Wednesday’s Headlines

By Blake Aued | | 1 Comment
  • Why can’t Trump build anything? Because Republicans don’t really care about investing in public infrastructure, according to the Times’s Paul Krugman.
  • What is going on in Colorado? A man is facing murder charges after allegedly intentionally hitting a pedestrian with his car. (The Denver Channel) Another man was shot and killed in a “long running parking spot feud.” (NY Post) And a jury awarded a cyclist who was paralyzed when a driver hit him in 2017 $52 million, one of the largest judgements in Colorado history. (Denver Post)
  • Two bills in the Washington state legislature would let cities expand the use of automated traffic cameras, for example to catch drivers blocking bus-only lanes. (My Northwest)
  • Electric cars, bike trails and pedestrian improvements near schools are among projects recently funded by the Twin Cities’ Metro Council. (Pioneer Press)
  • While gentrification is a concern, black leaders in Durham, N.C. say they see the benefits of light rail in connecting neighborhoods, creating jobs and providing access to jobs. (Raleigh News & Observer)
  • Uber is suing to overturn New York City’s cap on new licenses for ride-hailing vehicles. (The Drive)
  • Sidewalk Labs, the Google sister company that’s planning a waterfront “smart” neighborhood in Toronto, wants to expand the city’s light rail system. (New Civil Engineer)
  • Moscow’s public transit puts the D.C. Metro to shame. (Mobility Lab)
  • Note to Atlanta drivers: Cars are not one of the multiple uses for a multi-use path. (Curbed)
  • New York’s mayor says he wants to do more to protect cyclists, about 10,000 of whom are injured every year by drivers in the Big Apple. (StreetsblogNYC)

Tuesday’s Headlines

By Blake Aued | | 4 Comments
  • President Trump — who used to complain that China had faster trains than the U.S. — is now using passenger rail as a wedge issue. (CNN)
  • The federal funding bill Trump recently signed does include $800 million for transit. (Florida Politics) It also removed a longstanding ban on light rail in Richmond, Va. (Chron)
  • Is Uber’s business model sustainable? As the ride-hailing company prepares to go public, it announced that it lost $1.8 billion in 2017 despite a 43-percent increase in revenue. (The Drive)
  • Cops are writing fewer tickets in Denver while fatal crashes are trending upward. Safer infrastructure is the long-term solution, but safety advocates say the city needs to do more to enforce traffic laws in the meantime. (Denver Post)
  • And in Washington, D.C., parking tickets issued by police are on pace to fall again this year, continuing a decade-long slide. So far in 2019, the city has issued just one citation for blocking a bus stop and one for blocking a bus lane. (WTOP) The station also reports that the city is considering a tougher ban on drivers who block bike lanes.
  • If Tampa had a decent transit system, maybe the Tampa Bay Times wouldn’t have to ask where 80,000 “Hamilton” fans will park.
  • Atlanta residents strongly support Complete Streets, according to the city official who’s overseeing two massive programs for public works. (Saporta Report)
  • Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz is expected to propose a gas-tax hike when he unveils his budget today. (WCCO)
  • Readers accused a San Jose Mercury News columnist of victim-blaming after he suggested that pedestrians should wear bright clothing.
  • French drivers might hate having to drive more slowly — so much so that “yellow vest” protesters destroyed speed traps — but reducing the speed limit to 80 kilometers (50 miles) per hour worked. Six months after the change, traffic deaths are at an all-time low. (National Post)

Monday’s Headlines

By Blake Aued | | 1 Comment
  • California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s decision to drastically scale back plans for a Los Angeles-San Francisco bullet train is a gift to anti-transit Republicans. (Politico) He ensured Americans won’t get to experience modern rail travel for another generation. (Fortune)
  • A new study says that bike- and scooter-shares are hurting bus ridership, but trains and subways benefit. Bus trips tend to be just a couple of miles, which can easily be ridden on a bike or scooter. People also rent bikes and scooters to ride to the train station. (Government Technology)
  • The Federal Transit Administration is threatening to withhold $1.6 billion, including funding to build Maryland’s Purple Line, if the D.C. Metro restores late-night service. Critics of extending hours say it would cut into needed maintenance time. (Washington Post) In part because of the threat, a Metro committee voted last week to keep the current hours. (WAMU)
  • The Post also reports that Maryland is planning to add toll lanes to I-270 and the Beltway. And Georgia legislators are pushing for a whole new interstate: I-14, which would run from west Texas to Augusta. (WSB-TV)
  • New York City’s mayor penned an op-ed in the Times after Amazon took its ball and went home rather than deal with predictable local opposition — but that predictable local opposition had been ignored by Mayor de Blasio and Gov. Cuomo when they decided to give a $3-billion handout to the richest man in the world.
  • While Democrats in Gwinnett County vocally support expanding transit into the rapidly changing Atlanta suburb, most Republicans don’t want to talk about it either way. (AJC)
  • New Orleans’s transit authority is eliminating stops along the Canal Street streetcar line in hopes of speeding up ride times. (The Advocate)
  • Biking, walking and transit groups are asking Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine for a cut if the state raises its gas tax. (Cincinnati Inquirer)
  • Federal authorities are investigating potential fiscal mismanagement of a Honolulu light-rail project. (Civil Beat)
  • Awwwww. An Oklahoma City couple got married on the streetcar on Valentine’s Day. (KOCO)

