Angie Schmitt
Recent Posts
67 Congress Members Tell Feds: Measure the Movement of People, Not Cars
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If U.S. DOT doesn’t change its proposed congestion metric, 50 people riding in a bus will count as much as one person in an SUV. Image: Transportation for America
The federal government hands states about $40 billion a year for transportation, money they can basically spend however they want. The result in many places is a lot of expensive, traffic-inducing highways [...]
Report: Access to Car-Share and Bike-Share Is Worse in Communities of Color
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In many major American cities, communities of color have worse access to car-share and bike-share than majority white neighborhoods. Chart: Shared Use Mobility Center
Car-share and bike-share services are making it easier to go without owning a car in American cities, but access to “shared-use” systems remains limited in communities of color compared to majority-white neighborhoods, according to a new analysis [...]
Naomi Doerner on How Street Safety Advocates Can Support Racial Justice
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When a police officer in Falcon Heights, Minnesota, shot and killed Philando Castile earlier this month, the encounter began with a traffic stop. The stop fit a pattern: Castile had been pulled over many times before — 46 times in 13 years — but few of those citations were for dangerous driving. More prevalent were stops for minor issues like [...]
Report: As Cities Add Bike Lanes, More People Bike and Biking Gets Safer
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Cities adding bike infrastructure are seeing a “safety in numbers” — more people on bikes plus lower risk of severe or fatal injury. Graphs: NACTO
The more people bike on the streets, the safer the streets are for everyone who bikes. This phenomenon, originally identified by researcher Peter Jacobsen, is known as “safety in numbers.” And that’s [...]
Vox Pulls Back the Curtain on “Scam” to Save Lives With Red Light Cameras
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You can usually count on Vox for accurate, research-based explainers of public policy issues. That’s why the new Vox video on red light cameras is so monumentally disappointing.
Researchers have established that red light cameras make streets safer by reducing potentially fatal T-bone collisions, though they do lead to more rear-end crashes, which tend not be very serious. But motorists [...]
A 50-Year-Old Cartoon Satirizing Car Culture Still Rings True Today
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If aliens came to Earth, who would they assume is in control — people or cars? Cars, of course. That’s the premise of this 50-year-old animation dug up by Alex Ihnen at NextSTL.
It’s worth noting, says Ihnen, that the piece was made by Canadians:
It tells the story of aliens viewing earth and concluding that the automobile is the dominant [...]
The Right to Peaceful Assembly vs. the “Right” to Convenient Motoring
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Demonstrations against police brutality spilled onto streets and highways in American cities this weekend, with protesters stopping traffic in Baton Rouge, Memphis, St. Paul, Los Angeles, and Oakland.
NPR reports 102 people were arrested in St. Paul and another 120 in Baton Rouge, including prominent Black Lives Matter organizer DeRay Mckesson, who was arrested while walking along Airline [...]
CDC: America Falling Behind Other Nations on Traffic Safety
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America is falling behind peer nations on traffic safety — any way you measure it. Source: CDC
How is the U.S. doing on traffic safety?
To hear a lot of people tell it, we’re making great strides. President Obama recently referred to the reduction in American traffic deaths as a success story of sorts, contrasting it with the [...]
Park & Rides Lose Money and Waste Land — But Agencies Keep Building Them
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Transit agencies shell out big bucks to build and operate parking facilities. But how much do we really know about what they get for their money?
The surface parking lot at WMATA’s Branch Avenue station. Photo: TRB
Researchers Lisa Jacobson and Rachel Weinberger surveyed 37 American transit agencies about park-and-ride facilities. They found that despite the expense of [...]
U.S. Traffic Fatalities Rising Fast — Especially Pedestrian and Cyclist Deaths
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Traffic fatalities in America hit a seven-year high in 2015, with pedestrians and cyclists accounting for a disproportionate share of the alarming increase, according to preliminary data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
Last year, 35,200 people were killed in traffic — a 7.7 percent increase over 2014 and the worst death toll since 2008. The number of people killed while walking [...]
Houston’s Big Chance to Turn Back the Tide of Car Traffic
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TxDOT’s $7 billion plan for downtown Houston may tear down the Pierce Elevated Freeway while expanding I-45. Some civic leaders question why more resources won’t be devoted to transit. Image: TxDOT via Swamplot
There’s a lot riding on Texas DOT’s $7 billion plan for downtown Houston freeways.
TxDOT has been working for more than a decade on a plan [...]
“Opportunity Score” Shows Best Places to Find a Job Without Owning a Car
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The 30-minute transit shed near the author’s house, overlaid with a heatmap of jobs paying $40,000 or more. Image: Redfin/Opportunity Score
Which places put economic opportunity within reach for residents who don’t own cars?
There’s a new tool to evaluate housing locations according to the accessibility of jobs via transit and walking. Redfin, the company that runs Walk Score, today released “Opportunity Score,” [...]