Recent Streetsblog USA posts about Quality of Life

What’s Really Dangerous for Kids? Hint: It Has Four Wheels and a Tailpipe.

By Sarah Goodyear | May 5, 2009 | 9 Comments

Photo by pawpaw67 via Flickr. When she wrote a column for the New York Sun last year about letting her nine-year-old ride the subway on his own, Lenore Skenazy was pilloried by many as an irresponsible mom. She stuck to her guns, though, and started a blog dedicated to "sane parenting", advocating the idea that […]

Having a Kid Doesn’t Mean Having a Car

By Sarah Goodyear | Nov 6, 2008 | 12 Comments

Bus Chick’s "Chicklet" is happy to take public transit. One of our favorite recent discoveries on the national transpo blogging scene is Carla Saulter, a third-generation Seattleite who documents her transit-going life in a blog called Bus Chick for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. A lot of people who do without cars before they become parents think […]

The Case for Active Transportation, by the Numbers

By Sarah Goodyear | Oct 24, 2008 | 3 Comments

Thanks to commenter Stephen for prodding us to post on the new report from the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy, "Active Transportation for America" (download the PDF here). What makes the report notable are the numbers it contains. It’s jam-packed with quantifiable benefits that would result from increased investment in infrastructure that encourages and supports pedestrians and cyclists. […]

Study Provides a New Vision for Allen and Pike Street Malls

By Sarah Goodyear | Sep 19, 2008 | 5 Comments

Local residents turned out to give their opinions on the renovation of the malls early last summer. Residents of the Lower East Side and Chinatown have been fighting for improvements to the Allen and Pike Street pedestrian malls for more than a decade. Now, with the city’s Parks Department set to begin a $5.4 million […]

Measuring the Value of Livable Streets

By Ben Fried | Jul 31, 2008 | 2 Comments

Ever wonder how much New York stands to gain by making its streets more livable? Transportation Alternatives has been gathering evidence measuring the economic and social benefits that accrue when cities put pedestrians first. Their report is coming out next week, but the Observer published a sneak preview (headline: "The Woonerf Deficit") this Tuesday: The […]

Contented Streets: Why Copenhagen Is the World’s Happiest Capital

By Brad Aaron | Jul 2, 2008 | 12 Comments

Why have Danes again been named the happiest people on the planet? Early this year ABC News cited bikes as "perhaps … the best symbol of Danish happiness," and in this clip from "Contested Streets" it isn’t hard to see why. Here, livable streets guru Jan Gehl and others explain the many ways an increase […]

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