Let's Do It (Let's Fall in Love).

With formerly restrictive alcoholic beverage laws being relaxed, and from a recognition that outdoor living with social distancing is a way of coping with COVID, it would take almost nothing in terms of resources and expenditures for just about any city in America to enable experimentation like this.

Look at those parking spaces, finally used for a useful purpose. Local authorities need only establish broad boundaries and get out of the way, as state government already has done v.v. those alcohol floor plan laws.

The other day I was asked if I "hate" New Albany.

I answered no.

What I "hate" is that so many New Albanians can't so much as imagine things that occur in the outside world, like this. Quite literally what you see in the photo above is happening all across the country and the planet, thanks to the pandemic and the ability of city fathers to think on their feet.

Why not here in New Albany?

After all, Los Angeles is doing it.

L.A.-area parking spots have become dining areas during the pandemic. Will it last? by Laura J. Nelson (LA Times)

 ... The pandemic has forced cities and businesses to be more nimble and experimental, and allows them to think about the logistics and trade-offs in real time: "What’s going to bring us more customers? Is it that we have a place to sit outside, or that we have nearby parking?"

Jeffersonville's been doing it for quite a while, and now so is Louisville. Considering Louisville's mayor has been routinely wrong of late, here's one he can hit out of the damn park -- and does.

Louisville Metro says restaurants can expand to on-street dining to help survive pandemic, by Dahlia Ghabour (Courier Journal)

“As we envision a day beyond the pandemic, we want our eclectic Louisville eateries to be part of that future, which is why Louisville Metro has been seeking new ways to help them stay open throughout the restrictions,” Mayor Greg Fischer said in a news release. “The new on-street dining option will give restaurants the chance to serve more customers in a safe manner while complying with the state restrictions that are necessary to stem the spread of COVID-19.”

Why must easy things be so hard?

Head, meet wall: "Zurich shows that effective transportation requires that we widen our focus to see beyond cars."

CityLab is completely free. There's nothing stopping you from following this link and achieving a greater understanding of places where sensible solutions are allowed to exist.

What Does This Street In Zürich Mean?, by Norman Garrick (CityLab)

If you see how cars, streetcars, bikes, and pedestrians use this Swiss street, you can better understand what’s wrong with so many other urban thoroughfares.

Above is a picture of a pretty typical city street in Zürich, Switzerland.

What do you see?

In some ways, this scene represents a kind of Rorschach Test for transportation and urban planning. If you are a passenger on a tram riding on one of the two sets of rails that take up most of the street, this scene represents freedom of movement and a sense that transit is privileged in Zürich. If you’re a pedestrian, this is a relatively comfortable street to be on, with useful services, restaurants, and a few interesting stores (check out the model train store at the corner with Haldenbachstrasse). If you’re on a bike, this, like most other streets in Zürich, is OK, but not great.

But if you’re an American tourist, your first thought might be that these Europeans are real strange: Look at that long line of car traffic on the right, and look at all that road space going to waste. And an engineer or planner trained in the conventional mode will probably agree with you, and see a picture of abject failure. In the parlance of the traffic planner, this is a street operating at Level of Service F.

snip

Let us first deal with the American tourist who sees inefficiency. During the peak hour, the vehicle lanes carry about 400 cars and perhaps 500 people. (I counted!) The two tramlines carry about 3,500 people per hour. So, notwithstanding the fact that at first glance the tram lanes seem empty and remarkably inefficient, the numbers tell a different story—the tram lanes are doing yeoman’s work, carrying 7 times more people than the car lanes, and they could easily carry many more. And this is before we even start to consider the environmental and economic advantages of transit over cars. (People in Zürich have unlimited access to all transit in the city for just $1,000 per year, yet the subsidy from the city, state and the nation is modest, since the fare box returns, and other revenues, pay about two-thirds of the cost of operating the system.)

I'll stop there. I'm too depressed to keep snipping.

