Ever heard of Atlanta’s Vine City? No? That could be because it was largely obliterated by urban renewal two generations ago. These side-by-side images shared today by Darin at ATL Urbanist show the street grid in Vine City, near downtown Atlanta, in 1911 and today. And Darin says the city is poised to expand this hole in […]

Portland leaders are moving ahead with plans for a monthly fee, charged to city households and businesses, to shore up local transportation budgets. Portland Mayor Charlie Hales and Transportation Commissioner Steve Novick announced yesterday that they will ask the City Council to institute the program, rather than seek voter approval. Jonathan Maus at Bike Portland […]

It’s not often that the Portland region sees snow. But yesterday, like a handful of other odd places, including Texas, America’s bike capital got walloped (by northwest standards anyway). As it happens, a little snow can’t change Portland, reports Jonathan Maus at Bike Portland, who captured a series of photos showing cyclists who weren’t easily […]

At The Transport Politic, Yonah Freemark has made it a tradition to catalog new transit projects every year. He reports that 2014 will see a significant expansion of rail and bus rapid transit lines. “Virtually every metropolitan region in the United States and Canada is investing millions of dollars in new transit expansion projects,” he writes: […]

There’s a fixed mindset in many corners of the country, perhaps especially in the Midwest, which holds that highway building is an unquestioned economic good. Aaron Renn at the Urbanophile captures it perfectly in this quote borrowed from a friend: “Highways and bridges and casinos are their answer to every problem: Tax base eroding? Build a […]

The project to replace and expand the I-5 bridge between Oregon and Washington, a.k.a. the “Columbia River Crossing,” has been watched by transportation experts around the country as a case study in the dynamics of a highway boondoggle. Earlier this year, when state lawmakers in Washington State refused to fund their portion of the project, […]

While some legislators in the United States want to keep cyclists off the roads, a city in Bolivia is taking the opposite tack. Cochabamba, population 700,000, is actually considering a law requiring that residents make use of bicycles to help preserve the environment and improve public health, according to reports. Richard Masoner at Cyclelicious dug up this […]

Aaron Renn at the Urbanophile has been looking at the devastation wrought on different cities by highways. And he’s uncovered a pretty dramatic example in these pre- and post-highway photos of Cincinnati’s West End. Here’s a view of the neighborhood in the 1950s, the “before” photo: And here’s a satellite view of how it looks […]

There’s been some talk recently in Seattle about reorganizing the city’s transit system to improve efficiency. But almost immediately, strong objections emerged to eliminating lesser-used routes that some people depend on. Frank Chiachiere at Seattle Transit Blog argues that maximizing the social benefits of limited transit resources is more complicated than preventing harm to existing transit […]

The primary theme of U.S. transportation policy since the mid-20th century hasn’t been accessibility, public health, equality, or even efficiency. Primarily we’ve spent billions of dollars trying fruitlessly to eliminate congestion by building more roads. It has become clear that there are all kinds of problems with having motorist throughput as the highest priority of your […]

Bogotá, Colombia, has a deserved reputation as one of the best biking cities in Latin America. Former mayor Enrique Peñalosa helped endow the city with a system of all-ages bikeways. But like many global cities, Bogotá still struggles with congestion and car dependence, and cycling rates during the week are much lower than the weekends, […]

Later today President Obama is expected to nominate Charlotte Mayor Anthony Foxx to replace Ray LaHood as transportation secretary. The last time we reported about Foxx, the North Carolina Legislature was trying to thwart his plans to pursue a streetcar and light rail expansion at the same time. Speaking to the Washington Post, an anonymous White […]