It’s been three years since the Yoda of city planning, Richard Florida, published “The Rise of the Creative Class,” the book that tarted up usually mundane topics like economic development and city planning and pimped them all over America. Rub ’em the right way, Florida preached, and the sexy duo would lure not only the technologically savvy and hip, but the tax-paying corporations desperate to hire them. The rules of attraction are myriad — Are you gay? Do you like gays? Does your city have irony, lots of indie coffee shops and a mayor whose ass doesn’t look fat in jeans? — but amenities like public transit, bike lanes and the ability to walk rather than drive are particularly vital.
Feeling Frogger? Massive intersections like this one at Breckenridge and Dutchman’s lanes are not exactly an inviting site to pedestrians. (photo by ben schneider) |
Creating a walkable community isn’t just an economic development scheme or something only city-dwellers appreciate, however. Walkable communities — where pedestrians and bicyclists can safely coexist with motorists — benefit everyone, says David Coyte, president of the Coalition for the Advancement of Regional Transportation, a Louisville organization that advocates for public transportation.
Backing him up is a report by the Surface Transportation Policy Project, released last month, which names Metro Louisville the 23rd most dangerous place for pedestrians among 50 similar-sized regions.
The city’s Department of Planning and Design Services is in the process of analyzing data on accidents in which pedestrians or bicyclists were injured or killed during the past two years. So far it doesn’t look much different than what analysts found when they reviewed data from 2000 through 2002. There were 695 traffic collisions involving one or more pedestrians in the city of Louisville during those three years; 230 in 2000; 255 in 2001; and 210 in 2002, according to the report. Seventeen were fatal, 131 resulted in an incapacitating injury to the pedestrian, and 261 resulted in relatively minor injuries for the pedestrian.
In areas like Crescent Hill where Coyte lives and works, it’s common to see people out walking. Numerous shops and restaurants in close proximity to one another encourage locals and visitors to stroll, dine and window-shop. There are also wide sidewalks and traffic lights at intersections to give pedestrians a reasonable chance to move around safely.
But some neighborhoods, particularly the more recently developed suburbs, don’t have the same amenities, says Mohammad Nouri, assistant director of Planning and Design. Most of the accidents between 2000 and 2002 occurred in areas with no traffic signals or crosswalks, according to the analysis. That’s not to say every accident was attributable to the design of the roadway or even the driver, however; about 37 percent were a result of pedestrians crossing in the wrong place. But the design of the roadway is certainly a factor.
Nouri looks at areas where accidents involving pedestrians and bikers occur and tries to find ways to reduce the risk of accidents in the future. When two cyclists were hit, one of whom was seriously injured, at the intersection of Seneca Park and Pee Wee Reese roads, Nouri’s department examined the area.
“We know that accidents are inevitable, but there’s a difference between accidents at 40 mph and accidents involving bicycles at 15 mph.”
So Planning and Design services changed the intersection from an informal traffic circle to a “T” intersection, with a new stop sign for northbound traffic on Pee Wee Reese Road reducing the speed for drivers turning from eastbound Seneca Park Road to southbound Pee Wee Reese Road, says Nouri. “Now you have to almost come to a stop before you make that turn.”
There’s more that can be done. Last year Nouri’s department and Metro Council members Tom Owen and Tina Ward-Pugh joined citizens from all over Louisville for a series of Walkable Community Workshops. The workshops were developed by the National Center for Bicycling & Walking, a non-profit organization with a mission to make every community “walkable.” They were held around the country, with participants talking about the benefits of neighborhoods designed for motorists and non-motorists alike, then taking a walk to experience for themselves how wide streets, speeding cars and a lack of sidewalks can create a human version of the classic Nintendo game Frogger. With similar odds for survival.
“We look at schools, we look at the neighborhoods because that’s where the connection is; you have to go to the post office, you have to go from your home to the grocery store,” Nouri says. “How do you get there and what makes getting there easier or more difficult and dangerous?”
There’s a surprising lack of sidewalks in parts of Metro Louisville and other cities developed with suburban commuters in mind, he says. There’s also a surprising lack of funding to install them. According to the Mean Streets report, states sp/files/storyimages/an average less than 1 percent of their federal transportation dollars on pedestrian and bicycle-friendly projects. Bridges, roadways and highways get an average of $90 per capita.
Kentucky spent about 1 percent of its federal transportation funds on pedestrian and bicycle safety between 1998 and 2003, according to the Mean Street report. If all goes as planned, millions will be spent widening highways and building bridges for all those citizens clamoring for a better way to get to Indiana. In the meantime, Nouri, Owen and Ward-Pugh are among those who’d like to see Metro Louisville include funding to increase pedestrian and bicycle safety in the budget in July.
Their wish list has lofty projects, such as a the creation of a bike path leading from Brown Memorial Park to nearby residences in St. Matthews and am overpass wide enough for pedestrians and bicycles at the intersection of Breckenridge and I-264. A return to discussions of light rail would be great, too, says Nouri. But if the city funds basic projects such as installing sidewalks and building medians for those who can’t make it all the way across wide streets, pedestrian safety would necessarily be improved significantly.
Another set of recommendations for improving safety will come from participants in next month’s Bicycle Summit. It’s being billed as an event hosted by Mayor Jerry Abramson, but it’s a group effort, says Earl Jones, president of the Louisville Bicycle Club. Nouri is one of the participants, and Jones is optimistic that the two-day planning session will result in solid ideas for making Louisville more attractive to locals and out-of-towners alike.
“The mayor has committed real dollars to the development of [bicycle and pedestrian] facilities that the city receives from the federal government and other sources that are unprecedented,” says Jones.
The Bicycle Summit is open to the public, but so many people have already signed up to att/files/storyimages/that even the waiting list is full. The public can still get involved by visiting the summit’s Web site at www.louisvillebicyclesummit.com. Comments and suggestions for making Metro Louisville more pedestrian- and bike-friendly can be sent to info@louisvillebicyclesummit.com. Comments received by Feb. 7 will be reviewed and shared at the summit. On Feb. 8, summit participants will present a list of recommendations to the mayor and post them on the summit’s Web site. Anyone who would like to comment on the recommendations can s/files/storyimages/an e-mail from the site.
Jones says what the community supports carries weight.
“[It says] it’s interested in young people, it’s interested in fitness and it’s interested in places where people are active, and those are the sort of places that people want to be in,” he says.
Contact the writer at rrenford@leoweekly.com
