Sarah Goodyear

Yesterday, at The Urbanophile, Aaron Renn posted a thoughtful essay about the idea of the "city as platform." He looks at all the different meanings of the word platform and muses about how they apply in the urban context.

(editor's note: This is actually yesterday's "Streetsblog.net" story.  You can find today's at DC Streetsblog - DN)

It says something about the country that we live in that the simple act of walking to work can merit a blog post. But so it is. Today, at her fine blog The Naked City, Mary Newsom wrote about her experience walking the 4.2 miles from her home to her office. She lives in Charlotte, North Carolina. She often writes about planning and transportation issues and has a great understanding of livable streets issues. As she made her lonely way along the street, she was able to experience in a different way how completely dominated by cars her familiar landscape is, and what that means:

At Streetsblog Network member blog Planning Pool, this week is being billed as "Fail Week" -- a full five days on "information about bad planning, lack of planning, and planning generally gone awry." We can't wait to see what they'll be doing. There's certainly no shortage of potential topics.

If you've ever wanted a breakdown of the benefits of commuting by bike versus commuting by car, Carfree.us has got it for you. The writer of this Streetsblog Network member blog, a resident of Charlotte, North Carolina,  is not actually totally car-free, but he has made a commitment to commuting by bike or bus for the calendar year of 2010. From his introductory post:

As malls have struggled over the last 20 years or so to stay culturally relevant -- or even profitable -- one of the solutions that has gained ground is the "lifestyle center." These are malls with sidewalks and sidewalk musicians, European-style fountains, open-air restaurants, and of course, lots of shopping. They are prefab places masquerading as real places. Check out this 2006 piece from Slate and you'll get the idea.

Following up on yesterday's post about family-friendly transit, which generated a raft of interesting comments on Streetsblog New York (and even more on our SF, DC and LA sites), we've got a dispatch from the front lines. Carla Saulter, who writes the always excellent Bus Chick blog out in Seattle, weighs in on how going from one kid to two has made her car-free existence significantly more challenging, although she remains characteristically undaunted:

As someone who is raising a child without a car in a transit-rich city, I sometimes need to be reminded that for many people in the United States, the reality of maintaining a family life without a personal motor vehicle is impractical — or simply unthinkable, for a variety of reasons. This often holds true … Continued