Sound Transit in Seattle recently commissioned a survey to gauge support for pumping $15 billion into light rail expansion from local taxes. About 1,500 voters were interviewed by phone in Snohomish, King, and Pierce counties about their appetite for such an increase. The questions were phrased neutrally and showed “overwhelming” support for continuing to expand transit options […]

Buford Highway north of Atlanta is the deadliest road for pedestrians in the region. Though lined with residences of people with low incomes, the high-speed, high-traffic road has no continuous sidewalk. Lacking dedicated infrastructure, pedestrians have worn paths in the grass all around it. (See more photos below.) Darin at UrbanATL says these paths are a […]

Back in September we wrote about the various ways the Koch brothers are using their money to upend local transit projects. Four months later, Koch money is intensifying the assault against two more transit lines. Right now in the DC region, opponents of the Purple Line are trotting out Koch-funded “expert” Randall O’Toole, whom the press […]

In the competition to be the worst state for transit, Georgia is one of the clear standouts. The state contributes nothing — yep, zilch! — to Atlanta’s transit system, even as the region grapples with an increasingly crippling traffic and car dependence problem. State leaders are now pushing for a gas tax increase that would […]

What do people mean when they say a city has “good bones”? Well, if the streets are laid out in a walkable grid pattern, that can be the “skeleton” for a healthy urban environment. The United States used to regularly build places with “good bones” up until around the 1920s, writes Robert Steuteville at Better […]

The killing of Baltimore cyclist Thomas Palermo by a high-ranking official in the Episcopal Church two days after Christmas has caught the attention of the national media, raising questions about justice, fairness, and accountability. After declining to file charges immediately after the crash, the state’s attorney’s office finally announced on Friday that Bishop Heather Cook, the […]

A new report commissioned by Ohio DOT recommends that the state should double its funding for transit. At Notes from the Underground, Jason Segedy welcomes this  development, but he also notes that in many places, simply expanding transit funding won’t be enough, on its own, to make transit appealing. Places like Ohio need to complement additional […]

New Jersey governor and Republican presidential hopeful Chris Christie is back in the news for a decision that says a lot about his legacy. Over the Christmas holiday, Christie and his New York counterpart, Andrew Cuomo, vetoed legislation to reform the bi-state Port Authority, which among other responsibilities handles transportation infrastructure linking New Jersey and […]

Traffic engineers have an maddening tendency to hold out “Level of Service” — a measure of motorist delay — like a trump card. We need to widen this road, they’ll say, because otherwise drivers will angrily stew in traffic, and then there might be “accidents,” or some other dire consequence. That’s what’s happening right now […]