Poperinge Hop Parade: Now THIS is what I'm talking about.

Thanks, Jeff Gillenwater.

The video depicts highlights of the hops parade in Poperinge, Belgium in 2014. The hops festival there takes place every third year, meaning it's due again in 2020. You'll notice no sirens, police cars, municipal suck trucks, monster rigs, militia jeeps or deafening fire trucks; instead, there are actual humans, many of them walking, some on horseback or in wagons.

Taken as a whole, Poperinge’s hop festival is a recurring delight. This small provincial town possesses a self-image second to none, and the three-day event reflects a much appreciated commitment to local values.

Hop-related events and related revelry take place throughout the festival weekend, but the highlight is the Sunday parade through the tidy streets. The parade actually tells a story, with an accompanying libretto of sorts printed in several languages, periodic chapter markers, and a refreshing absence of commercial considerations.

The story concerns the history of brewing, the history of the hop, and its importance to the Poperinge economy. Onlookers meet the enemies of the hop -- for instance, brightly festooned children as beetles -- and the plant’s friends, other whistling children dressed as birds.

It is delightful. Here are a few links from past parades. Since 1999, I've missed only one of them (2011), and plan are underway for next year.

The 2017 Poperinge Hop Parade, Part One: One must pour the proper foundation for maximum parade enjoyment.

The 2017 Poperinge Hop Parade, Part Two: The procession itself, and where to dine afterward.

2014 Euro Reunion Tour, Day 12.5: The story of hops in parade format.

PRESS RELEASE: "Let’s go to the hops."

Hops are a boy's best friend.

Just watch this: "Utrecht: Planning for People, Not Cars."

Nice things we can't have in L'America.

Public restrooms are another beneficial project neither Jeff Gahan nor Develop New Albany is likely to pursue.

Public bathrooms just aren't luxurious enough for the appearance-over-substance suburbanites calling the shots at NA Anchor Central. They understand so very little about an outside world they've seldom experienced.

The only surprising aspect of their ignorance?

Surely a $100K public restroom study for a project destined to be scrapped would be the perfect stocking stuffer for HWC Engineering.

D.C.’s Downtown Was a Public Bathroom Desert. That Could Soon Change, by Sarah Holder (CityLab)

Homeless activists pushed Washington D.C. to pass expansive public restroom legislation. Now the city is moving to increase toilet access for the public.

 ... Finding a hygienic and accessible restroom on the street is a necessity for many, including homeless residents, seniors, and pregnant women—and a challenge in many U.S. cities, not just D.C. But a nationwide movement is building to create “more spaces for people to do private things,” as Alexandra Goldman, a community organizer in San Francisco, told CityLab. And now—years after D.C.’s bathroom committee conducted their first informal survey of publicly accessible private space—the city has taken the most sweeping action in the nation so far, passing the first Public Restroom bill of its kind.

The legislation builds on years of other urban toilet expansion efforts. Portland, Oregon, pioneered the Portland Loo, a 24/7 stand-alone public restroom design that has since spread to 20 other U.S. locations. San Francisco, where 311 complaints regarding feces on the streets have peaked, installed a fleet of portable public bathrooms called Pit Stops in strategic locations; an alternative to the more controversial self-cleaning Automated Public Toilets (APTs) that it and other cities also use. And while pay toilets are banned in many U.S. cities because of their discriminatory implications, New York State created an exemption to the rule for New York City, where need is high and few free public toilets are installed ...

Truth, facts, non-Disney real things: “Again and again, when we look at streets oriented toward people we find that they are more economically productive than any other style of development.”

The intro.

As we wrap up another year here at Strong Towns, we’re going to use the next two weeks to highlight some of the best content we published in 2018. We want to make sure these great pieces come to your attention—whether you missed them the first time around, discover something new in them on a second read, or think of somebody you’d love to share them with.

