Streetsblog Capitol Hill

Jake's girlfriend and her co-worker at Sam Schwartz Engineering were so excited that he won Streetsblog's "Commuter Idyll" challenge that they created this "infographic" of his commutes.

When we saw that Washington’s news-traffic-weather radio station, WTOP, was holding a ”Commuter Idle” contest for the worst commute in the DC area — and rewarding it with $1,000 in gas money — we couldn’t resist. We went looking for the best “Commuter Idyll” — the trips to work that made people happy, got them fresh air, helped them fit exercise into their day, gave them some extra time to sleep or read, and brought them to work more clear-headed and ready to tackle the day. And Streetsblog readers had lots of great stories to share of ditching long car commutes for transit, biking, or walking. We shared some of them yesterday.

Meanwhile, check out the painful stories of soul-sucking commutes of WTOP’s 10 finalists. Some are out of the house by 4:00 a.m., drive 80 miles each way, are stuck in their car for six hours a day. Imagine all the better ways they could use that time and money!

Our “Commuter Idyll” winner — Jake Williams of Chicago — had a hellish commute too. He made big changes to get control over his time, his health, and his happiness. Here’s Jake’s story.

Upon graduating from college at UCLA, I moved back home to Chicago to start my working career as an engineer. I had commuted to internships before, one in Kenosha, WI and one in Melrose Park, IL, so I was already exposed and accustomed to the solo commute by automobile. I was looking for work anywhere in the metro area, and when I was offered a job in Lincolnshire, a suburb of Chicago 26 miles from my apartment, I was not fazed. Little did I know that the next four years would at times literally “drive” me crazy.

The guts of Jake's old ride.

The commute affected my whole life and actually made me dread going to and from work. I tried waking up early in the morning, and while it was nice seeing the sunrise, it was not a sustainable schedule. I worked longer hours, and although the morning commute was somewhat more tolerable, the commute home was about as awful. I tried breaking up the afternoon commute by heading straight to the gym and then going home. The result was that I was gone 14 hours a day and exhausted, constantly.

I would become angry and irritable. I needed a “cool-off” period when I got home. I stalked the roads religiously on traffic sites and on the various radio stations, but knowing never changed what was coming. I realized that the commute had completely conquered me when I left work one snowy winter day and got so frustrated with the stagnation on the road that I turned around and went back to work, for hours.

So, when times got rough and I was laid off from work, the strange, overwhelming feeling was of relief. Ironically, I was supposed to be laid off a day earlier, but I had to call off work because my car had broken down. I was disenchanted with my career choice and lifestyle choice, and I realized after a couple of months that I had the power to change all of that. I decided that I had one of many new goals: to walk to work.

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Percent change in average residential sales prices relative to the region, 2006-11. Image: APTA and NAR

If you live close to a transit station, chances are you’ve weathered the recession better than your friends who don’t.

Your transportation costs are probably lower, since you can take transit instead of driving. Transit-served areas are usually more walkable and bikeable too, multiplying your options. And while home values plummeted during a recession that was triggered by a massive housing bubble, your home probably held its value relatively well – if you live near transit.

The National Association of Realtors and the American Public Transportation Association commissioned the Center for Neighborhood Technology to study the impact of transit access on home values during the recession. For the report, “The New Real Estate Mantra: Location Near Public Transportation” [PDF], CNT looked at five metro regions — Boston, Chicago, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Phoenix, and San Francisco.

While nearly everyone in hard-hit cities experienced some setback from tanking housing prices, transit-served areas were largely insulated from the worst of it, CNT found:

Across the study regions, the transit shed outperformed the region as a whole by 41.6 percent. In all of the regions the drop in average residential sales prices within the transit shed was smaller than in the region as a whole or the non-transit area. Boston station areas outperformed the region the most (129 percent), followed by Minneapolis-St. Paul (48 percent), San Francisco and Phoenix (37 percent), and Chicago (30 percent).

This is consistent with a study released last year by the Center for Housing Policy showing that access to rail transit created a “transit premium” for nearby home values of between six and 50 percent. That study, like CNT’s, looked at Minneapolis and Chicago, as well as Portland. The Center for Transit Oriented Development has also looked at this phenomenon and found transit premiums as high as 150 percent.

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Pittsburgh was the newest city to announce its bike-share plans this week, when it confirmed the city would add a 500-bike system by the spring of next year.

Kansas City was one of the first cities in the Midwest to launch a bike-share system, when it did so last summer. But soon it will have plenty of company. Image: Missouri Bicycle Federation

But nearby Columbus, Ohio, will beat them to the punch. Ohio’s capital city is planning to add 300 bikes this summer. Meanwhile, Indianapolis’ plan was to roll out its system next month.

