Where the sidewalk ends

extract courtesy seedmagazine.com

At an intersection in Portland’s Chinatown, the asphalt street suddenly gives way to an urban oasis. A pair of massive, granite planters with palm trees flank the entrance to the street, which opens onto a one-block space paved with concrete squares. There are no white lane dividers or sidewalks. Instead, rough-hewn granite columns distinguish places for pedestrians and places for cars.
“The idea of this street is that it’s designed like a public square but it’s open to traffic,” said Ellen Vanderslice, a project manager for the Portland Department of Transportation. “We were very consciously trying to create a body language of the street that tells people something different is going on here.”

...The approach appears to be working, she said. “Pedestrians tend to just mosey across the street every which way,” Vanderslice said. “And drivers slow down and pay attention.”
Portland’s so-called “festival street,” which opened two months ago, is one of a small but growing number of projects in the United States that seek to reclaim streets used by cars as public places for people, too. The strategy is to blur the boundary between pedestrians and automobiles by removing sidewalks and traffic devices, and to create a seamless multi-purpose urban space...
[ lots more ]

'Sharrows' aim to help cars and bikes share roads

...Caught between the need for a continuous bike lane and the demands of drivers, Portland transportation engineers finally came up with a solution. Next month, the city will fill the gaps in the network with new shared-lane pavement markings, called "sharrows." Stencils of a bicycle with two chevron markings above it will be painted, two per block, in areas too narrow for a bike lane. The idea is to keep cyclists away from parked cars while promoting awareness of their right to use the road.
"The sharrow sends the message to cyclists, 'yes, you are welcome here,' "...
...Pioneered in Denver in the mid-1990s, sharrows are attracting the attention of transportation officials around the United States. But the markings are controversial. In June, Boulder, Colo., became one of the few cities outside of California to install the shared-lane markings... [more]

See also story about introduction of SHARROWS in Cincinnati

Bloomberg Puts Forward a Bold, Transformative New Vision for Broadway

by Aaron Naparstek on February 26, 2009 StreetsBlog.org
New York City Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan unveiled plans to pedestrianize a large swath of Broadway in Midtown Manhattan ...
...Extending from 59th Street at Columbus Circle to 23rd Street at Madison Square with substantial pedestrian-only areas at Times and Herald Squares, Mayor Bloomberg's plan for Broadway is, arguably, the boldest and most transformative street reclamation project since Portland, Oregon decided to tear down Harbor Drive in 1974...
Construction on the street redesign -- which is being presented as a pilot project and being built with temporary materials -- will start in May and continue through August...
...Sadik-Khan said she expected the bike lane would mainly be used by tourists and pedicabs. The bicycle rental company Bike & Roll is considering setting up a rental facility somewhere along the route. [more]

Intersection Repair

by Clarence Eckerson, Jr. on May 31, 2007
Ever dreamed of making the streets outside your abode more livable, pedestrian-friendly, and community-oriented?
City Repair in Portland, Oregon hosts an annual Village Building Convergence where hundreds of people come together to build diverse projects for the benefit of their communites and to take back their streets via a process known as the Intersection Repair.This involves painting streets with a high-visiblity mural that creates a public square for residents to gather and one which gently encourages drivers to slow down when approaching these spaces. Over time the neighbors further enhance the transformation by adding amenities like benches, community bulletin boards, and introducing gardens & art. As you'll see, the possibilites are endless.StreetFilms visited three of the Intersection Repairs and spoke with Mark Lakeman co-founder of City Repair, Greg Raisman, the Portland DOT Liason, and scores of residents & volunteers about why they were doing it.
[watch the video]