Clarence Eckerson Jr.
Clarence Eckerson Jr. is the Director of Video Production for NYCSR's StreetFilms and producer of bikeTV. He loves the color purple, chocolate chip cookies, and enjoys walking, biking, and taking transit. He has never owned a driver's license.
Recent Posts
Touring Copenhagen’s Car-Free Bridges
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One of the things that makes Copenhagen great is the city is continually finding ways to make biking and walking better — like building car-free bridges. Bicycle Program Manager Marie Kastrup was very kind to take me on a tour of some of the bike and pedestrian bridges Copenhagen has constructed in the last decade. […]
How to Build a Thriving, Equitable Bike-Share System
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Bike-share has the capability to expand access to jobs and transit for communities in need of better transportation options — but only if the system is set up and operated in an equitable way. Our latest collaboration with the National Association of City Transportation Officials (NACTO) examines how to build a thriving, equitable bike-share system. At the end […]
Biking on Amsterdam Avenue in NYC — Now More Like Biking in Amsterdam
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Getting a protected bike lane on NYC’s Amsterdam Avenue was an epic struggle. This year, safe streets finally won. Amsterdam Avenue is a neighborhood street on the Upper West Side, but it was designed like a highway with several lanes of one-way motor vehicle traffic. Local residents campaigned for nearly ten years to repurpose one of […]
What Every Elected Should Say About Speed Cameras
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When City Council member Jimmy Van Bramer talks about street safety and automated enforcement, the message is clear: speeding is always wrong, it’s dangerous, and anyone who gets a ticket needs to change their behavior. In NYC, you have to be driving 11 mph or more above the speed limit to trigger a camera ticket. With a $50 […]
Santa Monica’s Savvy Multimodalism
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Santa Monica is trying just about everything in its transportation system: bike-share, a mix of bike lane treatments, a new rail line, neighborhood greenways, a pedestrian action plan, a new promenade/protected bike lane where the Expo line terminates, and of course they have the hard-to-miss Big Blue Bus! In the last six months alone the city has launched Breeze […]
Streetfilms Shortie: Double-Parking Insanity in the Jay Street Bike Lane
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While out collecting footage yesterday, one of my missions was to document a whole bunch of street conditions that NYC DOT is actively working to improve. One was the chronic double-parking that has overrun the Jay Street bike lane in Downtown Brooklyn forever. The level of disregard for the bike lane is just about unmatched anywhere else in […]
Ride the New Pulaski Bridge Bikeway With Streetfilms
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Today was a milestone for traveling between Brooklyn and Queens: NYC DOT opened the Pulaski Bridge bike path to lots of cheers with a celebratory ride. Before today, the Pulaski Bridge walking and biking path was dangerously congested, with more pedestrians and cyclists crammed on to its narrow right-of-way every year. The solution? Convert one lane of the roadway to a two-way […]
High Frequency: Why Houston Is Back on the Bus
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Every so often, every city should do a “system reimagining” of its bus network like Houston METRO did. Back in 2012, Houston’s bus network was in trouble. Ridership was down, and weekend ridership was especially weak. Frequent service was rare. Routes didn’t go directly where people needed to go. If you wanted to get from one place […]
Five Eclectic Questions for Streetfighter Janette Sadik-Khan
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Right before former New York City Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan set off on a multi-city book tour for Streetfight (along with co-author Seth Solomonow), I was able to get a few minutes to ask her five eclectic questions in Washington Square Park. Want to know the story behind the appearance of hundreds of cheap lawn chairs on opening day in car-free Times […]
Peatónito in NYC: Protecting Pedestrians in the Crosswalk
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Peatónito (“little pedestrian”) might be the most beloved figure in the world of street safety. How can you not love a superhero who protects pedestrians from cars?! Since donning the cape and luchador mask three years ago, he’s become a media sensation in Mexico. This week he’s in New York City for Transportation Alternatives’ Vision Zero for Cities 2016 conference, […]
The Gaman Spirit: Why Cycling Works in Tokyo
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In Tokyo, bicycling accounts for 14 percent of all trips. Yet Tokyo does not have the cycling infrastructure of Amsterdam or even Hamburg. As much as wider bike lanes would help, Tokyo residents will bike regardless. If there’s no bike lane, they’ll just hop on the sidewalk or wherever they feel safe. Joe Baur produced […]
If You Want to Buy a Car in Japan…
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If you want to buy a car in Japan, first you have to prove that you have somewhere to park it. That’s one of the policies Streetfilms encountered while interviewing experts for an upcoming three-part series on parking best practices. Here’s a sneak peek courtesy of Streetfilms correspondent Joe Baur, who grabbed this interview about the costs of car […]