Citywide Petition for Safe, Livable Streets

Original post, 5/24/08: Numerous studies have shown that safe, livable, walkable streets that encourage a sense of community are absolutely essential for cities that wish to promote public health, economic development, alternative forms of transport, the environment and social equity.

A citywide "petition for safe streets" -- which, among many other specific measures, calls for strict 15-20MPH speed limits in areas with dense concentrations of pedestrians like some of those surrounding Route 34 -- is being sponsored by a number of community groups, organizations and elected officials in New Haven. The petition may be viewed here. The document will be used to lobby for major change at the local and state level. Please feel free to circulate.

Update 5/27/08: A new umbrella website for the safe streets coalition has now been launched.

Update 5/29/08: An informational post from the Downtown-Wooster Square Community Management Team listserv:

The coalition for safe streets has many goals, which might be summarized as three distinct components:

1) Immediately reducing the number of deaths and injuries on our streets by 50% by 2009 and 90% by 2015. Virtually all of these are preventable. The number of New Haven residents currently being injured on our streets is ethically unacceptable, particularly when one considers that fewer than 30% of injuries are even ever reported to the hospital, and fewer than 1% to the news media -- even though almost all of us have had friends or relatives killed or permanently disabled in traffic incidents. By supporting the petition, New Haven is signaling that it absolutely and unequivocally can not and does not accept the current situation on our streets.

2) Raising education and awareness about the issue of traffic safety among the entire community, so that citizens can take preventative measures to ensure their own safety, mobilize around the issue and work for long-term changes that will benefit their neighborhoods, their health and their overall well-being. That includes protecting their property values -- would you want to move to a place where oil trucks were speeding down the road in front of your kid's school at 50MPH? It is happening here already -- see the New Haven Register article posted at http://www.newhavensafestreets.org. Long-term changes will require engineering, education, enforcement, planning/ public evaluation and legislative change. Those of you who follow progress in Hartford realize that our legislators are already listening and making some positive changes. As Doug points out, there are many pieces of the puzzle, which no single petition or master plan could ever fully address. As such, one of the specific requests of the petition is a quarterly public report on enforcement actions and traffic incidents by neighborhood, and an annual public evaluation of the city's progress on traffic safety, so that each community can better understand what is happening around them, and respond in ways that solve the problem. We are not minimizing the great work that communities and the police have done already, but it is clear from talking with such groups across the city that much more is needed.

3) Building political capital for change at the local, regional and state levels. Even though the economic development, transport efficiency, public health, social and environmental benefits of livable, safe streets have been widely and very precisely understood for decades, many cities are only just beginning to take vigorous action to implement them. If New Haven and other dense urban centers in Connecticut do not catch up with what these other cities, states and countries are currently doing, we will be forever fighting an uphill battle to compete with them (many would say that in some ways, we are already competing with our neighboring towns - on Sunday, I traveled through over 20 towns in Connecticut, all of which had pedestrian crosswalk markers except New Haven). Those concerned with the long-term economic health of our beautiful city, or even just the short-term health of their own bank accounts, literally can not afford to continue to accept the status quo on this issue.

Update 6/19/08: NHI reports (photo above) on canvassers taking to the New Haven Green and Medical Center area, educating residents about traffic safety concerns and collecting hundreds of signatures. A majority of the New Haven Board of Aldermen and neighborhood police district community management teams (CMTs), including the Downtown-Wooster Square CMT, have now signed on and support the petition. Check the coalition website for further updates.

Update 6/20/08: Another New Haven Register article on the citywide momentum for traffic calming and traffic safety:

"There is an incredible momentum on this issue. I hope everyone gets on the bandwagon and does something positive,” said Mary Faulkner, chairwoman of the Westville management group. She said traffic calming measures not only increase pedestrian safety, they enhance economic development and actually move traffic more efficiently. “We have to have more say in how our streets are designed,” Faulkner said.

Update 7/30/08: East Rock becomes the 10th of 12th New Haven Community Management Teams to vote in support of the petition. The city's two remaining neighborhoods, Dwight and Dixwell (DECMT), are expected to discuss and/or vote on the petition when they reconvene after summer break (the item has already been presented to the DECMT). In related events, one of the petition supporters, the Coalition for a Livable Whalley, along with Senator Toni Harp and Representative Pat Dillon, has recently brought up concerns about the DOT's plan to widen Whalley Avenue. DNH hears that the road is currently being designed with a "design speed" of about 40mph -- appropriate for a suburban highway, perhaps, but definitely not for a road that cuts through a vibrant and densely-populated urban neighborhood.

