4 ways to make a city more walkable
-
0:01 - 0:04So I'm here to talk to you
about the walkable city. -
0:04 - 0:05What is the walkable city?
-
0:05 - 0:08Well, for want of a better definition,
-
0:08 - 0:15it's a city in which the car
is an optional instrument of freedom, -
0:15 - 0:16rather than a prosthetic device.
-
0:17 - 0:19And I'd like to talk about
why we need the walkable city, -
0:19 - 0:24and I'd like to talk about
how to do the walkable city. -
0:24 - 0:28Most of the talks I give these days
are about why we need it, -
0:28 - 0:31but you guys are smart.
-
0:32 - 0:36And also I gave that talk
exactly a month ago, -
0:36 - 0:38and you can see it at TED.com.
-
0:38 - 0:41So today I want to talk
about how to do it. -
0:41 - 0:43In a lot of time thinking about this,
-
0:43 - 0:46I've come up with what I call
the general theory of walkability. -
0:46 - 0:49A bit of a pretentious term,
it's a little tongue-in-cheek, -
0:49 - 0:51but it's something
I've thought about for a long time, -
0:51 - 0:55and I'd like to share
what I think I've figured out. -
0:55 - 0:58In the American city,
the typical American city -- -
0:58 - 1:00the typical American city
is not Washington, DC, -
1:00 - 1:02or New York, or San Francisco;
-
1:02 - 1:05it's Grand Rapids or Cedar
Rapids or Memphis -- -
1:05 - 1:09in the typical American city
in which most people own cars -
1:09 - 1:11and the temptation
is to drive them all the time, -
1:11 - 1:15if you're going to get them to walk,
then you have to offer a walk -
1:15 - 1:17that's as good as a drive or better.
-
1:17 - 1:18What does that mean?
-
1:18 - 1:20It means you need to offer
four things simultaneously: -
1:20 - 1:22there needs to be a proper reason to walk,
-
1:22 - 1:25the walk has to be safe and feel safe,
-
1:25 - 1:27the walk has to be comfortable
-
1:27 - 1:28and the walk has to be interesting.
-
1:28 - 1:31You need to do all four
of these things simultaneously, -
1:31 - 1:33and that's the structure of my talk today,
-
1:33 - 1:35to take you through each of those.
-
1:35 - 1:38The reason to walk
is a story I learned from my mentors, -
1:38 - 1:40Andrés Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk,
-
1:40 - 1:42the founders of the New Urbanism movement.
-
1:42 - 1:46And I should say half the slides
and half of my talk today -
1:46 - 1:47I learned from them.
-
1:47 - 1:49It's the story of planning,
-
1:49 - 1:52the story of the formation
of the planning profession. -
1:52 - 1:57When in the 19th century
people were choking -
1:57 - 2:00from the soot of the dark, satanic mills,
-
2:00 - 2:04the planners said, hey, let's move
the housing away from the mills. -
2:04 - 2:07And lifespans increased
immediately, dramatically, -
2:08 - 2:09and we like to say
-
2:09 - 2:12the planners have been trying to repeat
that experience ever since. -
2:12 - 2:15So there's the onset
of what we call Euclidean zoning, -
2:15 - 2:19the separation of the landscape
into large areas of single use. -
2:19 - 2:21And typically when I arrive
in a city to do a plan, -
2:21 - 2:25a plan like this already awaits me
on the property that I'm looking at. -
2:25 - 2:27And all a plan like this guarantees
-
2:27 - 2:29is that you will not have a walkable city,
-
2:29 - 2:32because nothing is located
near anything else. -
2:32 - 2:36The alternative, of course,
is our most walkable city, -
2:36 - 2:38and I like to say, you know,
this is a Rothko, -
2:38 - 2:40and this is a Seurat.
-
2:40 - 2:42It's just a different way --
he was the pointilist -- -
2:42 - 2:44it's a different way of making places.
