I'm Back

So I am back in NYC after two long weeks in the Pacific Northwest. I have not been to all four cities (Portland, Seattle, Vancouver, and Victoria) since 1999. It was great to go back but a lot has changed. I must say I was impressed with Victoria (especially the greenway/trails) and Portland for the ease of walking, great public transit, and bike infrastructure, although, I felt the downtown was lacking in comparison to downtown Minneapolis.


Over the next few days I will post about each city and the things I really enjoyed and didn't like. It was interesting to go back to these cities and have a fresh perspective and view things more from a urban planning point of view. Seattle and Vancouver, at least for me, did not live up to all the hype they get and the high cost of living.

Here is my list from best liked city to least:

1. Portland, OR
2. Victoria, BC
3. Seattle, WA
4. Vancouver, BC

Vacation in the Northwest

Posts will be few and far between since I am in the Northwest on a trip. Here are some pics.

Magic Highway

Park(ing) Day - Seattle

I am on a trip in the Northwest. Came across Parking Day in Seattle.

Downside of the Chinatown Bus

I will admit from the get go that I use the Chinatown buses a lot. They are affordable, your bike can easily be locked in the cargo hold, and they are a great alternative to the train or greyhound. This Gotham Gazette article does point out that they are still a major problem in Chinatown. I would beg to differ, are the buses causing the congestion or are they just another vehicle in a larger broken down traffic circulation pattern. For those not in the NE this is why they are so popular:

The trip from New York to Boston on Amtrak is $89. By car, at $4 for a gallon of gas, the 220-mile drive costs somewhere about $30, without tolls. The Fung Wah or Lucky Star bus leaving from Canal Street or Chrystie Street respectively is $15, and their upscale neighbor, the Bolt Bus, which departs from the sidewalk outside of Penn Station, is about $20 with a reserved seat and wireless internet. Given the economics, it's no surprise that the bus business is booming.

In 2006, Michael Lau, the commanding officer of the Fifth Precinct, told the City Council Transportation Committee that the crowding of discount buses in Chinatown brings dangerously congested streets, the possibility of accidents and even violence as bus operators compete for parking spots and passengers. He claimed that 30 different bus companies dispatch more than 100 buses each day from Chinatown's curbsides.

As the end of the article suggests, it has long been over due that the city embrace this vital service for many and find ways to make it work for the bus companies, the neighborhoods, and the city as a whole. NYC does lack vision when it comes to planning for buses (of all kinds), but I really don't think a solution is all that hard if the city was willing to close a few blocks to traffic and make it a transit mall for all the different bus operations. I think it could work just fine and law enforcement would be easier. Here is a longer story in the NY Times about the buses.

Why all the hate?

The popular real estate blog Brownstoner had a post about cyclists dismounting at the bottom of the Brooklyn Bridge on the Brookyln side. Of course the 38 comments turned into a us against them argument. For some reason (actually many reasons) pedestrians, drivers, and cyclists are in a battle over the street space. This comment is the typical NIMBY knee jerk reaction that is making NYC a place where progress is very hard to come by.

The bike lanes are stupid. The bikers are stupid. You still live in a metropolis where there are cars and trucks and buses. Biking should be in the parks ONLY. For the new bikers that ride bikes with flip flops, ipods, and ice coffees in there hand and big sunglasses trying to steer a bike can be quite difficult. Also, I thought riding on sidewalks were a no no anyway next time I see a biker riding on a sidewalk they will get knocked down because its uncalled for. Oh! before I forget what they did to Vanderbilt ave in Prospect Heights is really stupid, with all of the traffic that has been there for years you go and put bike lanes and pedestrian islands in the middle of the ave. Now you have the existing traffic, bike lanes, and pedestrian crossing islands. I would like to be there when the horrific accident happens so I can say I told you so.

Cars have a right to the road. Pedestrians have a right to the road. Bicyclists have a right to the road. Let's redesign our roads so all have equal access.

Reinventing Grand Army Plaza

The design competition is done and all 30 designs are on display in Grand Army Plaza. Many of the designs neglect to actually deal with the current traffic issues and connecting the plaza to prospect park. It seems that many are not so happy with the plans that made the cut. Here is a comment that pretty much sums it up over at city room:

The ‘plaza’ area of Grand Army Plaza is a majestic, glorious public space designed by the inimitable team of Olmstead and Vaux, and is in absolutely no need of any ‘imagining’ or re-design — particularly not if the re-design is chosen via competition, which has proven in recent years to be a very poor and problematic method of soliciting the best designs for public projects (example: WTC memorial, Queens Museum of Art, etc..).

I would like to propose that the “problem” at Grand Army Plaza is not a landscape architectural problem, rather, a traffic engineering problem, and that the periphery of the plaza alone could use a redesign - not the interior, which, thank you very much, we in Brooklyn like just as it is.

Perhaps if the Design Trust truly had any stake in what’s most appropriate for Brooklyn, or had any sense of reverence for the democratic vision of Olmstead and Vaux, this would be apparent. As it is, this effort smacks of the same lethal combination of mediocre talent, opportunism, political access, and deep pockets that made possible Atlantic Yards, Frank Gehry’s outsized, outdated superblock-style monstrosity that no doubt has Jane Jacobs tossing in her grave… oh, Bruce Ratner is a supporter of this endeavor.

We in Brooklyn need to ask, who are the people behind these efforts to “reimagine” parts of our community? Particularly if a cursory look at the cast of characters includes sleazy Manhattan developers, a nonprofit with dubious qualifications, and — I mean, take a look at the exhibit itself. It’s a Manhattan graphic and display design sensibility, “giant cubes” just slapped down in the middle of Brooklyn.

As a New York Times editorial noted in 1963, after the demolition of Old Penn Station in Manhattan, “a civilization gets what it wants, is willing to pay for, and ultimately deserves” and “we will probably be judged not by the monuments we build but by those we have destroyed.” The misinformation in recent articles regarding GAP and its functionality is starting to sound suspiciously like some of the rhetoric employed during the architecturally disastrous urban renewal period… a period very harmful to the architectural consciousness of the city.
Where are the design professionals - architects, landscape architects, etc., - of Brooklyn on this matter? Has anyone else opened up The Death and Life of Great American Cities lately? (No comment on the architecturally vapid and environmentally stupid -glass curtain wall- Meier towers)…

Does anyone else have a problem with rich folks and dilletantes making decisions for Brooklyn?
— Posted by A Brooklyn Design Professional

That pretty much sums up the way I feel about the designs that made the final cut. While one does seem to create recreation for the residents. Check out all 30 and see what you think.