Our goal is to change the conversation about growth, development, and community prosperity in every city and town in North America. That means giving you, the members of the Strong Towns movement, the tools to have better conversations with your friends, colleagues, and local officials about what makes for a productive place.

One key attribute that financially productive and resilient places tend to have in common is walkability. Walkable places are places that are built to the human scale: where a person on foot feels not only safe, but comfortable and inclined to linger. These are the places where life happens, and it shows when you #DoTheMath: walkable places foster more economic activity and deliver a better return on investment, square foot for square foot, than places designed around motor vehicles.

The reprise:

Best of 2018: Why Walkable Streets are More Economically Productive, by Rachel Quednau (Strong Towns)

What is the value of a street where people can walk safely? Why build streets that are constructed with the needs of people in mind, not just the needs of cars?

Many people concerned with pedestrian safety and "walkability" care about these issues because they feel that walking is good exercise or that walkable places are more attractive or that walking is better for the environment than driving.

These are all valid arguments and may convince some of those reading this article that walkability is important. But what I want to talk about today isn’t an argument based on values or aesthetics. It’s an argument based on pure dollars and cents — one that should convince people with a myriad of values and political leanings that people-oriented places must be a priority if we want our communities to be economically prosperous.

Again and again, when we look at streets oriented toward people — that is, streets where walking is safe and enjoyable, that people are drawn to visit on foot, and where fast and extensive car traffic is not the #1 priority — we find that they are more economically productive than any other style of development. This is particularly true when we compare people-oriented places to car-oriented places—think of that stretch of your town that effectively does everything possible to discourage walking and biking, including a street with multiple wide lanes to ensure fast car movement, acres of parking, and minimal (if any) sidewalks, bike lanes and crosswalks.

Walkable streets, on the other hand, encourage business activity, generate greater tax revenue per acre and offer a higher return on investment than auto-oriented streets ...

I'm feeling suicidal: "No helmets, no problem: how the Dutch created a casual biking culture."

It's genuinely hard to read articles like this. All that intelligence and common sense, and then I look outside, and ... you have the nerve to ask me why I drink.

No helmets, no problem: how the Dutch created a casual biking culture, by David Roberts (Vox)

A chat with the authors of a new book on cycling in the Netherlands.

There's so much to quote, so might as well snip to the conclusion.

David Roberts
Some US cities have had to deal with an anti-bike lobby. Does that kind of sentiment or political force even exist at all in the Netherlands any more? Is there anyone pushing back?

Chris Bruntlett
Not that I’m aware. We had conversations with politicians there and they made it perfectly clear: Even the right-wing in the Netherlands has to support more spending on cycling.

David Roberts
Because of public pressure, public opinion?

Chris Bruntlett
Exactly. It’s not a tenable or realistic position to win an election when probably 80 percent of the population cycles at least once a week.

That’s not to say they aren’t also undermining the cause by building car parking and the like.

David Roberts
So, pro-bike is settled, but anti-car maybe is not?

Chris Bruntlett
The Dutch still love their cars. They drive miles and miles, as much as neighboring countries. They’re having the same conversations as we are around the allocation of space, because they built all this space for cycling and it started to fill up. Now they’re trying to push for more space for cycling, and the exact same argument is being made, around loss of parking, loss of vehicle lanes. Here, we’re just arguing for any space.

David Roberts
So it never ends? Every bit you take away from cars is a battle, forever?

Chris Bruntlett
Exactly.

Green street design: New Albany can't have nice things because our "leaders" don't, and our "pillars" aren't.

Because for the clique to even intelligently discuss it, they'd first be compelled to imagine it. They can't, and it's not even close.

And so we settle for the best that C-minus students can offer. It isn't much.

‘A VIRTUOUS CYCLE OF GREEN’: HOW STREET DESIGN CAN BE CALMED BY NATURE, by David Goldberg (Sightline)

Making Cascadia’s streets more like gardens ensures complete streets are green streets.