-
2:44 - 2:47And even this map of Manhattan
is a bit misleading -
2:47 - 2:51because the red color
is uses that are mixed vertically. -
2:51 - 2:54So this is the big story
of the New Urbanists -- -
2:54 - 2:56to acknowledge
that there are only two ways -
2:56 - 2:59that have been tested by the thousands
-
2:59 - 3:02to build communities,
in the world and throughout history. -
3:02 - 3:04One is the traditional neighborhood.
-
3:04 - 3:07You see here several neighborhoods
of Newburyport, Massachusetts, -
3:07 - 3:11which is defined as being compact
and being diverse -- -
3:11 - 3:15places to live, work, shop,
recreate, get educated -- -
3:16 - 3:17all within walking distance.
-
3:17 - 3:20And it's defined as being walkable.
-
3:20 - 3:21There are lots of small streets.
-
3:21 - 3:23Each one is comfortable to walk on.
-
3:23 - 3:25And we contrast that to the other way,
-
3:25 - 3:28an invention that happened
after the Second World War, -
3:28 - 3:30suburban sprawl,
-
3:30 - 3:34clearly not compact, clearly not diverse,
and it's not walkable, -
3:34 - 3:36because so few of the streets connect,
-
3:36 - 3:39that those streets that do connect
become overburdened, -
3:39 - 3:41and you wouldn't let your kid out on them.
-
3:41 - 3:44And I want to thank Alex Maclean,
the aerial photographer, -
3:44 - 3:47for many of these beautiful pictures
that I'm showing you today. -
3:47 - 3:51So it's fun to break sprawl down
into its constituent parts. -
3:51 - 3:52It's so easy to understand,
-
3:52 - 3:55the places where you only live,
the places where you only work, -
3:56 - 3:58the places where you only shop,
-
3:58 - 4:01and our super-sized public institutions.
-
4:01 - 4:03Schools get bigger and bigger,
-
4:03 - 4:05and therefore, further
and further from each other. -
4:05 - 4:09And the ratio of the size
of the parking lot -
4:09 - 4:10to the size of the school
-
4:10 - 4:11tells you all you need to know,
-
4:11 - 4:14which is that no child
has ever walked to this school, -
4:14 - 4:16no child will ever walk to this school.
-
4:16 - 4:20The seniors and juniors are driving
the freshmen and the sophomores, -
4:20 - 4:22and of course we have
the crash statistics to prove it. -
4:22 - 4:26And then the super-sizing
of our other civic institutions -
4:26 - 4:27like playing fields --
-
4:27 - 4:31it's wonderful that Westin
in the Ft. Lauderdale area -
4:31 - 4:34has eight soccer fields
and eight baseball diamonds -
4:34 - 4:36and 20 tennis courts,
-
4:36 - 4:40but look at the road
that takes you to that location, -
4:40 - 4:42and would you let your child bike on it?
-
4:42 - 4:44And this is why we have
the soccer mom now. -
4:44 - 4:46When I was young, I had one soccer field,
-
4:46 - 4:48one baseball diamond and one tennis court,
-
4:48 - 4:51but I could walk to it,
because it was in my neighborhood. -
4:51 - 4:54Then the final part of sprawl
that everyone forgot to count: -
4:54 - 4:57if you're going to separate everything
from everything else -
4:57 - 4:59and reconnect it
only with automotive infrastructure, -
4:59 - 5:02then this is what your landscape
begins to look like. -
5:02 - 5:03The main message here is:
-
5:03 - 5:07if you want to have a walkable city,
you can't start with the sprawl model. -
5:07 - 5:09you need the bones of an urban model.
-
5:09 - 5:12This is the outcome
of that form of design, -
5:12 - 5:13as is this.
-
5:13 - 5:16And this is something
that a lot of Americans want. -
5:16 - 5:18But we have to understand
it's a two-part American dream. -
5:18 - 5:20If you're dreaming for this,
-
5:20 - 5:23you're also going to be dreaming of this,
often to absurd extremes, -
5:23 - 5:26when we build our landscape
to accommodate cars first. -
5:26 - 5:28And the experience
of being in these places -- -
5:28 - 5:29(Laughter)
-
5:29 - 5:30This is not Photoshopped.
-
5:30 - 5:32Walter Kulash took this slide.
-
5:33 - 5:34It's in Panama City.
