Great Urban Streets Design Principles

Principle 1:
Manage CongestionCongestion is a fact of life in successful urban places. By definition, a place that supports a great concentration of economic and social activities within a pedestrian-scaled environment is going to be congested.

Principle 2:
Balanced/Active StreetsDowntown streets must balance the needs of pedestrians, bicycles, transit and the automobile in creating an attractive and viable urban core. Downtown streets are for people first, commercial second, parking third and through traffic fourth.

Principle 3:
Streets as PlacesThe Great Streets Program envisions downtown as a vital focus of city life, and as a primary destination. Our downtown streets are our most important and pervasive public space and common ground.

Principle 4:
Interactive Streets Urban Streets are the stages on which the public life of the community is acted out.

Principle 5:
Pride of PlaceVisible, caring and upkeep are critical to the vitality of urban street life.

Principle 6:
Public ArtArt in the public environment can help to establish a stronger sense of place and a continuity between the past, present and future.

Bike Racks as Art

A new take on Public art? Found this interesting site today called Cycloops. They make very fun and whimsical ways to lock your bike up in the urban or suburban enviornments. You can even submit your own creative design for them to fabricate. Now that is Boho.

H&M brand COS starts to sell Kronan bikes

Just before the Easter holidays it was announced that H&M founded retail chain COS (Collection of style) will start to sell the Swedish bike Kronan at its newly opened shops in England, Netherlands, Belgium and Germany. Kronan bikes are based on a classic Swedish military model (they actually started once by selling from an old stock of military bikes).

Maria Brunstedt, Managing Director of Kronan comments the collaboration like this: “We have noticed increased interest from other countries, and the timeless design of our bicycle has attracted consumers from the Netherlands and Japan for some time now. Now we have matured enough to take an additional step out into the international market. We are increasing our marketing efforts and are looking forward to meeting many more quality and style-conscious Europeans.”

Fruitvale: Challanged TOD

from New Urban News

Fruitvale Village in Oakland, California, has become a reluctant symbol of the difficulties that transit-oriented development (TOD) can encounter.

Three years after the $100 million collection of apartments, retail, and community and professional services opened next to a Bay Area Rapid Transit station in the Fruitvale neighborhood, four of its 23 retail spaces remain empty. Slowness in filling the stores has been a source of frustration for the Unity Council, which sponsored the project.

The slowness has given developers and transit specialists yet another case to cite when cautioning about putting large volumes of retail space in TOD projects — at least in unproven locations. Dan Parolek, a principal at Opticos Design in Berkeley, says a developer at the Pleasant Hill BART station in Contra Costa County tried to use the example of Fruitvale “as the reason why they should do very little retail within the project plan.”

Fruitvale’s problems do not seem insurmountable — the vacancies are now on the way to being filled, says Jeff Pace, Unity Council’s vice president of finance and business opportunities. But they have sparked discussion about how much spending commuters can be counted on to do in TOD projects. They have also highlighted the need for effective parking strategies.

Pace, who joined Unity Council in 2004, after the retail problems emerged, says Fruitvale Village has been a huge success in most respects. The 3.7-acre development is now a vital center for its predominantly Latino section of Oakland. The Village’s 114,000 square feet of office, professional, and community space include a public library, a Head Start program, a community-based medical clinic, a children’s counseling clinic, and a senior center, as well as the Council’s headquarters. The project’s 47 apartments, ten of them designated “affordable,” rented quickly and have remained in demand.

Jeff Ordway, manager of property development for BART, credits the Council with helping to strengthen International Boulevard, an old commercial corridor nearby. Retail buildings on International “went from 40 percent vacancy in 2000 to less than 5 percent in 2004,” he notes.The one blot on Fruitvale’s achievement is the tortoise-like progress in filling the 40,000 square feet of retail. Some observers fault the design, pointing out that the stores are arranged along a pedestrian plaza — one that the station’s 6,500 daily commuters have no need to traverse. BART more or less mandated that the main commuter parking garage be built where it would create a short and direct route between commuters’ cars and the station, says Pace, noting, “Pedestrians getting out of their cars have no natural incentive to walk through the retail.”

Parolek says that placing the retail along a pedestrian-only plaza and then converting a city street between the plaza and International Boulevard into a pedestrian-only passage probably harmed the retail by making it harder for motorists to become familiar with the Village’s offerings.