A revolution is brewing in the streets of Cascadia’s major cities. Not since the mid-20th century has this region seen such a wholesale remaking of city rights of way.

Rapid growth is driving experimentation in ways to move more and more people through the same corridors, whether by foot, bicycle, transit, rideshare or private vehicle, all while accommodating a rising tsunami of deliveries. And as as ever more buildings fill urban space, those public rights of way become critically important refuges for greenery.

Until recently, traffic engineers designed streets solely to move cars. For them, street trees were to be eliminated as roadside hazards and landscaped zones were a hindrance to “vehicle throughput.” Today, though, planners increasingly see space for trees and plants as vital to safety, clean waterways, and resiliency and adaptation to climate change.

Some cities are beginning to fuse four strains of fresh thinking that have emerged over the last decade or so:

Complete Streets
Vision Zero
Green Stormwater Infrastructure
Urban Forestry

“Trees and other plants clean the air, add economic value to real estate and commercial sales and they make places where people want to be,” said John Massengale, co-author with Victor Dover of Street Design: the Secret to Great Cities and Towns (Wiley 2013). “Perhaps most importantly, they slow cars down, which is critical to achieving Vision Zero.”

“There is a virtuous cycle of green,” said Brice Maryman, senior landscape architect at MIG|SvR in Seattle. “Giving street space over to plants and trees helps slow vehicles, and once you have slower vehicles you can use even more space for natural functions.”

Also, some of the same techniques that can be used to calm traffic and create safe zones for people on foot or bicycle offer opportunities to introduce more soothing vegetation and ecological functions—ensuring that complete streets are green streets ...

"The pressure of online advertising (makes) your favorite local news site, and many others, a fresh hell that even Dante himself couldn’t have imagined."

One minute to read an article written at 3rd-grade level of comprehension, and two minutes to swat away the myriad advertising intrusions.

What could any of this possibly have to do with the demise of the American "democratic" experiment?

Why Are Newspaper Websites So Horrible? by Andrew Zaleski (CityLab)

The pop-up ads! The autoplaying videos!

Emily Goligoski ... has heard time and again from news readers about how they’re increasingly turned off by the presentation they’re offered by local newspapers’ websites.

The torments of these sites are well known: clunky navigation, slow page-loading times, browser-freezing autoplaying videos, a siege of annoying pop-up ads, and especially those grids of bottom-of-the-page “related content” ads hawking belly fat cures and fake headlines (what’s known as Internet chum).

Put another way: Why must newspaper websites suck so damn much?

In particular, why is the online presence of local papers so much vividly worse than other fare on the web—especially when these outlets are engaged in a desperate fight for readers and subscribers nationwide? Perhaps you recall the (in)famous cartoon drawn by Brad Colbow in 2011. Entitled “This is Why Your Newspaper is Dying,” it offered a cheeky but precise summation of several crimes against digital decency, from “Your content takes up less than 20% of the page” to “Linking to a random story in the middle of an article.”

If anything, the situation may have somehow gotten worse in the years since, and the quality gap between local newspaper sites and more sophisticated content purveyors has become even more stark ...

Check it out: Portland (Oregon) has an ombudsman. Holding one's breath is inadvisable.

No need to worry.

An idea like this wouldn't ever make it past the Floyd County Democratic Party central committee, and if it did, the city corporate attorney would club it to death with his wallet.

ABOUT THE OMBUDSMAN'S OFFICE

The Ombudsman is an independent advocate for a fair, reasonable and just City government. Our office responds to members of the public, businesses and City employees to resolve complaints about City services and practices. We conduct impartial investigations and resolve problems informally. We have the authority to recommend remedial action or a change in policy.

ASK THE BORED: Heavy truck traffic banned in Ybor City, fetishized in New Albany.

I had intended skip a turn for our weekly stroll down the civic boredwalk, because after all, this post three days ago would have sufficed.

But do I really look like a guy with a plan?