-
5:34 - 5:36This is a real place.
-
5:36 - 5:39And being a driver
can be a bit of a nuisance, -
5:39 - 5:41and being a pedestrian
can be a bit of a nuisance -
5:41 - 5:43in these places.
-
5:43 - 5:46This is a slide that epidemiologists
have been showing for some time now, -
5:46 - 5:47(Laughter)
-
5:47 - 5:51The fact that we have a society
where you drive to the parking lot -
5:51 - 5:52to take the escalator to the treadmill
-
5:52 - 5:54shows that we're doing something wrong.
-
5:54 - 5:56But we know how to do it better.
-
5:56 - 5:58Here are the two models contrasted.
-
5:58 - 5:59I show this slide,
-
5:59 - 6:02which has been a formative document
of the New Urbanism now -
6:02 - 6:03for almost 30 years,
-
6:03 - 6:07to show that sprawl and the traditional
neighborhood contain the same things. -
6:07 - 6:09It's just how big are they,
-
6:09 - 6:10how close are they to each other,
-
6:10 - 6:12how are they interspersed together
-
6:12 - 6:15and do you have a street network,
rather than a cul-de-sac -
6:15 - 6:17or a collector system of streets?
-
6:17 - 6:19So when we look at a downtown area,
-
6:19 - 6:21at a place that has a hope
of being walkable, -
6:21 - 6:24and mostly that's our downtowns
in America's cities -
6:24 - 6:25and towns and villages,
-
6:25 - 6:29we look at them and say
we want the proper balance of uses. -
6:29 - 6:31So what is missing or underrepresented?
-
6:31 - 6:34And again, in the typical American cities
in which most Americans live, -
6:34 - 6:36it is housing that is lacking.
-
6:36 - 6:39The jobs-to-housing balance is off.
-
6:39 - 6:41And you find that when
you bring housing back, -
6:41 - 6:43these other things start to come back too,
-
6:43 - 6:45and housing is usually first
among those things. -
6:45 - 6:49And, of course, the thing
that shows up last and eventually -
6:49 - 6:50is the schools,
-
6:50 - 6:52because the people have to move in,
-
6:52 - 6:57the young pioneers have to move in,
get older, have kids -
6:57 - 7:00and fight, and then the schools
get pretty good eventually. -
7:00 - 7:02The other part of this part,
-
7:02 - 7:06the useful city part,
-
7:06 - 7:07is transit,
-
7:07 - 7:11and you can have a perfectly
walkable neighborhood without it. -
7:11 - 7:14But perfectly walkable cities
require transit, -
7:14 - 7:17because if you don't have access
to the whole city as a pedestrian, -
7:17 - 7:19then you get a car,
-
7:19 - 7:20and if you get a car,
-
7:20 - 7:22the city begins to reshape itself
around your needs, -
7:22 - 7:25and the streets get wider
and the parking lots get bigger -
7:25 - 7:27and you no longer have a walkable city.
-
7:27 - 7:28So transit is essential.
-
7:28 - 7:30But every transit experience,
every transit trip, -
7:31 - 7:32begins or ends as a walk,
-
7:32 - 7:36and so we have to remember to build
walkability around our transit stations. -
7:36 - 7:39Next category, the biggest one,
is the safe walk. -
7:39 - 7:41It's what most walkability
experts talk about. -
7:41 - 7:45It is essential, but alone not enough
to get people to walk. -
7:45 - 7:48And there are so many moving parts
that add up to a walkable city. -
7:48 - 7:50The first is block size.
-
7:50 - 7:51This is Portland, Oregon,
-
7:51 - 7:55famously 200-foot blocks,
famously walkable. -
7:55 - 7:56This is Salt Lake City,
-
7:56 - 7:58famously 600-foot blocks,
-
7:58 - 8:00famously unwalkable.
-
8:00 - 8:03If you look at the two,
it's almost like two different planets, -
8:03 - 8:05but these places were both built by humans
-
8:05 - 8:09and in fact, the story is that when
you have a 200-foot block city, -
8:09 - 8:10you can have a two-lane city,
-
8:10 - 8:12or a two-to-four lane city,
-
8:12 - 8:16and a 600-foot block city
is a six-lane city, and that's a problem. -
8:16 - 8:17These are the crash statistics.