The truth is you would be hard-pressed to find a large Midwestern city that hasn’t taken formal steps toward adding a bike-share system.

Both Cleveland and Detroit are studying bike-share. Cincinnati completed a bike-share study late last year, and is now seeking proposals from contractors. Milwaukee is assembling money for a system. Chicago hopes to add 3,000 bikes this spring.

And of course there’s the grandaddy of them all: Minneapolis’ Nice Ride. Launched in 2010, this system currently boasts more than 1,200 bikes. Late last year, the system surpassed half a million trips.

Midwestern cities have been inspired by some of the more spectacular examples on the coasts, according to Eric Rogers, executive director of BikeWalkKC, the nonprofit organization that manages Kansas City’s bike-share system. Kansas City was a little ahead of the pack when it launched Kansas City B-Cycle, with 200 bikes at 12 stations, last summer.

“The last few years a lot of cities, especially in the Midwest, have seen good examples from places like Chicago and Portland and New York and D.C. of a lot of innovative facilities that are out there: cycle tracks, bike boxes, bike-sharing,” he said. “There’s so much more knowledge out there now that it’s easier to develop a solution and pursue it.”

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After setting up transportation news sites covering New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and national policy, next Tuesday Streetsblog will be expanding for the first time in four years with the launch of Streetsblog Chicago.

The reporters producing Streetsblog Chicago are John Greenfield and Steven Vance, who have built an impressive audience for local transportation and planning news at their current site, Grid Chicago. As writers and planners, they’re both veterans of the city’s movement for livable streets. With the additional resources Streetsblog affords them, John and Steven will be creating a wide-ranging, daily news source where Chicagoans can plug in to efforts to improve walking, biking, and transit. Initial funding for Streetsblog Chicago has been provided by The Chicago Community Trust, the Rockefeller Foundation, local advertisers, and a generous anonymous donor.

Steven Vance and John Greenfield

Streetsblog will be launching at a moment when expectations are high for progressive change to the city’s streets. Mayor Rahm Emanuel and his transportation commissioner, Gabe Klein, have rapidly expanded the city’s bike network, installing 12.5 miles of protected bikeways and 14.5 miles of buffered lanes since coming into office less than two years ago. Advocates believe upcoming Bus Rapid Transit projects could set a national precedent, showing other American mayors they shouldn’t shy away from giving street space to BRT. The Chicago Transit Authority is working on a major rehab of the Red Line and looking into extending it. Klein has made it the city’s explicit goal to eliminate traffic deaths by 2022. With so much happening in Chicago right now, there’s no such thing as a slow news day.

Streetsblog will track these developments, informing Chicagoans about how to get involved in the upgrades to their streets. We’ll explain changes so it’s clear, for instance, why converting motor vehicle lanes into exclusive transit lanes will pay off, and why this makes the city more livable. There’s a long way to go to re-orient Chicago’s streets toward effective transit and safe walking and biking, and getting from here to there won’t be simple or quick. Streetsblog will help map the route. If a columnist in search of pageviews starts ranting about a “war on cars,” we’ll be there to set the record straight, and if it looks like the city’s decision makers are going off-course, we won’t hold back from saying so.

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Five city transportation chiefs -- Phildelphia's Rina Cutler, Chicago's Gabe Klein, NYC's Janette Sadik-Khan, San Francisco's Ed Reiskin, and Boston's Tom Tinlin -- shared their perspectives today on how cities have innovated by necessity.

The leaders of the nation’s big city transportation agencies have formed a tight-knit circle, brought together by the National Association of City Transportation Officials to share best practices, and yes, battle scars.

As NACTO’s first ever national conference drew to a close Friday, transportation chiefs from Boston, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Chicago and New York all talked about the progress their cities have made and shared their frustration at the lack of attention to cities and transportation in the state and national political arenas.

NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg set the tone by blasting the state government in his introductory remarks. “Our economy is dependent on transportation,” he said. “But our state refused to give us money for a new subway line, so we said ‘screw you’ and took city taxpayer money to extend a subway line.”

NYC Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan put it even more starkly. She said that instead of the old New Yorker cartoon, a New Yorker’s view of the world, in which the map falls off dramatically after the Hudson River, “Washington’s view of the world is made up of Iowa, Ohio and lots of highways. And some dollar signs on the map where New York and Los Angeles are.”

Despite the lack of attention from Congress and the presidential contenders, Sadik-Khan explained that transportation innovations at the city level can cumulatively affect the nation’s economy, echoing the previous day’s plenary speaker Bruce Katz of the Brookings Institution. “You’ve got two-thirds of Americans living in top 100 metropolitans areas, where three-quarters of US GDP is generated,” Sadik-Khan said. “Yet there is no mention of cities in presidential debates.” Added San Francisco Municipal Transportation Commissioner Ed Reiskin, “There was no mention at all of transportation in any of the debates.”

