advisory group wants traffic study related to delivery truck parking downtown, by Megan Favignano (Columbia Tribune)

... Earlier this year, the CID’s operations committee and board established a list of recommended or best practices for businesses receiving deliveries downtown.

Those included delivery companies, distributors and merchants complete loading and unloading as quickly as possible, avoiding large deliveries during peak times if possible, paying meters if parked in a meter spot while loading, staying at least 30 feet away from intersections to avoid blocking traffic and larger delivery trucks parking in the middle of the street down the center divider if unloading on Broadway.

The Downtown CID’s board created these guidelines and decided not to establish any policies or recommend the city create an ordinance related to delivery truck parking. Essing said the board felt a policy restricting delivery truck parking could harm businesses.

For instance, she said, if a policy only allowed deliveries during a certain time frame, that may not match up with the hours of operation of all downtown businesses. That means some businesses would need to pay employees to come in to receive shipments during a time the business is not normally open.

Farrar said placing restrictions on delivery truck drivers could have other negative effects on businesses downtown, including delayed delivery of products they need.

The downtown leadership council discussed how prohibiting deliveries during certain hours may affect the businesses downtown, including worsening traffic during a different time of day rather than solving the traffic congestion issue.

“I think everyone wishes there was an easy solution,” Essing said. “If you make one change you need to think about what else is that going to impact.”

Farrar said community awareness could help. She said the trucks have few places to park and citizens should expect occasional delays.

Two jaw-dropping concepts emerge from this article: there's a Downtown Community Improvement District (CID) in Columbia, and a Downtown Leadership Council to tackle downtown issues.

Just imagine. I good place to start would be downtown merchants working together, not separately -- but street direction isn't a direct determinant of this relative failure, is it?

---

Previously:

Grid Control, Vol. 23: City's fuddy-duddies losing their minds as the debut for a two-way Spring Street is pegged at August 29.

Grid Control, Vol. 22: City engineer Larry Summers answers our questions about intersection striping errors and the "No Trucks" sign removal.

Grid Control, Vol. 21: Murderous intersection at Spring & 10th to be repaved and restriped -- and, the hocus-pocus with a disappearing "No Trucks" sign at Spring & Vincennes.

Grid Control, Vol. 20: As Team Gahan dawdles, another bicyclist is crushed into mincemeat at 10th & Spring's dangerous dogleg.

Grid Control, Vol. 19: In a positive move, HWC begins righting the wrong cross hatching on Spring Street.

Grid Control, Vol. 18: Finally a few BoW street grid project answers, almost all of them citing "contractor error."

Grid Control, Vol. 17: Judging by the misdirection of this "CROSS TRAFFIC DOES NOT STOP" sign, we now reside in the British Empire.

Grid Control, Vol. 16: What about HWC's cross hatching correction? Will this be finished before or after Team Gahan declares victory?

Grid Control, Vol. 15: Dooring enhancement perfectly epitomizes Deaf Gahan's "biking last" approach to grid modernization.

Grid Control, Vol. 14: Yes, you can still park on the south side of Spring Street during the stalled two-way grid project.

Grid Control, Vol. 13: "Dear Deaf Gahan and minions: FOR THE LOVE OF PETE, STOP TRYING TO BE COOL AND DESIGNER-ISH. YOU'RE NOT, AND IT'S EMBARRASSING ALL OF US."

Grid Control, Vol. 12: Meet the artistic crosswalk design equivalent of dogs playing poker.

Grid Control, Vol. 11: HWC Engineering meets with St. Marks, city officials nowhere to be found.

Grid Control, Vol. 10: City officials predictably AWOL as HWC Engineering falls on its sword over striping errors.

Grid Control, Vol. 9: "This was supposed to be discussed with us," but Dear Leader doesn't ever discuss, does he?

Grid Control, Vol. 8: City Hall characteristically mum as HWC Engineering at least tries to answer the cross-hatching question.

Grid Control, Vol. 7: What will the Board of Works do to rectify HWC's striping errors on the north side of Spring Street, apart from microwaving another round of sausage biscuits?

Grid Control, Vol. 6: Jeff Speck tweets about NA's grid changes, and those missed bicycling opportunities.

Grid Control, Vol. 5: Egg on HWC Engineering's well-compensated face as it botches Spring Street's westbound bike buffer cross hatching.

Grid Control, Vol. 4: But this actually isn't a bus lane, is it?

Grid Control, Vol. 3: TARC's taking your curbside church parking, says City Hall.

Grid Control, Vol. 2: Southsiders get six more parking inches, but you gotta love those 10-foot traffic lanes on Spring.