Invariably, when faced with a question they can't or won't answer, there is silence like snow falling on the earth.

As last night's council rubber-stamping should clearly attest, whatever plan I possess usually requires me to be a glutton for punishment, but then again so are they, so let's take a look at an expression of municipal principle so amazing that it might be happening on Jupiter, such are the chances of New Albany's ruling elite ever grasping it.

YBOR CITY BANS TRUCK TRAFFIC, EYES A BALANCED FUTURE

As heavy truck traffic is removed from the streets of Ybor City, efforts to return the area to its place as one of West Florida's most vibrant urban neighborhoods receive a major boost.

As 2016 came to an end, merchants, residents and developers in Tampa's Ybor City could look forward to a future that they themselves would define rather than a future that has been forced upon them for the greater part of 50 years by an interstate highway system.

More than 6,000 tractor trailers would cut through the neighborhood along 21st and 22nd Streets, the main exit off I-4 into Ybor City, carrying cargo to and from the Port of Tampa. A trail of destruction that crippled buildings, clogged otherwise residential roadways and thwarted redevelopment efforts followed in the wake of this heavy truck traffic.

Now, heavy truck traffic has been banned in Ybor City and redirected to a $426 million connector between Interstate 4 and Lee Roy Selmon Expressway in order to efficiently serve the port and bypass the neighborhood all together.

Removing 21st and 22nd Streets from Tampa's list of approved truck routes represented a culmination of infrastructure enhancements throughout Ybor City that are all designed to return the neighborhood into a less auto-centric, mixed-use neighborhood. On 21st and 22nd Streets alone, over $9.5 million was spent on infrastructure improvements that have included slimming down the streets from three lanes to two, widening sidewalks, adding features such as bike lanes, on-street parking and lamp posts, as well as upgrading stormwater systems and water and sewer pipes.

On the first day the official truck traffic ban went into affect, Ybor City was no longer merely an industrial area that housed the last vestiges of a legacy population too stubborn to relocate. At once, the building-shaking sounds of heavy truck traffic that once ripped right through the heart of the community went silent. Instead, the sounds of wild chickens crowing, conversations among people enjoying espressos in outdoor café spaces and children playing on playground equipment filled the air.

"Chamber Musicians Take to the Streets," and daddy wants some Shostakovich on the plaza.

Not Takin' It to the Streets, which was a Doobie Brothers hit (shall we say) prior to the birth of younger readers.

This is chamber music in the context of placemaking, and I won't rest until Shostakovich greets me as I cross the newly (miraculously?) enlivened concrete slab in front of the City County Building, in route to a city council meeting.

I know; it would require placemaking on steroids to rouse such a dead space. Hope springs eternal, and music soothes the addled here in New Gahania.

Sound Places: Chamber Musicians Take to the Streets (Project for Public Spaces)

Back in October, PPS provided you with a preview of how chamber music and placemaking are coming together in the unprecedented Sound Places program. Since then, program partners Chamber Music America (CMA), the Louisiana Division of the Arts (LDOA), and Project for Public Spaces (PPS), with grant support from the National Endowment of the Arts (NEA), have selected two of Louisiana’s Cultural Districts and two of America’s finest ensembles to collaborate in perfect harmony within the framework of this residency program.

The 2nd movement of Dmitri Shostakovich's String Quartet No. 8 in C minor (Op. 110)

Roadsworth: Innovative street art in Canada, probably forbidden by ordinance in New Gahania.

Of course, not like THIS.

"A Progressive in New Albany." (from the link)

File under: But Will Padgett Approve?

One might not think that parking lots, crosswalks, and other broad asphalt expanses would be particularly amenable to artwork, but for Montreaal-based artist and activist Roadsworth (aka Peter Gibson, previously) every white or yellow traffic paint stripe is a new opportunity. Although his work on the road is what he’s most known for—turning parking stripes into dandelions or urging drivers to get out of their cars and onto bicycles—he’s also branched out into other mediums, creating large scale installations and working on mural commissions. He recently updated his website with tons of work (both old and new) and currently has a print available. You can also follow Roadsworth on Instagram.