Redesign of Bustling Yale Intersection Raises Traffic Safety Questions

Are the City of New Haven and Yale University doing enough to encourage pedestrian safety at one of Downtown New Haven's busiest pedestrian intersections (and one that will soon have an additional 800-900 or so students living right next to it)?

See reporting by the New Haven Independent, and article comments, on this page.

Update 7/30/08: An open public letter to the President of Yale University seeks, in part, to address this issue.

Environmental Protection Agency Response to $5 Gasoline: Stop Those Commuter Rail Projects!

A critical op-ed piece on the EPA's priorities, in today's Hartford Courant.

"Gov. Jodi Rell and legislative leaders have forged a bipartisan plan to re-introduce commuter rail service on the existing train route between New Haven, Hartford and Springfield, extending up to Brattleboro if our friends in Vermont join in, as they say they will.... But the EPA is having none of this "rail" thing. It has ordered a full-blown environmental impact statement to determine whether it is safe to replace some track and run trains in exactly the same place trains have run for the past 150 years."

Farmington Canal Greenway Gets Rolling

According to this report in the New Haven Register, the City of New Haven has bid out Phase 3 of the Farmington Canal Greenway, which will connect from the trail's current end on Shelton Avenue up to the Hamden border. Simultaneously, Hamden has now begun construction on its last remaining section, which runs from Hamden High School to the New Haven border. This means that the linear park should be largely completed by mid-2009, providing a continuous off-road walking and bicycling trail from Downtown New Haven running about a dozen miles into Cheshire and then (with a few remaining gaps) a total of 84-miles to Northampton, Massachusetts. Now, if only the thing would show up on Google Maps.

Phase 4 of the trail, which is currently in design, will run from the current trailhead on Hillhouse avenue to Canal Dock Road on the New Haven Harbor. Yale University has done incredible work paving, lighting and maintaining the first half of the section of trail running through its campus, from Prospect to Hillhouse Avenue (also soon to be the home of two fantastic pedestrian bridges), and has provided close to a million dollars to complete the portion of Phase 4 which runs through another block or so of its campus.

Thanks to the design and site planning of Diana Balmori and Cesar Pelli, the multi-use trail helps provide a stunning setting for Yale's new Malone Engineering Center (see photo). Hopefully Mack Scogin and Merrill Elam's new Yale University Health Services building, which is under construction just a block up the street, will have a similar relationship to the adjacent path.

Trail greenways like the Farmington Canal have a massive impact on the local environment and economy. According to the National Association of Realtor's 2002 Consumer's Survey on Smart Choices for Home Buyers, trails ranked as the second most important community amenity out of a list of 18 choices. Studies have shown that trail proximity adds about 10% to the value of homes and that homes adjacent to greenways sell much more quickly. In an era when only 10% of children walk to school, these trails are also critical resources to promote recreation and public health. More Greenways are planned to connect with Downtown New Haven over the coming years: the Harborside Greenway running from Lighthouse Point (and points beyond) around New Haven Harbor to West Haven will connect with the Fair Haven and West River waterfront trails. All four of New Haven's rivers (counting Morris Creek) will then be connected to one another by a system of "green" biking and walking routes, essentially enabling any resident to get anywhere in the city without needing to travel on busy urban streets.

Unfortunately, despite their obvious benefits and relatively low cost, these trails have been taking more than two decades to complete. Part of the reason is the fact that over 60% of our state's transportation funding is spent on highways, whereas less than 1% goes to bicycle and pedestrian projects. Call all of your elected officials today and ask them to keep these projects moving along!

Cycling Activity vs. National Gas Prices

Looks like the number of posts per day on the ElmCityCycling listserv, a forum for making New Haven more accommodating to bicyclists and pedestrians, is highly correlated with the national price of unleaded gasoline (click on chart to enlarge). Who would have thought?

With gasoline predicted to hit $6-10 per gallon as soon as a few months from now, the number of nonmotorized trips to work in New Haven is only likely to continue to increase. As a relatively flat and compact city, Downtown New Haven is already perfect for bicycling and walking, as evidenced by the fact that the city has one of the highest percentages of bicycle commuters in the United States (1.8%, versus 1.2% in Boston, 0.9% in Providence, 0.6% in New York City, 0.4% in Hartford, 0.1% in Bridgeport and 0.0% in Waterbury, according to the Census Bureau's 2006 ACS). During rush hour, there are already occasional bicycle "traffic jams" on the popular Orange Street bicycle lane. New Haven was also recently named one of the 20 most walkable cities in the United States.