-
8:17 - 8:20When you double the block size --
-
8:20 - 8:22this was a study
of 24 California cities -- -
8:22 - 8:23when you double the block size,
-
8:23 - 8:27you almost quadruple
the number of fatal accidents -
8:27 - 8:29on non-highway streets.
-
8:29 - 8:31So how many lanes do we have?
-
8:31 - 8:35This is where I'm going to tell you
what I tell every audience I meet, -
8:35 - 8:37which is to remind you
about induced demand. -
8:37 - 8:42Induced demand applies
both to highways and to city streets. -
8:42 - 8:45And induced demand tells us
that when we widen the streets -
8:45 - 8:48to accept the congestion
that we're anticipating, -
8:48 - 8:51or the additional trips
that we're anticipating -
8:51 - 8:55in congested systems,
it is principally that congestion -
8:55 - 8:57that is constraining demand,
-
8:57 - 8:59and so that the widening comes,
-
8:59 - 9:02and there are all of these latent trips
that are ready to happen. -
9:02 - 9:03People move further from work
-
9:03 - 9:05and make other choices
about when they commute, -
9:05 - 9:08and those lanes fill up
very quickly with traffic, -
9:08 - 9:10so we widen the street again,
and they fill up again. -
9:10 - 9:12And we've learned that
in congested systems, -
9:13 - 9:15we cannot satisfy the automobile.
-
9:15 - 9:18This is from Newsweek Magazine --
hardly an esoteric publication: -
9:18 - 9:20"Today's engineers acknowledge
-
9:20 - 9:23that building new roads
usually makes traffic worse." -
9:23 - 9:27My response to reading this was,
may I please meet some of these engineers, -
9:27 - 9:29because these are not the ones that I --
-
9:29 - 9:32there are great exceptions
that I'm working with now -- -
9:32 - 9:35but these are not the engineers
one typically meets working in a city, -
9:35 - 9:38where they say, "Oh, that road
is too crowded, we need to add a lane." -
9:38 - 9:41So you add a lane, and the traffic comes,
-
9:41 - 9:43and they say, "See, I told you
we needed that lane." -
9:43 - 9:47This applies both to highways
and to city streets if they're congested. -
9:47 - 9:50But the amazing thing
about most American cities that I work in, -
9:50 - 9:51the more typical cities,
-
9:51 - 9:54is that they have a lot of streets
that are actually oversized -
9:54 - 9:57for the congestion
they're currently experiencing. -
9:57 - 9:59This was the case in Oklahoma City,
-
9:59 - 10:01when the mayor came running
to me, very upset, -
10:01 - 10:04because they were named
in Prevention Magazine -
10:04 - 10:07the worst city for pedestrians
in the entire country. -
10:07 - 10:08Now that can't possibly be true,
-
10:08 - 10:12but it certainly is enough
to make a mayor do something about it. -
10:12 - 10:13We did a walkability study,
-
10:13 - 10:16and what we found, looking
at the car counts on the street -- -
10:16 - 10:20these are 3,000-, 4,000-, 7,000-car counts
-
10:20 - 10:24and we know that two lanes
can handle 10,000 cars per day. -
10:24 - 10:29Look at these numbers --
they're all near or under 10,000 cars, -
10:29 - 10:31and these were the streets
that were designated -
10:31 - 10:33in the new downtown plan
-
10:33 - 10:36to be four lanes to six lanes wide.
-
10:36 - 10:39So you had a fundamental disconnect
between the number of lanes -
10:39 - 10:42and the number of cars
that wanted to use them. -
10:42 - 10:46So it was my job to redesign
every street in the downtown -
10:46 - 10:47from curb face to curb face,
-
10:47 - 10:49and we did it for 50 blocks of streets,
-
10:49 - 10:51and we're rebuilding it now.
-
10:51 - 10:54So a typical oversized street to nowhere
-
10:54 - 10:56is being narrowed, and now
under construction, -
10:56 - 10:58and the project is half done.