Given the progress that cities across the country are making on transportation reform, the question arises: How much more can cities do without the active support of Washington and state governments?

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Yesterday, the city of Chicago rolled out a sweeping new plan for pedestrian safety [PDF]. With some 250 recommendations — including traffic-calming measures like pedestrian islands, chicanes and midblock curb bumpouts — Chicago joins cities like New York and Portland in formalizing a plan to meet targets for reducing pedestrian injuries and deaths.

Chicago is getting serious about pedestrian safety. Photo: CDOT

Chicago Department of Transportation Director Gabe Klein aims to bring the total number of pedestrian fatalities down to zero in 10 years time. Currently about 50 pedestrians are killed annually on Chicago streets.

“We want pedestrian safety to be at the forefront of everything we do,” Klein told the Chicago Tribune. “Everyone in the city is a pedestrian.”

The plan was developed after a series of public meetings. It calls for identifying and repairing two high-collision corridors and four dangerous intersections annually, basing the interventions on crash data. Chicago also aims to improve driver education, conduct police crackdowns on dangerous drivers, and implement tougher safety mandates for taxis.

A wide variety of street infrastructure treatments are listed in Chicago’s toolkit, including road diets, roundabouts, speed humps and pedestrian scrambles — a signal phase for pedestrians only. Even nagging headaches like snow removal lapses and sidewalk closures for construction — treated as a fact of life in most places — are addressed.

Better connectivity for walking trips is another goal. CDOT recommends filling in gaps in the pedestrian network, improving walking routes to transit, and enhancing pedestrian wayfinding systems.

Each recommendation contains a timeframe for implementation, and the plan calls for CDOT to evaluate its progress at regular intervals.

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Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and his DOT head Gabe Klein have introduced a bold, 100-page plan to make the Windy City’s transportation system more safe and sustainable.

Chicago's transportation "action plan" calls for increased camera-based traffic enforcement. Image: Chicago DOT

Published last week, the “Chicago Forward Action Agenda” [PDF] places a very strong emphasis on safety, in addition to setting admirable cycling ridership targets and goals for transit investment.

Highlights include:

• A target of zero traffic fatalities annually in 10 years. (The city has been averaging about 50 a year.)
• 20 mph zones in all the city’s residential areas.
• A five percent bike mode share on trips less than five miles. (Currently 1.3 percent of Chicagoans travel by bike, but in the central city the figure is as high as two percent.)
• An emphasis on street maintenance, or “fix it first.”

In his introduction, Emanuel makes it clear that it’s a new day at Chicago DOT: ”Where we once built expressways that divided our communities, we are now reconnecting neighborhoods with new bus lanes and extensive and expanding bicycle facilities that offer safe, green, and fit ways to travel for all ages.”

To achieve the safety targets, the plan makes a commitment to address problem intersections, calling for the city to “analyze all fatal crashes involving pedestrian and cyclists” and improve the city’s top 10 traffic collision locations annually. The city’s ability to install speed enforcement cameras — recently granted by the state legislature and City Council — also figures prominently in achieving the safety targets.

The document reinforces the city’s promise to invest in new infrastructure to improve bicycling and transit, including the already-stated goals of building out protected bikeways and high-quality rapid busways. Among other projects, the plan calls for the installation of 500 new bike racks per year and 100 transit-priority traffic signals.

The “Action Agenda” appears to be modeled after New York’s sustainable streets strategic plan, laying out a roadmap for Chicago DOT over the “next 24 months.” The safety benchmarks are especially ambitious. No other major American city has set a goal of zero traffic deaths, a target first pursued by Scandinavian governments through a set of wide-ranging policies guided by the principle known as “Vision Zero.”

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The transportation news has been flying out of Chicago lately. Last week, in a 41-9 vote, the City Council approved Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s Chicago Infrastructure Trust, which will be used to build projects with private financing. Earlier this week, Emanuel and transportation commissioner Gabe Klein just unveiled a plan for a downtown bus rapid transit loop that will serve six different routes. Those bus lanes will open within two years. In the meantime, 2012 will see the inauguration of a 300-station bike share system and the city’s first enhanced bus service on Jeffrey Boulevard.

Photo: Flickr user Dok1

When it comes to improving existing transit, however, the mess in Washington is still threatening to delay some much needed improvements to Chicago’s century-old system of elevated trains.

Chicago’s Red Line is the city’s busiest, as well as one of its oldest, with some segments of the route dating to 1900. It’s long overdue for a modern overhaul, but current federal laws don’t offer much in the way of support for aging transit networks, making it much easier to get federal money if you’re starting from scratch. As an article in the Chicago Tribune describes it, the fate of the Red Line hinges on the work of the conference committee currently hashing out a national transportation bill:

Under existing federal transit rules and the House proposal, the Red Line replacement wouldn’t be eligible for “new starts” funding because the project is on an existing transit line.