However, improvements to the city's bicycle-friendliness are needed before the average area resident will choose to ride to work, or even use his or her bicycle for short trips (e.g., a 4-block run to the corner store). Considering that bicycles are already widely-owned (and very inexpensive), the most frequently given reasons why Connecticut residents don't bicycle more often - infrastructure and safety - are fairly easy to solve. According to numerous studies, infrastructure such as bicycle parking, bike-friendly street design, multi-use greenways like the Farmington Canal Trail and accessibility at train stations raise land values by an amount much greater than the investment put into them (in part because they tend to calm traffic). Reckless and high-speed driving and driver education can be addressed through community-wide "safe streets" efforts and traffic enforcement, and through measures such as anti-dooring ordinances like those found in Chicago.

With the average American family devoting 20% or more of their annual spending towards automobile expenses - more than on health care, education, or food, farmers switching from tractors to pack mules, gasoline prices continuing to skyrocket, and of course, global warming (if everyone who lives within 5 miles of their workplace were to cycle to work just one day a week, nearly 5 million tons of global warming pollution would be saved every year, the equivalent of taking about a million cars off the road, not to mention that the energy required to manufacture a new car is 100+ times that of a new bicycle), American cities will likely need to start taking a Copenhagen-like approach as soon as possible. New York City is already heading that direction, with the hiring of Jan Gehl, Copenhagen's world-renowned planner and urbanist. By conservative estimates, the number of bicycle trips in New York has already increased by 50-75% in the past 10 years, even without major infrastructure improvements. Transit ridership is increasing rapidly as well, on systems all across the United States including those that serve Downtown New Haven.

In Connecticut, promoting bicycling and walking will most likely require a shift in funding priorities. According to the Tri-State Transportation Campaign, more than 60% of 2007-2010 highway funding is currently used to expand and build new highways (even as existing ones crumble), whereas less than 1% of the overall transportation budget is spent on bicycle and pedestrian projects (see PDF report here). If Connecticut's 169 cities and town centers are to compete in the 21st century, that equation needs to flip.

Update 5/23/08: According to this graph, bicycle sales are up too. NY Times factoid of the day: "Every one-cent increase in gasoline prices means Americans pay $1.42 billion more a year for gas, according to Stephen P. Brown, an economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. Nearly two-thirds of that goes to foreign producers." It is any surprise that we are $10,000,000,000,000 in debt?

Update 6/15/08: Chart updated - both gas prices and ECC listserv posts have risen more quickly than anticipated. Also, a couple of local news items today: according to a story in today's Hartford Courant, higher gas prices are now reshaping hiring practices. Not only have studies shown that commuters who walk or bike to work at least once per week more productive (because they are healthier), they are apparently becoming attractive to companies in other ways as well. Also today, an article in the New Haven Register talks about various options that commuters are turning to in order to reduce their gasoline use:

Probably the most ambitious rider at Friday’s event was Alienne Morrione of Bridgeport who bicycles 30 minutes from her home to the Metro-North train there. After the 25-minute trip to New Haven, she cycles to the Yale Medical School, where she works in the brain tumor center. Morrione, 31, a dedicated rider, has sometimes been blocked from peak-travel times on Metro-North, so she cycles almost two hours between the cities... “As a single mom, it’s the greatest way to save money,” Morrione said as she pedaled away to work.

And in the article, an interesting statistic on commuting mode share to Downtown New Haven's largest employer:

"Holly Parker, director of Sustainable Transportation Systems at Yale, said in a survey taken last November, she found that 44 percent of faculty, staff and graduate students, over 10,000 workers, drive alone to reach the Yale campus.... But this means that more than half already, even without the added incentive of rising gas costs, were walking (23 percent), taking public transportation (19 percent), sharing a ride (6 percent), bicycling (5 percent) or telecommuting (3 percent.) She is eager to compare figures from the second survey set for the fall."

Stem Cells for Dummies

The Yale Stem Cell Center Presents "Stem Cells: Everything You Wanted to Know But Were Afraid to Ask," a program given by Haifan Lin, Ph.D., Director of the Yale Stem Cell Center and Professor of Cell Biology and Genetics at Yale, and Robert Mandelkern, Connecticut State Coordinator, Parkinson's Action Network. The event takes place on Wednesday, June 18, 2008, at 12:00 p.m. at the Anlyan Center Auditorium, 300 Cedar Street, Downtown New Haven. Please bring anyone you know who would like to learn more about stem cell research in non-scientific terms. This is a brown bag lunch, but cookies and drinks will be served.

