Walking

Last Friday the LAPD was at it again.  In what they claimed was an effort to make the intersection of Wilshire and Western safer for pedestrians, the LAPD was handing out tickets to pedestrians who crossed the street against a flashing red hand.  In the ten minutes I observed their their ticketing I observed the following.

Back in January, the LA Downtown News reported on exciting new design standards for new development in the Downtown which will lead to wider sidewalks, landscaped parkways and medians, and bring additional streetlights, trees and street parking to Downtown.  The standards, approved last week by the City Council, will require that as new development comes to the Downtown, that developers will be required to come up with pedestrian plans for the development.

The East Hollywood Neighborhood Council has barely been in existence for two years, yet they've already layed out a vision for transportation in the video East Hollywood on the Move, led the way by endorsing the Cyclists Bill of Rights before any other Neighborhood Council and proclaimed that streets are for people, not cars, at the first annual ArtCycle.  Last night they began to marry their vision with policy when they declared themselves a "pedestrian oriented community" and vowed to get all members of the community involved in redesigning parts of the community following the "Sole Mates" process.

Earlier this week, Mayor Villaraigosa gave the annual State of the City address and for the first time it discussed a future with reduced auto dependency.  The following paragraph appears as part of a larger discussion of the Mayor's Clean Tech Corridor initiative.  It's not much, but it's more than last year:

Via BikinginLA, the above image captures so much of what is wrong with pedestrian planning in Los Angeles:

One of Glendale's Better Streets for Pedestrians

In a segment on NBC’s “Football Night in America” last night, the network’s NFL desk anchors and commentators were asked what they’ve done to “green their routines.” While Jerome Bettis uses the cold setting for laundry and Keith Olberman forgoes bottled water, Cris Collinsworth said he is walking to the studio every Sunday, and former … Continued

Here is a mesmerizing time-lapse video from Spacing Toronto and photoblogger Sam Javanrouh. The clip shows traffic moving through Toronto's pedestrian scramble -- a.k.a. priority crossing, a.k.a. Barnes Dance -- installed at Yonge and Dundas Streets last August.