Had us worried there for a minute.

About a bicycle trail in Missouri, over there somewhere, outside our Same Old Box.

Adaptive reuse.

Bringing people to places they'd otherwise not go.

Connecting wider areas by means of multi-modal transport options.

More effective economic development expenditures covering wider areas.

Just reminding myself that it's possible. Living where we do, it's easy to forget the wide expanse of terrain outside the self-imposed limitations of The Box, but we must try to remember.

Missouri towns see another path to prosperity — a bicycle trail along the old Rock Island Line, by Kasia Kovacs (Kansas City Star)

... He bought and renovated the hotel and now has enough patrons that his business is up and running in the black. And he’s expecting far more visitors in anticipation of a new project from the Missouri Department of Natural Resources: the Rock Island Trail.

Lawson is one of many business owners preparing for the state department to finish conversion of the out-of-use Rock Island Railway into a hiking and biking trail. The trail would stretch about 200 miles in Missouri, from Pleasant Hill, a town half an hour southeast of Kansas City, to Beaufort in the south-central part of the state. It also might loop with the Katy Trail, creating 400 miles of the longest rail-converted trail system in the country ...

Liveable Street Design Guidelines in Hagerstown. More Padgett cranes in New Albany.

In case you're wondering, the cities of Hagerstown, Maryland and New Albany, Indiana are very similar in size. They're both just shy of 40,000 residents, and they're both components of larger metropolitan area (although Louisville is far more populous than Hagerstown/Martinsburg's 270,000).

No matter, because the point remains:  Like the Bill of Rights, the "Liveable Street Design Guidelines" come first. It's something we've offered from time to time, as here:

Mission Pedestrian and the Declaration of Pedestrian Rights.

It's why a city's own laws matter. It's why the mayor of Indianapolis is able to point to the city's human rights ordinances, and trump the governor. It's how we might set the tone for the walkable city, over and above reconverting one-way streets and fighting 1950s culture wars with heavy equipment operators and dull retrogrades ike Irv Stumler.

But it takes guts, resolve and will.

Politically, New Albany doesn't have any of those qualities, and if you've gone and planted a Gahan for Mayor sign in your yard in the expectation that they'll magically materialize, also toss some gravel in a spittoon filled with dirt.

Maybe some pricey Galaxy hops will grow like the weeds in a Main Street median.

When I'm mayor, we'll codify, enforce and implement the Speck plan. Complete and liveable streets are a fundamental component of quality of life, and we'll treat them as such. 

Hagerstown City Council to consider 'liveable' street designs, by Dave McMillion (Herald-Mail)

As people embrace alternative forms of transportation, communities across the nation have developed guidelines to ensure that bicyclists, pedestrians and others are comfortable using public streets, according to a Hagerstown official.

City Engineer Rodney A. Tissue said that the city is now looking to adopt such guidelines.

The Hagerstown City Council Tuesday night is expected to consider implementing "Liveable Street Design Guidelines."

"Liveable" or complete streets are designed to ensure safe access for all users, Tissue said.

"It's not just for vehicles as roads have been done in the past, which I guess would be an incomplete street," Tissue said in an interview Monday.

"Creative placemaking practitioners use artistic interventions to bring new perspectives (beyond just aesthetics) to communities."

Chattanooga Terrain Art Park; from the article below.

"Successful use of creative placemaking requires making the people part of the resilience equation work. To do this, cities have to treat creatives with the same gravity afforded other community development assets and colleagues."

Didn't I just have this conversation with a local artist, standing on the corner, facing Main Street, and lamenting that whenever New Albany's governmental functionaries (read: DemoDisneyDixecratic operatives) get involved with artistic expression, the inevitable results are different versions of the same "Dogs Playing Poker" motif?