Lieberman: Trains are for those who can't afford cars

Aware that Congress has taken up consideration of Amtrak funding (H.R. 6003, the Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act), a DNH reader wrote to Senator Lieberman urging better funding of Amtrak and more service to New Haven, suggesting an earlier train to Penn Station in order to allow for connections to early-morning departures to cities such as Pittsburgh, Raleigh, Toronto and Montreal. The letter did not once mention high gas prices.

Senator Lieberman's long reply to his constituent began as follows:

"Thank you for contacting me regarding high oil and gasoline prices. I fully share your concerns; and I am working to alleviate the pain at the pump on several fronts through a number of legislative measures that are intended to ease gas prices, increase oversight of energy markets, prevent price gouging, increase fuel efficiency and vehicle fuel economy standards, reduce America's dependence on foreign sources of oil, and increase tax benefits for renewable energy and conservation."

The reply went on for more than fifteen paragraphs, excoriating oil executives, discussing alternative fuels and battery-powered cars yet not once mentioning Amtrak. A simple slip-up by a busy staffer? Perhaps. But the implication is still distressing: our leaders think the only reason we would support intercity rail is that we just can't afford to drive any more. Never mind climate change, the 42,000 killed yearly in "accidents," the erosion of community into the endless sprawl that reliance on the automobile leads to. To Senator Lieberman, travel by rail is apparently a second-rate option, one for people who can't afford proper transportation. And he's from Connecticut. (Thank you to the anonymous reader for contributing this post).

New Website: New Haven Safe Streets

"New Haven Safe Streets is a coalition of various organizations and individuals advocating for streets that are safer and therefore more livable, walkable, economically viable and environmentally sound."

Update 5/28/08: An article about the safety coalition, with quotes from sponsors including Senator Toni Harp and Alderwoman Erin Sturgis-Pascale, appears in today's New Haven Register. Also, a TV news item appeared on WSFB news today. Tri-State Transportation Campaign's blog also features a post on the petition.

Harvard School of Public Health: High traffic reduces child IQ levels

Original post 3/24/08: This interesting news article was widely circulated throughout New York City today.

"If we don't do something to reduce automobile congestion, our children's brain development could be put at risk. "

Update 5/24/08: Speaking of traffic, a recent high-profile public health study adds to the growing evidence that particulate air pollution is several times more deadly than previously thought -- causing up to 24,000 deaths per year in California alone, a staggering figure. Expect public health officials and concerned area residents to issue renewed calls for pollution controls and/or higher fees on cars, buses and trucks to try to offset this.

Update 5/29/08: Yet another study shows elevated health risks associated with high levels of particulate pollution. The lead author, Dr. Andrea Baccarelli, writes “it’s a risk to live where pollution is high... but air pollution is not the only risk for D.V.T. Rather, this emphasizes the need for having a healthy lifestyle. That’s important wherever you live, but even more important if you live where pollution is high.” A DNH reader points out that creating safer streets, so that residents can walk and bicycle more often, is essential to promoting that.

Green Drinks, Simple Pleasures, Pipas and Model City Blues

A trio of Downtown New Haven events this week (among many others):

1. New Haven’s monthly eco-friendly happy hour, New Haven Green Drinks, will be Wednesday, May 21, 6-8:00pm at Café Nine, at 250 State Street. This month Daniel Schaefer, the founder of the New Haven-based nonprofit Invested Citizens will be speaking on ways to make climate change and clean energy relevant to a wider audience. Remember to walk, bike, bus or carpool to the event.

2. New Haven band The Simple Pleasures - the featured musicians in the groundbreaking Yale School of Drama production of Baal last year - will play this Wednesday night at BAR. They are coming straight from their recent shows at Luna Lounge, Fortune Cookie and The Midway. On Friday night (5/23), check out Min Xiao-Fen's Asian Trio at Firehouse 12: Min Xiao-Fen is among the most renowned pipa masters in the world and has collaborated with Derek Bailey, Björk, Jane Ira Bloom, Tan Dun, Philip Glass, Susie Ibarra, the New York City Opera, Ned Rothenberg, Randy Weston and John Zorn among many others.

3. Mandi Isaacs Jackson, author of Model City Blues: Urban Space and Organized Resistance in New Haven, a new book about 1960s urban renewal and political struggle, will hold a discussion this Thursday, May 22nd at 5:30PM at Labyrinth Books New Haven.

Also, if you are an architecture writer, stay on the lookout for another one of Robert A.M. Stern's hard-hat tours of the renovated landmark Rudolph Building. The New Haven Register reports on Gwathmey Siegel's $130+ million Rudolph Building renovation here.