-
10:58 - 11:00The typical street like this, you know,
-
11:00 - 11:03when you do that,
you find room for medians. -
11:03 - 11:05You find room for bike lanes.
-
11:05 - 11:07We've doubled the amount
of on-street parking. -
11:07 - 11:11We've added a full bike network
where one didn't exist before. -
11:11 - 11:15But not everyone has the money
that Oklahoma City has, -
11:15 - 11:18because they have an extraction
economy that's doing quite well. -
11:18 - 11:20The typical city is more
like Cedar Rapids, -
11:20 - 11:24where they have an all four-lane
system, half one-way system. -
11:24 - 11:25And it's a little hard to see,
-
11:25 - 11:29but what we've done -- what we're doing;
it's in process right now, -
11:29 - 11:30it's in engineering right now --
-
11:30 - 11:34is turning an all four-lane
system, half one-way -
11:34 - 11:38into an all two-lane system, all two-way,
-
11:38 - 11:41and in so doing, we're adding
70 percent more on-street parking, -
11:41 - 11:42which the merchants love,
-
11:42 - 11:44and it protects the sidewalk.
-
11:44 - 11:46That parking makes the sidewalk safe,
-
11:46 - 11:49and we're adding a much more
robust bicycle network. -
11:49 - 11:52Then the lanes themselves.
How wide are they? -
11:52 - 11:53That's really important.
-
11:53 - 11:56The standards have changed
such that, as Andrés Duany says, -
11:56 - 11:58the typical road
to a subdivision in America -
11:58 - 12:01allows you to see
the curvature of the Earth. -
12:01 - 12:02(Laughter)
-
12:02 - 12:05This is a subdivision
outside of Washington from the 1960s. -
12:05 - 12:07Look very carefully
at the width of the streets. -
12:07 - 12:09This is a subdivision from the 1980s.
-
12:09 - 12:111960s, 1980s.
-
12:11 - 12:13The standards have changed
to such a degree -
12:13 - 12:15that my old neighborhood of South Beach,
-
12:15 - 12:18when it was time to fix the street
that wasn't draining properly, -
12:18 - 12:21they had to widen it
and take away half our sidewalk, -
12:21 - 12:23because the standards were wider.
-
12:23 - 12:26People go faster on wider streets.
-
12:26 - 12:27People know this.
-
12:27 - 12:30The engineers deny it,
but the citizens know it, -
12:30 - 12:34so that in Birmingham, Michigan,
they fight for narrower streets. -
12:34 - 12:37Portland, Oregon, famously walkable,
-
12:37 - 12:40instituted its "Skinny Streets" program
in its residential neighborhood. -
12:40 - 12:42We know that skinny streets are safer.
-
12:42 - 12:45The developer Vince Graham,
in his project I'On, -
12:45 - 12:47which we worked on in South Carolina,
-
12:47 - 12:51he goes to conferences and he shows
his amazing 22-foot roads. -
12:51 - 12:54These are two-way roads,
very narrow rights of way, -
12:54 - 12:56and he shows this well-known philosopher,
-
12:56 - 12:58who said, "Broad is the road
that leads to destruction ... -
12:58 - 13:01narrow is the road that leads to life."
-
13:01 - 13:03(Laughter)
-
13:03 - 13:05(Applause)
-
13:05 - 13:07This plays very well in the South.
-
13:07 - 13:09Now: bicycles.
-
13:10 - 13:14Bicycles and bicycling
are the current revolution underway -
13:14 - 13:16in only some American cities.
-
13:16 - 13:18But where you build it, they come.
-
13:18 - 13:22As a planner, I hate to say that,
but the one thing I can say -
13:22 - 13:26is that bicycle population
is a function of bicycle infrastructure. -
13:26 - 13:29I asked my friend Tom Brennan
from Nelson\Nygaard in Portland -
13:29 - 13:32to send me some pictures
of the Portland bike commute. -
13:32 - 13:35He sent me this. I said,
"Was that bike to work day?" -
13:35 - 13:36He said, "No, that was Tuesday."