Friday’s Headlines

By Blake Aued | | 1 Comment
  • Eighty percent of Capital Bikeshare’s users are white, and 90 percent of its stations are in white neighborhoods. (DCist) With transportation equity (or the lack thereof) in the news a lot lately, maybe that’s why Lyft is offering free rides (up to $10) to African-American historical and cultural sites in New York, Atlanta, Chicago and L.A. for Black History Month. (The Grio)
  • D.C. Metro is considering subsidizing ride-hailing trips in lieu of extending hours, which the transit agency says would jeopardize train and track maintenance. (Washington Post)
  • The Charlotte Area Transit system is moving toward opting for bus rapid transit over rail along I-77. Light rail is out, although CATS hasn’t completely given up on negotiations with Norfolk-Southern to use its freight tracks, even though the company doesn’t seem interested in sharing. The BRT line between Charlotte and Mooresville could open in five to 10 years. (WCNC)
  • Crosscut profiles Barb Chamberlain, bike advocate turned director of active transportation for the Washington State DOT.
  • A $101-million air-quality bill in the Utah legislature could fund a fare-free transit pilot program. (Deseret News)
  • Missouri splits a meager $1.7 million in state funding for public transit among 34 different local agencies. (Democrat News)
  • Even conservatives are turning on Streetsblog nemesis Randal O’Toole’s anti-transit rhetoric. (Urban Milwaukee)
  • The Des Moines City Council killed a road diet based on the fallacious belief that road diets slow down emergency vehicles. They often improve response times. (Register)
  • We got excited when we saw a headline saying Idaho’s Republican Gov. Brad Little is in favor of “more money for transit,” but then we found out that by “transit,” he meant high-occupancy lanes for cars. (BoiseDev)
  • Popular Science says computers can learn to be better drivers than humans. Great, let’s put them in charge of our missile defense system.
  • Need a laugh? Check out these 18 terrible parking jobs. (Carbuzz)

Thursday’s Headlines

By Blake Aued | | 1 Comment
  • Only a month after taking office and a week after the Green New Deal highlighted the need for more passenger rail, California Gov. Gavin Newsom is drastically scaling back a San Francisco-to-Los Angeles high-speed rail line. (City Lab; more at Streetsblog CAL)
  • The Washington Post editorial board buys into D.C. Metro officials’ argument that extending hours will make the transit system less safe by cutting into the amount of time available for maintenance. Metro’s safety committee is scheduled to vote today on a resolution to keep the current hours.
  • Pretty much everyone in San Antonio has given up on building light rail. Well, bus rapid transit it is. (Express News)
  • Traffic deaths are rising in Dallas and Houston, but they’re slowly declining in Austin even as the city has grown. Still, Austin’s rate of traffic deaths is nine times higher than New York City’s. (Monitor)
  • Two Twin Cities rail lines had more riders than ever in 2018, but overall Metro Transit ridership was down. Officials said low gas prices, a bus driver shortage, construction and a fare increase were responsible for the dip. (Fox 9)
  • Philadelphia now has an interactive online map showing where construction is blocking sidewalks. (Enquirer)
  • Georgia lawmakers are fast-tracking a bill requiring drivers to stop for school buses where kids are getting on or off in the opposite lane. They relaxed the requirement last year, but now fear that if they don’t act, children will die. (AJC)
  • Ditching your car and Ubering everywhere doesn’t make financial sense, but if you mix in transit, bike-shares and scooters, it might. (Motor Trend)
  • Cupertino, Calif., now has bright orange flags pedestrians can wave in front of drivers right before they get pancaked because the city did nothing to slow down drivers. (San Jose Mercury News)
  • Happy Valentine’s Day! Six Uber drivers who’ve seen it all give you their relationship advice. (Bustle)
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