The Senate bill, however, “recognizes common sense and says you’re building a new railroad,’’ [Chicago Transit Authority President Forrest] Claypool said. “It just happens to be within the existing right of way that is serving an increasing number of riders each year, despite its deteriorating condition.’’

Cost estimates for the rebuilding range from $2 billion to $4 billion depending on “options for new stations and other upgrades” according to the Tribune, and that’s only the first phase, covering about nine miles on the city’s north side. A planned 5.3-mile extension on the south side would cost an additional $1.4 billion, and is also on hold pending Congressional action.

Rebuilding the Red Line had been suggested as a possible use of financing from the new infrastructure trust, but it’s not clear how any borrowing would be paid back. Matt Sledge at the Huffington Post raised the point that Emanuel still hasn’t been specific about what kind of projects the trust will be able to finance — and who will benefit from them.

Absent some additional certainty in Washington, it seems increasingly unlikely that city hall can fill in all the gaps, even in a city with as much forward momentum as Chicago.

The Bikes Belong Foundation has chosen six cities to fast track physically protected bikeway designs that make cycling safer and more accessible to a wide range of people.

Photo: NYC DOT/Bikes Belong

Austin, Chicago, Memphis, Portland, San Francisco and Washington D.C. will receive a leg up from Bikes Belong’s new “Green Lane Project.” The two-year, intensive technical assistance program is intended to help these cities develop protected on-street bike lanes and make this type of bike infrastructure a mainstream street design in the U.S.

The program attracted a total of 42 applicants, said project director Martha Roskowski, from “established leaders such as Minneapolis and Boulder” to relative newcomers like Wichita, Miami, and Pittsburgh.

“They are a range of sizes, spread across the country, and at various stages in terms of developing networks for bicycles,” said Roskowski. “What they share is a strong commitment to rethinking how city streets are used and making room for bicycles.”

Bikes Belong expects cities across the nation to benefit from the program, whether or not they were selected. The idea is to help build technical expertise on the design and implementation of protected bike lanes, and to collect data on how they perform.

Protected bike lanes are widely employed in countries that have achieved high rates of cycling, such as the Netherlands. In America they were pioneered by the New York City Department of Transportation in 2007, and have since been implemented in Washington, D.C., Portland, and Chicago.

Protected lanes have been shown to be safer than biking in the street and more likely to encourage people to take up cycling. But they are considered “experimental” treatments in the gospel of traffic engineering, the Manual of Uniform Traffic Control Devices, which has stymied their adoption throughout the United States.

“The selected cities have ambitious goals and a vision for bicycling supported by their elected officials and communities,” said Bikes Belong President Tim Blumenthal. “They are poised to get projects on the ground quickly and will serve as excellent examples for other interested cities.”

The Green Lane Project represents a more focused iteration of the Bikes Belong Foundation’s Bicycling Design Best Practices Program, which has been dedicated to hosting workshops and taking city officials and engineers on study tours to leading U.S. and European cities.

Did John Boehner and and John Mica overreach with their proposal to strip dedicated funding for transit, cycling, and walking in the House transportation bill? That’s the question observers have been asking since House GOP leaders sprung this politicized legislation in committee last week.

It’s too soon to tell whether the bill will clear the House, but the list of Boehner’s members speaking out against it is growing longer.

Today, Crain’s Chicago reports that a trio of Chicagoland’s suburban Republicans have come out against the bill. Robert Dold, Judy Biggert, and Adam Kinzinger each had slightly different objections, but their dissatisfaction seems to stem from the provision that would transfer federal gas tax revenues from transit to roads. Crain’s is reporting that that provision of the bill could cost Chicago-area transit providers $450 million annually. The region also stands to lose $900 million annually in road funding if the bill passes.

A spokesman for Biggert told Crain’s: “She does not support the House bill in its current form due to concerns with its overall funding for Illinois, as well as its potential impact on long-term planning for Chicago and suburban rail systems.”

Meanwhile, Dold released a statement late yesterday, saying “he has concerns with the impact it will have on the environment, as well as the way it damages vital funding for the state of Illinois.”

The Illinois Chamber of Commerce has also come out against the bill, saying it “would put hundreds of millions of dollars for transit in real peril, while drastically reducing funding for Illinois highways.”

More House Republicans will have to reject the bill in order to kill its chances, but Crain’s reporter Greg Hinz believes that “Mr. Boehner will have to go to Plan B.”

Other Republicans opposing the bill in its current form include Ohio’s Steven LaTourette, Wisconsin’s Tom Petri and Illinois’ Tim Johnson. New York’s Peter King and Bob Turner have also expressed reservations about the proposal.