Angie Schmitt
Angie is a Cleveland-based writer with a background in planning and newspaper reporting. She has been writing about cities for Streetsblog for six years.
Recent Posts
Inspiration for Turning Decrepit Public Staircases Into Beautiful Places
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In cities with steep hills, public staircases can be an important piece of the walking network. Like any type of infrastructure, however, sometimes cities let their staircases fall apart. Randy Simes at Urban Cincy says that’s happening to many of Cincinnati’s public stairs right now. To turn around that situation, he points to Seoul, South Korea, for inspiration: Many […]
Brutal Jaywalking Arrest in Austin Caught on Video
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Austin police were captured on video beating a group of “jaywalkers” into submission late last Wednesday in an incident that reeks of racial profiling. The arrest was recorded and shared on Facebook by Rolando Ramiro. He told the website Photography is Not a Crime that he and a group of friends were trying to cross a street that had been blocked […]
A Plea for City Leaders to Support Smart Projects, Not Crony Subsidies
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Darin Givens at ATL Urbanist is retiring his blog after five years writing about city planning in Atlanta. Thinking about the future of Atlanta in his final post, he touched on something important and universal: Who gets public resources, and what types of projects should city leaders support? City leaders bend over backwards as they prioritize mega developments like […]
Every Traffic Fatality in the U.S. — Mapped
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What is the most dangerous street in your region? Which one most needs improvements to protect cyclists? Where do drunk drivers do the most damage? Thanks to a new tool from New York City data scientist Max Galka, you can get a pretty good sense with a few clicks. Galka recently completed a map of every traffic […]
How to Turn a Dead Mall Into Walkable Place
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Built on a 136-acre site in the heart of a walkable, inner-ring suburb in 1962, Severance was the first mall in the Cleveland area. And over the years, it has mirrored every trend in retail, morphing from an indoor mall to a big-box anchored “shopping center.” But the site recently lost its anchor — the […]
Just How Bad Is the Final House Transportation Bill?
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Nobody was expecting the GOP-controlled House of Representatives to put together a transportation bill that did much for streets and transit in American cities. And they were right — there’s nothing to get excited about in the bill. But neither is it the total disaster for walking, biking, and transit it could have been. So how does the House bill […]
Funds for San Diego “Park” Go Mostly to Free Parking for County Employees
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Nobody’s going to give San Diego County an award for park planning — we hope! — on its “Waterfront Park project,” which is more accurately described as the “subsidized garage project.” Grinning county officials recently cut the ribbon on a $36 million parking garage that will be free for county employees. With 640 spaces, the […]
Transit vs. Highways: Which Came Out on Top in Local Elections?
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There were several local ballot measures with big implications for streets and transportation yesterday, and results were all over the map. Here’s how three of the most notable votes turned out. Seattle’s property tax increase to fund walking, biking, and transit Voters have spoken and they decided to enact Move Seattle, the $900 million property tax levy for transportation. […]
State Funds for Transit in Ohio Have “Evaporated” Since 2000
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A lot of revenue-starved transit agencies around the country have been skimping on essential maintenance, and one of the more dire cases is in Cleveland, Ohio. Cleveland has a rail system built in the 1960s and 70s that runs mostly on former freight rights-of-way. Sprawl has been eating away at ridership, but it still moves a fair […]
3 Bright Prospects for a Better Transportation Bill
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Yesterday we reported on some of the terrible amendments that might get tacked on to the House transportation bill this week. But there are also some good ideas with bipartisan support among the hundreds of amendments submitted by members of the House. Here are three amendments that have the potential to improve transportation policy in the U.S. — should legislators give […]
Will Federal Oversight Help or Hinder DC Transit?
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The feds have taken over safety oversight of D.C.’s embattled Metro, and that could actually be cause for concern, says David Alpert at Greater Greater Washington. U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx laid out his vision for safety-related reforms under the aegis of the Federal Transit Administration in a recent piece in the Washington Post. One person was killed when smoke filled […]
Funds for Walking and Biking Under Attack in Congress This Week
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Funds for walking and biking infrastructure account for a tiny portion of federal transportation spending. Safer streets don’t cost much, though, so for the cities and towns that count on these programs, a few dollars from the feds can be a huge help. Despite the relatively small sums at play, walking and biking programs are a constant […]