Recent Streetsblog NYC posts about Traffic

Seattle’s “Viadoom 2016” — Another Carmageddon That Wasn’t

By Angie Schmitt | May 16, 2016 | No Comments

Heard this one before? The temporary closure of Seattle’s Alaskan Way Viaduct to accommodate construction — code name: “Viadoom” — was going paralyze the city. The elevated highway carries about 110,000 vehicles a day. Without it, travel times would soar 50 percent, predicted the traffic analytics firm Inrix. The highway was closed from April 29 to May 8, […]

STREETSBLOG USA

U.S. DOT Blows Chance to Reform the City-Killing, Planet-Broiling Status Quo

By Angie Schmitt | Apr 19, 2016 | No Comments

The Obama administration purportedly wants to use the lever of transportation policy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx recently said he’d like to reverse the damage highways caused in urban neighborhoods, but you’d never know that by looking at U.S. DOT’s latest policy prescription. U.S. DOT has drafted new rules requiring state DOTs to track their […]

Robert Rodriguez Introduces Toll Reform Bill in State Assembly

By Ben Fried | Mar 24, 2016 | 51 Comments

For the first time, a state legislator is sponsoring legislation in Albany to enact the Move NY toll reform plan. By creating a more rational toll system in New York City, the plan would significantly reduce traffic and raise revenue to invest in improving transit. Assembly Member Robert Rodriguez introduced a bill today, A09633, that would […]

STREETSBLOG USA

More Driving, More People Dying on America’s Streets

By Angie Schmitt | Feb 9, 2016 | No Comments

On Friday, the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration released new data [PDF] showing that traffic deaths are up. Up quite a bit. During the first nine months of 2015, 26,000 Americans were killed in traffic collisions — a 9.3 percent increase over the same period in 2014. According to Autoblog, that would work out to the highest one-year percentage […]

STREETSBLOG USA

The Feds Want to Reform the Cult of “Level of Service”

By Angie Schmitt | Jan 28, 2016 | No Comments

“What you measure is what you get,” the saying goes. That’s certainly true for transportation policy. And for a very long time one metric has reigned supreme on American streets: “Level of Service,” a system that assigns letter grades based on motorist delay. Roughly speaking, a street with free-flowing traffic gets an A while one where […]

STREETSBLOG USA

The Feds Aren’t Crowing About the Record Amount of Driving in America

By Angie Schmitt | Jan 26, 2016 | No Comments

Gas is as cheap as ever, and cumulatively, Americans are driving a record amount. Newly released U.S. DOT data shows that through the end of November, Americans drove a cumulative 2.88 trillion miles last year, well above the same period in 2014, indicating that 2015 will set a new national record for driving mileage. Adjusting for population growth, driving […]

Show More Stories