Downtown Traffic Safety Event and Ride of Silence

All are invited to "Traffic Safety in Our Community," an event being held by the community this Thursday in memory of Mila Rainof.

• Thursday, May 22nd
• 4 to 5:30 pm
• Fitkin Amphitheater, 330 Cedar Street, New Haven, CT
• Speakers include Dr. Kimberly Davis, MD, FACS, Chief of Trauma, Surgical Critical Care and Surgical Emergencies, Yale University School of Medicine and Michael Piscitelli, AICP, Director, New Haven Dept. of Transportation, Traffic and Parking.

For background information, see this post or join the Yale Traffic Safety Group email list here.

Update 5/20/08: On Wednesday, May 21st, at 7PM there will be a nationwide "Ride of Silence" to commemorate those injured or killed in traffic accidents over the past year. New Haven's silent bicycle ride leaves from the flagpole on the New Haven Green, and will be slow-paced and appropriate for all skill levels and age groups.

Update 5/23/08: New Haven Independent post-event coverage, and valuable information on what to do next, posted here. New Haven Register coverage here.

Update 5/29/08: The Yale Traffic Safety Group is one of the sponsors of the new citywide petition for safe streets.

Updated: Pedestrian fatality highlights safety issues on Route 34 near Yale-New Haven Hospital

Mila Rainof, 27, was killed over the weekend of April 19-20 in a traffic incident near Yale-New Haven Hospital. Discussion continues today on the ElmCityCycling listserv and the Yale Daily News article comments about how to make the Route 34 & Frontage Road area a safer place for pedestrians.

Erica writes: "Mila was one of the warmest people I've ever met, and she was about to graduate and go into emergency medicine. ... Why do we continue to let this happen and call motor vehicle accidents "accidents"? Why don't people know and talk about all these "accidents"?

One anonymous commentor writes: "If it is found that the driver of the sports car was traveling even 1MPH above the posted speed limit, he or she should be tried for murder and sent to prison for 20 years. We need to rigorously enforce the speed limit, and one way to do that is to try speeders as felons if they kill or injure anyone while speeding."

Tom writes: "This is unacceptable. Despite the mounting number of fatalities, the NHPD continues to ignore traffic violations throughout the city. How many people have to be killed before the police decide that this is a problem? In collisions involving pedestrians, once vehicle speeds exceed 20 mph, the odds of a fatality increase exponentially. The speed limit in downtown needs to be reduced to 20 mph and the police need to enforce the traffic laws."

Anonymous writes: "Sweden has adopted a plan called Vision Zero which is taking steps to ensure that zero, imagine that - zero! - people will die in motor vehicle fatalities in 2020. ... why can't we adopt a Vision Zero for Connecticut? Traffic accidents are not a force of nature - even when no particular actor is "at fault", as here, there are ways of preventing the accidents: safer crosswalks, better traffic enforcement, speed bumps etc. etc. Take a look: the Connecticut General Assembly has taken a look at Sweden's Vision Zero and came up with this report... Let's get our state behind this. http://www.cga.ct.gov/2007/rpt/2007-R-0635.htm "

Because Route 34 is a major road, cars frequently exceed the posted speed limits. Another comment on ElmCityCycling notes that a 2006 petition with 646 signatures calling for pedestrian safety in this area has largely been ignored so far, a fact that the YDN highlights in an article today about the intersection. Could the situation be improved through traffic calming?

Coverage and discussion also continues in the New Haven Independent, Student Doctor Network forum, Hartford Courant, and elsewhere.

Update 4/30/08: An op-ed piece written by three members of ElmCityCycling about traffic safety and the Swedish "Vision Zero" program, "Why Tolerate 42,000 Traffic Deaths A Year?", appears in today's Hartford Courant. On a related note, about 30 members of the community met on Monday at the Yale Medical School, and are beginning to mobilize a response to the situation. Coverage of that meeting appears here and the first set of meeting minutes was posted on the ElmCityCycling listserv.

Update 5/19/08: A community traffic safety event will be held on May 22. Details here.

Update 6/3/08: The Yale Medical Traffic Safety Group is a member of the New Haven Safe Streets coalition.

Prevention Magazine: New Haven ranks high for walkability

New Haven ranks #19 out of 500 cities nationwide -- above Portland, Burlington and Seattle -- for its walkability. The score was based on urban planning reviews, crime rates, % of residents who walk to work, availability of neighborhood parks, and other factors. Providence comes in at #105 and Hartford at #107.
http://www.newhavenindependent.org/archives/upload/2008/03/walk%20ability.pdf