That's what happens with agoraphobia. You must control every situation, lest the walls start closing in.

Putting the Arts to Work for City Resilience: Creative Placemaking, by Jason Schupbach (100 Resilient Cities)

I recently attended a major convening of community development and arts professionals where Ben Hecht from Living Cities said, and I’m paraphrasing here, "The science of how to do the technical parts of community development is well understood – how to build water infrastructure, housing units, transportation systems - but we as community development officials have forgotten about the ‘people’ part of the equation. How do we build places where people actually want to live their lives? How do we build strong social ties? The secret lies partly in the arts."

Mission Pedestrian and the Declaration of Pedestrian Rights.

The web site of Mission Pedestrian (Santa Cruz CA) includes the classic Declaration of Pedestrian Rights. For resident New Albanians, it's a model for action; the introductory "Who we are" reminds us of the importance of clear, concise mission statements. I'll quibble with one detail alone: I've come to prefer the word "walker" over "pedestrian."

Just imagine if Develop New Albany spent more time pursuing worthy goals like this, and less time touting real estate listings in outlying areas.

Although I've linked to this site many times previously, reminders never hurt. First, the mission statement.

Mission Pedestrian

Who we are

Mission Pedestrian is an organization of residents, business people, and neighbors who live and work in Santa Cruz. We support safe, comprehensive, convenient, accessible and attractive pedestrian travel ways.

We believe vibrant business districts and livable neighborhoods facilitate foot traffic between businesses and between homes and businesses. Our mission is to improve the pedestrian environment in Santa Cruz.

We encourage you to use this web site to arm yourself with useful information, voice your opinions, share ideas, and build a strong, supportive, pedestrian advocacy community here in Santa Cruz.

Next, the declaration.

---

Declaration of Pedestrian Rights

All people are pedestrians, and as pedestrians are endowed with certain inalienable rights. Among these rights are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

All too often, people must risk their lives to walk. All too often, people are not at liberty to travel outside the confinement of a motor vehicle. All too often, barren streets allow one to walk, but produce no joy or happiness from the experience.

Whereas, walking is a healthful activity, while physical inactivity is a major cause of obesity, ill health, and early death;

Whereas, walking is friendly to the environment, while many other forms of transportation are major sources of pollution;

Whereas, walking is energy efficient, while motorized transportation uses scarce energy resources;

Whereas, walking teaches children independence, while many children are dependent upon adults for transportation;

Whereas, walking allows the elderly to maintain independence, while auto-oriented sprawl forces many seniors to prematurely leave their homes;

Whereas, walking is economical, while the cost of having several automobiles is a major financial burden on many households;

Whereas, walking promotes informal interactions between people and strengthens community, while many neighborhoods lack any social contact between neighbors;

Whereas, walking is good for the mind and the soul, while too many suffer under stress driving in traffic;

Now therefore be it RESOLVED that:

People shall have a way to walk along the public right of way. Streets and roads in populated areas will include sidewalks or other suitable pathways. People shall have a way to walk across the public right of way.

Streets and roads will include safe, comfortable, and convenient crossings wherever people would reasonably want to cross. People shall have places to walk to. Housing, commercial, and retail developments will be located so as to have a variety of destinations within walking distance. People shall have a welcoming environment. Sidewalks will be a generous width, with shade trees, benches, or other appropriate amenities to make walking pleasant.

People shall have a well-maintained environment. Sidewalks will be kept free of shrubbery, snow, parked cars, and other obstructions. People shall have support from other modes. Transit systems will work as an effective extension of walking.

People shall have full consideration for their range of needs when walking. Persons with disabilities will be accommodated both to the letter and in the spirit of the Americans With Disabilities Act.

People shall be protected from vehicle threats by adequate enforcement of traffic laws. Drivers will respect crosswalk laws.

Hereby adopted by acclamation on the 18th of August, 2001, in Oakland, California.