Unity Council, like many nonprofit organizations with a social mission, was inexperienced at managing a retail center, and made mistakes in signing up merchants. National retailers were turned away while independent local merchants were favored. A locals-first policy can, of course, enhance local character. In Fruitvale, though, it led to selecting some merchants who were inexperienced and undercapitalized — unable to survive when pedestrian traffic fell short of expectations. “We turned away Starbucks twice,” says Pace. “That’s a really stupid thing to do.”

The Council did not obtain adequate legal protections. Its standard lease lacked a “going dark” clause, which would have stipulated that if a tenant did not get its business operating by a certain date, the agreement would terminate. “We have someone who has been paying rent for 21 months and is still not open,” Pace acknowledges. That business is now expected to open late this year. Leases contained no ban on retailers having other locations close by. “A record store had one store a block and a half away; they couldn’t make them both work,” says Pace, who is articulate and candid on what to do and what not to do.

FINDING REMEDIES
The Council has sharpened its leasing strategy in the past two years, and is now giving people more reasons for exploring the plaza. “We’ve been running a farmers’ market right in front of the BART patrons,” Pace says. “Our plan is to extend it through the main Fruitvale plaza.” In the summer, an outdoor cinema operates on Friday evenings in the plaza. “First Thursdays,” an event featuring food and mariachi music, operated until early October and will return in the spring.

The Council has introduced seating, better lighting, and other improvements to the passage from the plaza to International Boulevard. A public market will soon occupy one of the buildings along the passage, and there will be places for permanent outdoor stalls as well as stalls that can be assembled and disassembled each day, Pace says. Small merchants will sell arts and crafts and handmade foods such as tortillas.

At the end of October, negotiations were under way to fill the plaza’s four remaining vacancies. “We think we’re really turning the corner,” he says. Architect Ernesto Vasquez, a principal in McLarand, Vasquez, Emsiek & Partners, involved in the project for years, says Fruitvale Village is becoming a destination for people seeking Latino products and services. He urges developers: “Be patient; you need to avoid being rushed into getting tenants, and not getting the right tenants.” Delaying the retail component of a project or building it in phases may reduce the risk of its failing. Vasquez thinks conditions at Fruitvale will improve when the project’s second phase, containing approximately 300 to 450 housing units, is built.

“Retail is the Achilles’ heel of TODs,” warns Richard Cervero, a transportation specialist who teaches at Berkeley. “If not done right, it can really stigmatize a development as a loser.” Richard Willson, a Cal Poly Pomona planning professor who has advised BART on parking policy, says, “Among developers, I find a bit of naiveté about how people use transit facilities.” They often don’t realize that many commuters rush through, not buying much, Willson says. Ordway says commuters generally constitute a tertiary market — less important than the people who live in the surrounding community and individuals who live or work in the project area.Ordway says developers would be wise to study a TOD project that Calthorpe Associates was involved in planning next to a BART station in Richmond, north of Berkeley. There, buildings along a pathway to the station were constructed so they could start as wholly residential and be converted to live/work — with street-level offices or retail — after the location proves itself.

RECONSIDERING PARKING
BART has abandoned its policy of providing free parking at many of its East Bay stations. BART has also modified its requirement that when parking lots at a station are built upon, an equal number of new parking spaces must be provided, typically in garages or decks. The changes bode well for future TOD, by eliminating major financial hurdles.

Patrick Siegman at Nelson\Nygaard consultants in San Francisco, says the next step should be the establishment, by municipalities, of “parking benefit districts” in neighborhoods around transit stations. Commuters could pay to use designated on-street spaces. The revenue would be devoted to public improvements desired by the neighborhood, such as better sidewalks, lighting, and landscaping. “At $4 each for 250 cars, you’d have $1,000 a day in revenue to spruce up the neighborhood,” Siegman calculates. Parking benefit districts are being considered at two Oakland stations, Ordway says.Despite challenges, TOD is gaining momentum. On land owned by BART, nearly $2 billion of capital has already been invested in TOD or is in process or in negotiations, according to Ordway. At Pleasant Hill, which contains substantial housing and employment, approximately 40,000 square feet of space is expected to be available for retail. “It’s not just pure retail,” Parolek emphasizes. “It’s allowed to be used for professional services such as a dentist or optometrist.”

"Complete" Streets

Courier-Journal 3/8/2007

''For decades, we in Louisville -- and cities around the nation -- have built roads only for vehicles,'' said Metro Mayor Jerry Abramson in endorsement of its proposed ''Complete Streets'' design guidelines, which also focus on sidewalks, bike lanes and curbs easy for wheelchairs and baby-strollers, confident the new policy will rectify that old ''urban planning mistake.''