Grid Control, Vol. 1: You people drive so freaking horribly that someone's going to die at Spring and 10th.

Fearing an auto apocalypse on two-way streets? Why not have a drink, pop a Valium, and relax.

I asked Jeff Speck the hottest question in town.

Roger: Has there ever been credible evidence documenting a tsunami of crashes and deaths in the wake of a two-way street changeover?

Speck: The only studies I have seen document improved safety from 2-way.

Waiter, I'll have a Caesar Salad with the grilled crow, and a side of humble pie. No, not for me. Take them over to that sad looking man in the corner booth with the bicentennial book.

The magic number is 2,228 ... days since Bob Caesar vowed to protect Pearl Street against the damned pergessives.

Speck's noteworthy New Albany Downtown Street Network Proposal was submitted to the city of in December, 2014. Following is a passage from the study briefly rebutting some of the claims I've been forced to endure ad nauseam on social media these past few days.

As a side note, it's interesting to contemplate that while Speck's study deals at length with tolling pass-throughs, the level of ORBP refugees hasn't been as high as most of us imagined. There was a palpable increase, just not an epic one.

At first during the run-up, City Hall used the predicted tolling dynamic as a cover argument in favor of the street grid changes, but then implementation was delayed until after tolling began, suggesting that even as thick-headed a luminary as Jeff Gahan saw at least some merit in the many ancillary benefits of two-way streets beyond deterring toll dodgers.

If so, that's a rare check in the mayor's favor. He simply wouldn't be undertaking this reversion if he thought there were more votes to be lost than gained.

Now, to Speck.

---

Potential Outcomes

To be intelligent, this political discussion must be informed by two other discussions. The first concerns urban vitality, while the second concerns relative impacts.

Urban Vitality

Few people will argue that, in the heart of a city, the desires of commuters just passing through should trump the safety of pedestrians and the success of businesses. 

However, there are many people who reasonably fear that slowing down traffic might create such congestion that the city fails to function properly, and that all residents and businesses will suffer as a result. While this fear is reasonable, it is not based in fact. 

The experience of many dozens of cities all across America has been consistent: there is not a single record in the extensive annals of urban planning of a city’s vitality suffering in any way from a one-way to two-way conversion. To the contrary: there are many reports of business success and a rebirth of street life, but never has the additional traffic friction presented by two-way streets caused a city to perform less well socially or economically.

Relative Impacts

For the above reasons, this discussion becomes a simple argument between those who want to get through the downtown as quickly as possible, and those who want a downtown worth arriving at. While only those who prioritize speed over vitality can argue for the former, it is worth considering what the true speed impacts are likely to be.

Here we must revisit our earlier discussion about the Proper Number of Lanes. As noted, unless the planned tolling regime for Ohio River bridges is changed, New Albany can expect to have a considerable increase in traffic downtown. That traffic will fill the space allotted, and behave according to the cues that it receives from its environment.

If this traffic continues to be funneled down multi-lane one-way streets, drivers will continue to think of downtown New Albany as a highway, and use it as such. More drivers will be drawn to these downtown streets. They will not think about stopping to shop or eat, and their principal impacts to downtown will be more pollution and increased danger to pedestrians, cyclists, and other drivers. 

If instead, downtown is reverted back to its original two-way grid, a few things will happen differently. 

First, a less expedited path through downtown will cause fewer drivers to take the New Albany detour. 

Second, the distribution of these drivers among two-way streets, with fewer opportunities for lane-jockeying, will result in a safer environment for all. 

And, finally, the more comforting “main street” experience offered to these drivers, and the time spent lingering at intersections, will make them more likely to shop or dine. Experiencing New Albany as a place, and not just a conduit, they will be more inclined to spend a little time and money there.

---

These past few days have been wearying, indeed -- but what about Harvest Homecoming?

Yawn.

What about it?

Grid Control, Vol. 6: Jeff Speck tweets about NA's grid changes, and those missed bicycling opportunities.

The street grid proposal that Jeff Speck submitted to New Albany did more than change automotive directions.

It included a fresh and significant biking infrastructure component that if implemented, would have made New Albany the undisputed regional leader.

HWC Engineering then stripped most of Speck's ideas from the business-as-usual compromise plan, primarily because Jeff Gahan and his crony enablers never understood them, and moreover, because we're just too stupidly anchored in place as New Albany for such concepts to be grasped by the suburbanite time servers.

I suspect the two-way grid will be helpful, and conditions will improve. My councilman will declare victory in a process that by his own admission eluded his input and control.

Still, the junking of Speck's amazing vision will be remembered as a tremendous missed opportunity, ranking right up there with Bob Real's failure to tackle a ramshackle sewer system before the EPA's mega-expensive death sentence came down.

