Street Design
Making Protected Bike Lanes the Design Standard
An institutional mandate isn't enough to make a design vision a reality. Portland is working on bringing its standards and guidelines in line with its ambition for protected bike lanes.
Insurance Institute: Pedestrian Fatalities Jump 46 Percent from 2009
The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety released a study on May 8 that attributes the increased number of pedestrians killed in part to road design that allows for higher speeds, fewer intersections and pedestrian crossings and more SUVs.
Factoring Freight into Complete Streets Plans
The goods movement industry wants a seat at the table.
Embracing the Future of City Streets
Streets will have to evolve, again.
It's that Time of Year Again: Sneckdown Time
Every year, all over the country (depending on El Niño and Polar Vortexes), snow covers roads and traffic patterns and snow removal equipment reveals a safer street design.
Portland Bike Lanes and the Danger of Half-Measures
Willamette's new bike lanes make for an important link in Portland's bike infrastructure, but building unprotected bike lanes on a high-speed street carries risk.
Nominate the 'Best Urban Street Transformation' of 2017
Streetsblog USA is seeking nominations.
Federal Highway Administration Bureaucrat Says Rainbow Crosswalks Are a Liability
An administrator for the Kentucky division of the Federal Highway Administration informed the city of Lexington that its rainbow crosswalk does not meet federal safety standards.
San Francisco Has a New 'Vision Zero' Fire Truck
The size of fire trucks frustrates advocates on many sides of the public safety debate. The San Francisco Fire Department sought a solution.
What's a Stroad and Why Do Stroads Matter?
An explainer post on that much-lamented feature of contemporary communities—the stroad.
Icelandic Town Hopes to Slow Traffic with 3-D Illusion
The small town of Isafjordur, Iceland is hoping an optical illusion painted onto a street will work to slow down drivers.
Florida DOT Adopts 'Context-Based' Street Design
The "right street in the right place" hasn't always been a concept that departments of transportation were ready to acknowledge, much less adopt. The Florida Department of Transportation, however, is working to take context into consideration.
Traffic Garden Teaches Kids Street Design
Educators in Washington, D.C. are expanding on the "Safety Town" concept to teach grade schoolers how to be safe in traffic as well as about street design and the merits of different kinds of streets.
Friday Funny: Sarcastic Responses to Honolulu's 'Distracted Walking' Ban
The Onion's always-sardonic "American Voices" feature allows some totally fake people to respond to Honolulu's recent decision to make it illegal to text while crossing the street on foot.
Autonomous Vehicles and Streets: A Guide to Potential Impacts
As the arrival of autonomous vehicles (AVs) becomes more of a reality, cities need to start considering how this new technology will affect streets and street networks. This brief guide provides an overview and resources on this topic.
Hot Off the Presses: Austin's Draft Street Design Guide
Austin has mostly been planning, designing, and engineering its streets the same way for 20 years. A new Street Design Guide would pave the way for a new era.
Saving Lives: Including Sidewalk Bollards in Street Design
Countless lives were likely saved by a strategically placed bollard on W. 45th Ave. which stopped a motorist who had driven three blocks on city sidewalks, mowing-down as many pedestrians as possible, from entering the Times Square pedestrian plaza.
Florida Home to 8 of the 10 Deadliest Cities for Pedestrians
Smart Growth America has released its annual Dangerous by Design report, showing that many older, car-oriented cities are the country's most dangerous.
Recent Pedestrian Deaths Move Portland Residents to Protest
Portland's Division Street has been the site of a number of high-profile pedestrian deaths.
Untouched Snow Reveals Street Usage
Those who promote safe streets often complain of streets that are too wide, wasting space and promoting reckless speeds. In chilly Calgary, undisturbed snow shows just how much street area is completely unused.
Urban Design for Planners 1: Software Tools
This six-course series explores essential urban design concepts using open source software and equips planners with the tools they need to participate fully in the urban design process.
Planning for Universal Design
Learn the tools for implementing Universal Design in planning regulations.
City of Albany
UCLA Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies
Mpact (formerly Rail~Volution)
Chaddick Institute at DePaul University
City of Piedmont, CA
Great Falls Development Authority, Inc.
HUDs Office of Policy Development and Research