Promoted by the Washington-based National Complete Streets Coalition and the Prescott, Arizona-based Thunderhead Alliance of bicycle and pedestrian advocacy organizations, the Complete Street guidelines are in force in 22 cities so far.

For Louisville Metro, writes Louisville Courier-Journal reporter Marcus Green, they were drafted and explained in a 163-page manual by a broad-based area committee, which included neighborhood activists, transit champions and advocates for the disabled.

They agreed that all new streets should have dedicated lanes or paths for cyclists, along with pedestrian-oriented and wheelchair-friendly sidewalks -- requirements also applicable to street realignment and improvement wherever possible.

''You have to think about that at the time of construction,'' said Louisville Metro Planning & Design Director Charles Cash, to make local residents aware that they will have ''alternative means of getting where they want to go.''

Set as a key goal at the city's bicycle summit two year ago, the reporter notes, the anticipated Complete Streets policy has already prompted officials to earmark $1 million in federal money for planning work on a seven-mile bikeway on River Road, the future top cycling corridor along the Ohio River.

''Bike paths and bike lanes are good,'' observed local cycling advocate David Morse, who lived for several years in the bike-friendly Los Angeles and San Francisco bay areas, ''because they inform drivers that, yes, bicyclists are legitimate transportation users just like car drivers.''

TOD or Transit-Adjacent Development

by Patrick Siegman, in Tumlin and Millard-Ball


What’s the difference between a true transit-oriented development, which will deliver
promised social and economic benefits, and a transit-adjacent development? A true TOD will include most of the following:

• The transit-oriented development lies within a five-minute walk of the transit stop, or about a quarter-mile from stop to edge. For major stations offering access to frequent high-speed service this catchment area may be extended to the measure of a 10-minute walk.

• A balanced mix of uses generates 24-hour ridership. There are places to work, to live, to learn, to relax and to shop for daily needs.

• A place-based zoning code generates buildings that shape and define memorable streets, squares, and plazas, while allowing uses to change easily over time.

• The average block perimeter is limited to no more than 1,350 feet. This generates a fine-grained network of streets, dispersing traffic and allowing for the creation of quiet and intimate thoroughfares.

• Minimum parking requirements are abolished.

• Maximum parking requirements are instituted: For every 1,000 workers, no more than 500 spaces and as few as 10 spaces are provided.

• Parking costs are “unbundled,” and full market rates are charged for all parking spaces. The exception may be validated parking for shoppers.

• Major stops provide BikeStations, offering free attended bicycle parking, repairs, and rentals. At minor stops, secure and fully enclosed bicycle parking is provided.

• Transit service is fast, frequent, reliable, and comfortable, with a headway of 15 minutes or less.

• Roadway space is allocated and traffic signals timed primarily for the convenience of walkers and cyclists.

• Automobile level-of-service standards are met through congestion pricing measures, or disregarded entirely.

• Traffic is calmed, with roads designed to limit speed to 30 mph on major streets and 20 mph on lesser streets.

Creating Walkable Neighborhoods

by smartgrowth.org

Walkable communities are desirable places to live, work, learn, worship and play, and therefore a key component of smart growth. Their desirability comes from two factors. First, walkable communities locate within an easy and safe walk goods (such as housing, offices, and retail) and services (such as transportation, schools, libraries) that a community resident or employee needs on a regular basis. Second, by definition, walkable communities make pedestrian activity possible, thus expanding transportation options, and creating a streetscape that better serves a range of users -- pedestrians, bicyclists, transit riders, and automobiles. To foster walkability, communities must mix land uses and build compactly, and ensure safe and inviting pedestrian corridors.



Walkable communities are nothing new. Outside of the last half-century communities worldwide have created neighborhoods, communities, towns and cities premised on pedestrian access. Within the last fifty years public and private actions often present created obstacles to walkable communities. Conventional land use regulation often prohibits the mixing of land uses, thus lengthening trips and making walking a less viable alternative to other forms of travel. This regulatory bias against mixed-use development is reinforced by private financing policies that view mixed-use development as riskier than single-use development. Many communities -- particularly those that are dispersed and largely auto-dependent -- employ street and development design practices that reduce pedestrian activity.



As the personal and societal benefits of pedestrian friendly communities are realized – benefits which include lower transportation costs, greater social interaction, improved personal and environmental health, and expanded consumer choice -- many are calling upon the public and private sector to facilitate the development of walkable places. Land use and community design plays a pivotal role in encouraging pedestrian environments. By building places with multiple destinations within close proximity, where the streets and sidewalks balance all forms of transportation, communities have the basic framework for encouraging walkability.