-
13:36 - 13:41When you do what Portland did and spend
money on bicycle infrastructure -- -
13:41 - 13:45New York City has doubled the number
of bikers in it several times now -
13:45 - 13:48by painting these bright green lanes.
-
13:48 - 13:51Even automotive cities
like Long Beach, California: -
13:51 - 13:55vast uptick in the number of bikers
based on the infrastructure. -
13:55 - 13:57And of course, what really does it,
-
13:57 - 13:59if you know 15th Street
here in Washington, DC -- -
13:59 - 14:02please meet Rahm Emanuel's
new bike lanes in Chicago, -
14:02 - 14:06the buffered lane, the parallel parking
pulled off the curb, -
14:06 - 14:10the bikes between the parked
cars and the curb -- -
14:10 - 14:12these mint cyclists.
-
14:12 - 14:15If, however, as in Pasadena,
every lane is a bike lane, -
14:15 - 14:17then no lane is a bike lane.
-
14:17 - 14:20And this is the only bicyclist
that I met in Pasadena, so ... -
14:20 - 14:22(Laughter)
-
14:22 - 14:24The parallel parking I mentioned --
-
14:24 - 14:25it's an essential barrier of steel
-
14:25 - 14:29that protects the curb and pedestrians
from moving vehicles. -
14:29 - 14:33This is Ft. Lauderdale;
one side of the street, you can park, -
14:33 - 14:35the other side of the street, you can't.
-
14:35 - 14:37This is happy hour on the parking side.
-
14:37 - 14:40This is sad hour on the other side.
-
14:40 - 14:43And then the trees themselves
slow cars down. -
14:43 - 14:45They move slower when trees
are next to the road, -
14:45 - 14:47and, of course, sometimes
they slow down very quickly. -
14:48 - 14:51All the little details --
the curb return radius. -
14:51 - 14:53Is it one foot or is it 40 feet?
-
14:53 - 14:56How swoopy is that curb to determine
how fast the car goes -
14:56 - 14:58and how much room you have to cross.
-
14:58 - 15:01And then I love this,
because this is objective journalism. -
15:01 - 15:06"Some say the entrance to CityCenter
is not inviting to pedestrians." -
15:06 - 15:08When every aspect
of the landscape is swoopy, -
15:08 - 15:11is aerodynamic, is stream-form geometrics,
-
15:11 - 15:13it says: "This is a vehicular place."
-
15:13 - 15:18So no one detail, no one speciality,
can be allowed to set the stage. -
15:18 - 15:20And here, you know, this street:
-
15:20 - 15:24yes, it will drain within a minute
of the hundred-year storm, -
15:24 - 15:26but this poor woman
has to mount the curb every day. -
15:26 - 15:29So then quickly, the comfortable walk
has to do with the fact -
15:29 - 15:34that all animals seek, simultaneously,
prospect and refuge. -
15:34 - 15:37We want to be able to see our predators,
-
15:37 - 15:39but we also want to feel
that our flanks are covered. -
15:39 - 15:42And so we're drawn to places
that have good edges, -
15:42 - 15:45and if you don't supply the edges,
people won't want to be there. -
15:45 - 15:47What's the proper ratio
of height to width? -
15:47 - 15:49Is it one to one? Three to one?
-
15:49 - 15:53If you get beyond one to six,
you're not very comfortable anymore. -
15:53 - 15:54You don't feel enclosed.
-
15:54 - 15:57Now, six to one in Salzburg
can be perfectly delightful. -
15:57 - 16:00The opposite of Salzburg is Houston.
-
16:00 - 16:04The point being the parking lot
is the principal problem here. -
16:04 - 16:08However, missing teeth, those empty lots
can be issues as well, -
16:08 - 16:11and if you have a missing corner
because of an outdated zoning code, -
16:11 - 16:14then you could have a missing nose
in your neighborhood. -
16:14 - 16:16That's what we had in my neighborhood.
-
16:16 - 16:19This was the zoning code that said
I couldn't build on that site. -
16:19 - 16:23As you may know, Washington, DC
is now changing its zoning -
16:23 - 16:26to allow sites like this
to become sites like this. -
16:26 - 16:28We needed a lot of variances to do that.
