Friday’s Headlines to End the Week in Style

  • Bike booms in the 1890s and 1970s didn’t last, but the current bike craze doesn’t have to end that way — if the federal government finally stops privileging automobiles and starts embracing bikes. (City Lab)
  • AI isn’t just for self-driving cars. It could help create a more efficient and sustainable transportation system. (Cities Today) (It’s also helpful for the pushers of conspiracy theories, as NBC News reported.)
  • The pandemic is forcing cities to find new and creative ways to gather public input. (The Grist)
  • A Congressional Black Caucus study on equity in transportation found that one-fifth of Black households don’t have a car; a quarter can’t use ride-hailing apps because they don’t have a smartphone; and 12 percent of the population is Black, but they make up 24 percent of transit users. (WTOP)
  • An Iranian immigrant’s experiences with racism and harassment on the bus led her into the field of planning. (GreenBiz)
  • A City Fix podcast examines how street safety is a sustainability issue.
  • A California judge says freedom of speech allows Uber to use in-app messages to pressure drivers into supporting Prop 22. (The Verge)
  • Service cuts at New York City’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority could cost an estimated 450,000 jobs and $50 billion in lost earnings. (NY Times)
  • Maryland’s Democratic congressmen are pressing Gov. Larry Hogan to finish the Purple Line after contractors quit the project due to a dispute over cost overruns. (Washington Post)
  • Traffic deaths are up 60 percent in Philadelphia, where drivers have killed 120 people so far this year, compared to 75 at this point last year. (Philly Voice)
  • Arkansas’s new 10-year transit plan will shorten trip times and add more frequency in Little Rock and Fayetteville, if voters approved a $42-million tax. (Democrat-Gazette)
  • With help from $100 million in federal coronavirus funding, Utah transit will restore almost all pre-COVID service next year. (Salt Lake Tribune)
  • A Nashville man is suing the city over an ordinance requiring homeowners to build sidewalks in front of their houses or pay into a sidewalk fund. (WSMV)
  • Like many transit agencies, San Francisco’s Muni has a limit on bus passengers during the pandemic. When one driver recently tried to avoid overcrowding the bus, hilarity ensued. (SFist)
  • And, finally, some good news about the upcoming civil war: At least Walmart has stopped displaying guns. (NYDN)

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By Tanya Snyder |
Before the end of this year, the Federal Highway Administration will release its own guidance on designing protected bike lanes. The agency’s positions on bicycling infrastructure has matured in recent years. Until recently, U.S. DOT’s policy was simple adherence to outdated and stodgy manuals like AASHTO’s Green Book and FHWA’s own Manual on Uniform Traffic […]

Why Aren’t American Bike-Share Systems Living Up to Their Potential?

By Angie Schmitt |
As policy director at the New York City Department of Transportation from 2007 to June, 2014, Jon Orcutt shepherded the nation’s largest bike-share system through the earliest stages of planning, a wide-ranging public engagement process, and, last year, the rollout of hundreds of Citi Bike stations. That makes Orcutt, formerly of Transportation Alternatives and the Tri-State Transportation […]