At this point, all we can do is hope the chance to optimize the downtown street grid for all users, and not just their cars, arises again at some point in the future.

Maybe next time we'll do it right.

---

Previously:

Grid Control, Vol. 5: Egg on HWC Engineering's well-compensated face as it botches Spring Street's westbound bike buffer cross hatching.

Grid Control, Vol. 4: But this actually isn't a bus lane, is it?

Grid Control, Vol. 3: TARC's taking your curbside church parking, says City Hall.

Grid Control, Vol. 2: Southsiders get six more parking inches, but you gotta love those 10-foot traffic lanes on Spring.

Grid Control, Vol. 1: You people drive so freaking horribly that someone's going to die at Spring and 10th.

Refresher course: “Let’s become a place where people want to be. And if we achieve that, everything else should follow.”

Just waiting to be proven right. Patience, grasshopper.

At times of exhaustion or dissipation -- hell, it's even been known to happen while sober and well-rested, but why risk it? -- there'll be a merry bout of free association.

Here is mine for Monday, April 24. It begins with yesterday's post about the attractions of river mud.

Mud-struck New Gahanian anchor seal marketing ... and Rhode Island's disastrous state branding campaign.

This is not a "marketing piece", a "branding image" - it's not a progressive symbol, it doesn't imply a growing and vital city. An anchor? Who designed this?

A reader left this comment.

Ms. Marshall's article's most relevant point that applies to New Albany's effort:

5) Make it sellable in the first place

Finally, the secret sauce to place branding: the place. “If the community doesn’t have infrastructure, doesn’t have enough beds to attract new tourists, or it doesn’t have a qualified workforce to offer, then from a business perspective and marketing perspective, your money should go toward improving the community,” says Pryor.

It ain’t worth advertising if there’s nothing worth selling.

Then there's this, also from yesterday.

I've just finished reading Jaron Lanier's book, "You Are Not a Gadget."

Funding a civilization through advertising is like trying to get nutrition by connecting a tube from one’s anus to one’s mouth. The body starts consuming itself. That is what we are doing online.

This brings me to the left hook. The author's interview with Jeff Speck provides a useful reminder of the point appearing in bold, italic and enlarged font. It's about becoming a place where people want to be each and every day, not during scattered one-off celebrations. That's why a two-way street grid matters.

City Hall insists it's coming. I'll believe it when the trucks that shouldn't be on Spring Street in the first place begin traveling in two directions.

designer-jeff-speck-walkable-cities-economic-development/">Urban designer Jeff Speck on walkable cities and economic development, by Rudolph Bell (Upstate Business Journal)

“Let’s become a place where people want to be. And if we achieve that, everything else should follow.”

Jeff Speck is a city planner, urban designer, author, and lecturer who advocates for more walkable cities. He advises municipalities and real estate developers through Speck & Associates, his consultancy in Brookline, Mass. Speck is the author of “Walkable City: How Downtown Can Save America, One Step at a Time” and was previously director of design at the National Endowment for the Arts.

UBJ interviewed Speck on April 12 while he was in Greenville for a speaking engagement at the downtown offices of Clemson University’s MBA program. The event was sponsored by the Greenville chapter of the American Institute of Architects and 21 other groups.

"Engineers design streets for speeds well above the posted limit, so that speeding drivers will be safe—a practice that, of course, causes the very speeding it hopes to protect against."

See also: Charles Marohn's "The Five Ways Engineers Deflect Criticism."

The title of this post is explained by Jeff Speck, right here, but before we consider the "questionable applications of data" on the part of traffic (or "transportation") engineers, resulting in streets intended to accommodate automotive speed at the expense of wider societal safety, here is Speck again to metaphorically explain what HWC Engineering has done to his wonderful walkability plan for New Albany.

The relevant passage is in bold.

Speck: Resist the urge to make every street a highway

Urban design expert Jeff Speck -- who has made repeated appearances in Des Moines -- says transportation engineers often see every new street as a chance to build a highway.

That's a mistake in an era when streets need to be designed to meet diverse community needs, including the ability to walk through an area without crossing four to eight lanes of speedy traffic.

Speck, who runs his own consulting firm and teaches at Harvard University, writes in a blog post in The Atlantic: "Even when traffic engineers have the best intentions, too many simply lack the tools to make successful places. In the typical American city, asking a traffic engineer to design a walkable street is like asking a hammer to insert a screw."

Of course, HWC's merry hammering at screws is occurring according to the wishes of a City Hall that brains long ago forgot. Speck's New Albany streets study might as well have been written in Gaelic, insofar as Mayor Jeff Gahan is concerned. Sections applicable to campaign finance beak-wetting were retained for modification beyond recognition, and the rest was flushed.

