American streetcar manufacturer Oregon Iron Works turned to European company Skoda to get ideas for its new 10 T3 Streetcar Prototype, which will be open to the public this summer. Photo by United Streetcar.
Yesterday, U.S. Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood made his appearance at the formal unveiling of an American-made streetcar — the first to be manufactured in the United States in nearly 60 years.
United Streetcar, a subsidiary of Oregon Iron Works, developed the light rail vehicle at a local factory in compliance with the Federal Transit Administration’s “Buy America” requirement that any vehicle purchased with federal funds has at least a 60 percent domestic content and undergoes final assembly in the United States. According to Rail magazine, United Streetcar’s vehicle contains 70 percent domestic content. (Read more about the history of modern streetcars in America here.)
United Streetcar President Chandra Brown said, “We see a market for this modern streetcar, as more and more cities look to fight congestion and have rail play a role in local economic development.” Read the rest of this entry »
World Streets shares this very funny French ad for a car-sharing company.
The translation of their slogan is “It’s almost your car.” In another ad, the same man is eating a messy sandwich in the car and dripping on himself when someone knocks on the door.
Aerial photograph of suburban housing in Maryland. Photo by Vidiot.
The BeyondDC newsfeed yesterday just blew my mind. Of yesterday’s five headlines, each and every one is about some part of Montgomery County embracing a more sustainable, more urban land use pattern. Let’s go through them one by one:
By reducing parking space requirements, cities can reduce car culture - and encourage the development of healthier grocery stores - in underserved areas. Photo by Wenzday01
Today, the New York Times alerted me to a problem that I had no idea sustainable transportation could solve.
The New York Times, though, mentioned that one of the strategies New York City is using to attract more supermarkets into food deserts is to change the city’s zoning laws that would “free smaller supermarkets from having to supply parking spaces.” Reducing or eliminating parking minimums for new development is good urbanism. But if it can help provide affordable, accessible, and nutritious food to low-income residents of the District - which is already a District goal - the planning commission has one more very good reason to wean us off of cars.
A graphic rendering of the proposed “Central Plaza” of CityCenter DC. Illustration via CityCenter DC.
There’s been a lot of big transportation news in the last two days. Between the Purple Line vote and Sec. Ray LaHood and Rep. Jim Oberstar’s competing proposals for the transportation bill (a topic that you should definitely follow over at DC Streetsblog), there are a lot of major political decisions being made about transportation.
At the same time, some of the most important changes needed to create a sustainable transportation system in D.C. have nothing to do with transportation at all. For example, redeveloping the old convention center site downtown would be a major victory for sustainable transportation in D.C.
Boston’s commuter rail is informally known as the “Purple Line.” Maryland still hasn’t decided whether its Purple Line will be light rail or bus rapid transit. Photo by Pylon757.
Today’s a big day for the Purple Line. (Check out our previous post about the controversial transit project here.) The National Capital Region Transportation Planning Board is voting on whether or not to include the Purple Line in the long-range transportation plan. The NCRTPB is the D.C. area’s metropolitan planning organization. MPOs are critical parts of any planning process, in that federal transportation dollars won’t go to projects that the regional MPO doesn’t include in its plan. (Nashua, N.H.’s MPO provides a decent guide to the role of MPOshere.)
Moreover, if the Board does include the Purple Line and are then able to secure funding, opposition suddenly becomes a lot harder. It’s pretty rare to see someone give back federal dollars.
Metro ridership is up. Bus ridership is down. What gives? Photo by Teo.
The American Public Transportation Association (APTA) released their ridership numbers for the first quarter on Monday, and there’s some very interesting news for D.C. and for the nation.
Let’s start at the national level. Total transit ridership is down 1.2% from the first quarter of 2008. That sounds like bad news, except by comparison with the 1.7% decrease in vehicle miles traveled. In other words, it appears the recession has caused people to drive less more than it has negatively affected the use of public transit. APTA further points out that this is true even despite lower gas prices than a year ago, a factor that would ordinarily shift commuters back into their cars.
Can D.C. use a bag tax to fund public transportation? Photo by nicasaurusrex.
Yesterday, the D.C. Council finalized the five cent tax on paper and plastic bags at grocery, drug, convenience and liquor stores. This is a good move for the environment, but I’m particularly happy that four of the five cents go directly toward cleaning up the Anacostia River. It makes the tax more transactional. It doesn’t feel like the government is stepping in and taking away your plastic bags, which people would resent; it feels like you’re paying a nickel to get a clean city. That’s very smart framing for the environmental movement, which too often is painted as a bunch of killjoys, and I’m sure part of the reason the Council was able to pass it unanimously.
D.C. plans to build 15 miles of new sidewalks. Photo by BrittneyBush.
The Wash Cycle pointed out today that Mayor Fenty has announced he’ll be spending $4 million in stimulus money on new sidewalks, enough to build 15 miles of new sidewalks out of the 200 missing miles in the District. The Washington Post’s Get There blog adds that these particular streets were chosen “by matching medium and high pedestrian activity areas with missing sidewalk locations and reviewing comments received from Advisory Neighborhood Commissioners and residents.”
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