I am sitting in the back of a motionless taxi on the way from New York’s JFK airport to a meeting in the city. It’s a blazing hot spring morning—a preview of global warming, I wonder? I felt vaguely guilty about hailing a cab to research a story on innovative ideas in transportation, especially when…
Thanks to the efforts of a local NGO, Vankovka, a new development in Brno, Czech Republic will preserve an historic brownfield site and incorporate community services into new mall development. The site was purchased by the city of Brno and will be developed by the German firm ECE. Next to a new shopping mall, in…
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Lisa Peterson, 212-629-8001, [email protected] Dar Es Salaam Lord Mayor Sykes, together with City Director Wilson Mukama, today announced that the city will commence planning for the adoption of a new city-wide mobility blueprint for Dar Es Salaam. The blueprint will serve as the basis for a new world-class Bus Rapid Transit (BRT)…
On Feburary 13 and 14, a seminar focused on cycleways as a viable transportation alternative in Quito was held for the first time. This event responds to a feeling of restlessness and frustration about the unsustainable situation of transportation in the city, to the lack of urban spaces for cyclists and to the need for…
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Paul Steely White or Lisa Peterson, 212-629-8001 Within three years, former Bogotá Mayor Enrique Peñalosa transformed his city from a congested and dangerous mess, where many citizens did not have access to transportation, into the world’s leading model for sustainable urban design. Now, on the Building a New City tour, Mr….
In 1996, a law was passed requiring all French municipalities of more than 100,000 inhabitants to develop plans to improve air quality. In Paris this resulted in the creation, in 1998 and 1999, of an Urban Mobility Master Plan (Plan des Displacements Urbains de l’Ile-de-France, or PDUIF) to reduce car traffic, emissions and energy use….
The initial line, expected to be complete in six months, is only the first part of a long-term vision for a city-wide BRT system called Trans Metro. The expected cost of the system is a rather economical $600,000 per km constructed. To make the Bus Rapid Transit corridors viable, the municipality has made the difficult…
Included in this vision are the following components: Restructure the road network to provide better access to key destinations and to facilitate the passing of traffic outside of central urban zones. Improve the public transport sector by implementing transit corridors that feature exclusive bus lanes. Create disincentives to private vehicle use by introducing restrictions through…
Nevertheless, eight years after the end of Apartheid, in excess of 250,000 families are on waiting lists for low-income homes, the population of AIDS orphans is rapidly on the increase, and access to public transport remains minimal. Given these goals and the plans to achieve them, it is worth asking whether the planned R 7…