-
16:28 - 16:30Triangular houses
can be interesting to build, -
16:30 - 16:33but if you get one built,
people generally like it. -
16:33 - 16:35So you've got to fill those missing noses.
-
16:35 - 16:37And then, finally, the interesting walk:
-
16:37 - 16:39signs of humanity.
-
16:39 - 16:41We are among the social primates.
-
16:41 - 16:43Nothing interests us more
than other people. -
16:43 - 16:45We want signs of people.
-
16:45 - 16:48So the perfect one-to-one ratio,
it's a great thing. -
16:48 - 16:50This is Grand Rapids,
a very walkable city, -
16:50 - 16:52but nobody walks on this street
-
16:52 - 16:54that connects the two
best hotels together, -
16:54 - 16:58because if on the left,
you have an exposed parking deck, -
16:58 - 17:01and on the right,
you have a conference facility -
17:01 - 17:04that was apparently designed
in admiration for that parking deck, -
17:04 - 17:07then you don't attract that many people.
-
17:07 - 17:11Mayor Joe Riley, in his 10th term,
Mayor of Charleston, South Carolina, -
17:11 - 17:13taught us it only takes
25 feet of building -
17:13 - 17:15to hide 250 feet of garage.
-
17:15 - 17:18This one I call the Chia Pet Garage.
It's in South Beach. -
17:18 - 17:19That active ground floor.
-
17:19 - 17:22I want to end with this project
that I love to show. -
17:22 - 17:25It's by Meleca Architects.
It's in Columbus, Ohio. -
17:25 - 17:28To the left is the convention center
neighborhood, full of pedestrians. -
17:28 - 17:31To the right is the Short North
neighborhood -- ethnic, -
17:31 - 17:34great restaurants,
great shops, struggling. -
17:34 - 17:36It wasn't doing very well
because this was the bridge, -
17:36 - 17:39and no one was walking
from the convention center -
17:39 - 17:40into that neighborhood.
-
17:40 - 17:45Well, when they rebuilt the highway,
they added an extra 80 feet to the bridge. -
17:45 - 17:47Sorry -- they rebuilt the bridge
over the highway. -
17:47 - 17:49The city paid 1.9 million dollars,
-
17:49 - 17:52they gave the site to a developer,
-
17:52 - 17:53the developer built this
-
17:53 - 17:55and now the Short North
has come back to life. -
17:55 - 17:59And everyone says, the newspapers,
not the planning magazines, -
17:59 - 18:01the newspapers say
it's because of that bridge. -
18:01 - 18:04So that's it. That's the general
theory of walkability. -
18:04 - 18:06Think about your own cities.
-
18:06 - 18:08Think about how you can apply it.
-
18:08 - 18:10You've got to do all four things at once.
-
18:10 - 18:12So find those places
where you have most of them -
18:12 - 18:14and fix what you can,
-
18:14 - 18:17fix what still needs fixing
in those places. -
18:17 - 18:19I really appreciate your attention,
-
18:19 - 18:22and thank you for coming today.
-
18:22 - 18:24(Applause)
- Title:
- 4 ways to make a city more walkable
- Speaker:
- Jeff Speck
- Description:
-
Freedom from cars, freedom from sprawl, freedom to walk your city! City planner Jeff Speck shares his "general theory of walkability" -- four planning principles to transform sprawling cities of six-lane highways and 600-foot blocks into safe, walkable oases full of bike lanes and tree-lined streets.
- Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TEDTalks
- Duration:
- 18:37
Brian Greene edited English subtitles for 4 ways to make a city more walkable | ||
Brian Greene edited English subtitles for 4 ways to make a city more walkable | ||
Brian Greene edited English subtitles for 4 ways to make a city more walkable | ||
Camille Martínez accepted English subtitles for 4 ways to make a city more walkable | ||
Camille Martínez edited English subtitles for 4 ways to make a city more walkable | ||
Camille Martínez edited English subtitles for 4 ways to make a city more walkable | ||
Joseph Geni edited English subtitles for 4 ways to make a city more walkable |