The result?

Speck's amazing and transformative principles of walkability now have been truncated to achieve entirely unrelated imperatives, like paving envy and federal monies (see "beak wetting," above), as well as abject capitulation to trucking interests; hence the grainy, filler-stuffed sausage, and a two-way street grid plan stripped of most ancillary usefulness -- but just as with the elevation of the Mighty Trumpolini, Nawbanians elected Gahan, and now you get exactly what you want, good and hard, in the form of a city being built according to his atrophied, sleight-of-hand, Mickey Mouse "vision."

That felt great, so back to the point: Here's how traffic engineers knowingly build streets fit only for speeding cars.

Why The Rules Of The Road Aren’t Enough To Prevent People From Dying, by Anna Maria Barry-Jester (FiveThirtyEight)

... In 2013, 32,719 people died in motor vehicle crashes in the United States, and 2.3 million were injured, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). Those numbers were down from the previous year, but motor vehicle crashes remain a leading cause of death, and speed is a leading cause of accidents. The NHTSA estimates a $277 billion annual price tag for those accidents, with an additional $594 billion for “harm from the loss of life and the pain and decreased quality of life due to injuries.”

Given the social and economic toll of speeding, one might assume that we set speed limits with careful calculations aimed at maximizing safety. But that’s not exactly how it works, and a history of questionable applications of data is partly to blame.

A sharrows symbol might as well be the Mark of Blithering Idiot on Jeff Gahan's forehead.

Here's what we know, to date. It's isn't pretty.

1. Mayor Jeff Gahan has spent millions of dollars on park units connected to each other not by walking or bicycling infrastructure, but by roads intended for use solely by cars. These roads require constant upkeep and paving, which in turn provide numerous conduits for campaign finance sluicing, but you already knew this.

2. Whenever "safety" is used as a mantra for street grid change, however fleeting and incremental, it is a dog whistle intended to describe conditions for motorists, not walkers or cyclists, because they're incidental in the grand scheme of beak-wetting.

3. During five years in office, all Gahan has done to guard against the eventuality of toll dodging is implement a grotesquely ballyhooed road diet on Spring between Vincennes and Beharrell, describe it in terms exclusive to automotive "safety", build no bicycle infrastructure whatever between Beharrell and Silver, then draw a few scant sharrow symbols on the pavement and create unprotected bike lanes from Silver to Vincennes, after which they continue ineffectively and still unprotected along high-speed, one-way Spring until petering out downtown.

4. None of these existing bike lanes are connected to any other, or to a park, or to the city's downtown commercial area, or evince any design of being connected to anything, now or in the future. They begin and end nowhere, and not once has a city planner ever revealed a comprehensive design that might convince us otherwise -- when they've bothered to answer questions at all.

5. Insofar as consultant Jeff Speck recommended protected bike lanes throughout the street grid as part of converting one-way streets to two-way traffic, 95% of his recommendations were tossed from the grandiosely tagged "Downtown Grid Modernization Project" in what might be termed as a late-term abortion.

6. While hideous, HWC Engineering's recasting of Speck's downtown street network proposal didn't materialize from the ether. It came at the behest of Gahan and the usual timer-serving suspects among city officials, among them David Duggins, the city's presumed economic development director, whose wife works for HWC, seeing as nepotism is job one with Gahan and not proposals representing genuine progress (see "beak-wetting" above).

7. And, just for the hell of it, if the opportunity presents itself to reduce shade along this botched and unrealized street grid by felling trees, Gahan's stellar team of suburbanites does this first, then insists that in spite of the absence of evidence to the contrary, far more trees are being planted than clear-cut. When we ask for the evidence, we're told that the poor, underfunded Tree Board can only do so much.

Think about the preceding.

Then consider that the very same time-serving paycheck endorsers instituting street grid mayhem as outlined above presently are seated on a steering committee to write a Comprehensive Plan to carry the city forward two whole decades.

To more of the same?

Who are you going to believe, John Rosenbarger or your own two eyes?

Today's photos are courtesy of Bicycle Lobby, on Twitter here.

Recent documentation of conditions in the civic asylum:

WITHIN CITY LIMITS: Episode XII, How Do I Join the New Albany Planning Committee?

The composition of Jeff Gahan's comprehensive plan steering committee guarantees yet another business-as-usual silo, and compels me to vomit.

New Albany's new Comprehensive Plan to be happily midwifed by precisely the same old suspects.

Jeff Speck on HWC Engineering's bicycle-free, two-way streets abortion: "I guess that's what you get when you ask engineers who do not value biking to change a plan."