From CultureMap: It took a while, but nearly five months after Houston City Council approved the first citywide Parking Benefit District for the Washington Avenue corridor, the meters started charging at 7 a.m. on Wednesday. The City of Houston’s Administration and Regulatory Affairs Department hopes to solve a handful of issues with the new parking system, including [...]
Posts Tagged ‘pedestrians’
Heights-Northside Mobility Study
You might want to put this on your calendar. The area defined as the Heights-Northside study area bounded on the east by US 59, on the south by IH 10, and on the north and west by IH 610. The purpose of this study is to identify near and long range projects that promote better [...]
Why does Midtown need a big box store?
This story is about a forthcoming six-acre “superblock” being developed in Midtown, and about Midtown’s rise as a successful residential/entertainment area. What caught my eye was this bit at the end: Still, Midtown has yet to see any significant new retail, retail broker Ed Page said, referring to big-box stores like Target, TJ Maxx and [...]
Ashby everywhere
Nancy Sarnoff notes a trend. Homeowners in the Memorial area held a meeting last month in the lobby of a nearby medical office building to discuss what to do about a large apartment complex being planned in their neighborhood. They said the project – and other new developments in the area – would lead to [...]
Buffalo Bayou begins its makeover
This is going to be great. The jogging and biking trails that wind through Buffalo Bayou Park west of downtown are about to get a bit more circuitous as a $55 million effort to transform the area into an iconic green space for Houston begins in earnest this month. [...] The Harris County Flood Control [...]
Take the train to your dining destination
Katharine Shilcutt writes about how she gets to some of her favorite restaurants. When owner Staci Davis decided on a location for her restaurant, Radical Eats, one thing was extremely important to her above all: Davis wanted her vegan paradise to have access to the new Metro light rail North Line that’s currently being built along Fulton. When [...]
Petition for safer walking and biking
From Marty Hajovsky: Stephanie Riceman with the Heights Kids Group, a 900-strong (at least) group of families in and around the greater Houston Heights, has put together an interesting online petition that says as much about how many new families there are in the Heights as it does about the need to make streets safer for bike riders [...]
Benchmarking biking and walking
Via Dallas Transportation, here’s a ginormous comprehensive report on the way we walk and bike in 2012, the 2012 Bicycling and Walking in the United States Benchmark Report, by the Alliance for Biking and Walking. It’s a 200+ page PDF file, so be prepared to spend some time on it. Here’s some overview information about [...]
On getting to walkable urbanism
This story about neighborhood opposition to the Kroger 380 agreement doesn’t quite get at what I think are the key issues that need to be discussed. [O]pponents of both the Wal-Mart and Kroger deals say suburban-style big-box stores don’t fit a widely-held urban vision for Washington Avenue Corridor. They’d like to see more incentives offered [...]
If fixing the streets is easy, then tell us how to do it
Lisa Gray writes about a guy who thinks Houston’s streets could be much more user friendly if only we tried a little harder to make them be. “Houston’s streets behave like alleys,” Nathan Norris shouted to the 20 or so people who followed him like ducklings, single file, on Jackson Hill Street’s skinny sidewalk. Norris [...]
TPC splits the difference
Bike advocates get a partial victory as the Transportation Policy Council voted to keep the last $12.8 million of unallocated federal funds on alternate mode projects instead of redirecting it towards roads. “Whatever we do in this room is supposed to be representative of our regional values and needs,” said Harris County Public Infrastructure Department [...]
Today’s the day for the TIP
That postponed Transportation Policy Council meeting to determine how to allocate unprogrammed federal transportation funds happens today. A proposal before the regional Transportation Policy Council last month could have clawed back $12.8 million in funding set aside for bicycle and pedestrian projects and directed those dollars to road and freight rail work. At the urging [...]
HGAC hearing on TIP
From Houston Tomorrow: The Houston – Galveston Area Council Transportation Policy Council will host a public hearing to discuss citizen priorities for the use of discretionary funds in the 2011-2014 Transportation Improvement Program on March 25, 2011 at 8:45am at the H-GAC building in the 2nd Floor Conference room at 3555 Timmons. The Technical Advisory [...]
TPC delays vote on TIP
Houston Tomorrow: The Houston-Galveston Area Council’sTransportation Policy Council (TPC) unanimously voted on Friday morning to delay by thirty days its vote on a full $79.8 million allocation of unprogrammed federal transportation funds toward Mobility – roadway and freight rail – projects and a reallocation of $12.8 million from already committed pedestrian, bicycle, and Livable Centers [...]
More on H-GAC and the TIP
I received some feedback from Judge Ed Emmett’s office regarding this post about H-GAC’s Friday Transportation Policy Council (TPC) meeting, at which funding in the 2011-2014 Transportation Improvement Program (TIP) will be discussed and voted on. There’s some context missing from what Houston Tomorrow and Bike Houston wrote about this. Let me start by pointing [...]
Why aren’t we investing more in non-road transportation?
Houston Tomorrow has some disturbing news. A proposal to limit bike, pedestrian, and livability funding in the 2011 Transportation Improvement Program will come before the Houston-Galveston Area Council’s Transportation Policy Council (TPC) this Friday, February 25, at a public meeting in the H-GAC building at 3555 Timmons on the 2nd floor in Conference Room A. The proposal [...]
Sugar Land contemplates its transportation options
Via Houston Tomorrow, here’s an interesting story about how Sugar Land is thinking about the effect of the planned baseball stadium and Imperial Sugar Mill redevelopment on traffic. Both projects mean this older part of Sugar Land is likely to become much more popular, making it ripe for heavy congestion. This is something local resident [...]
Carless in Dallas
Meet Patrick Kennedy, the best-known non-driving person in Dallas. Kennedy moved to Dallas in 2002, after growing up in Pennsylvania and earning a landscape architecture degree at Penn State University. After living in parts of East Dallas and Uptown, he decided to give up his Toyota Corolla and move downtown in 2008. He moved into [...]
A Montrose/Studemont walkability update
Back in 2008, I put together a photo essay on density and walkability in Montrose, in particular on Montrose/Studemont between West Gray and Washington. It included this photo, taken in front of what was then the old Ed Sacks Waste Paper site: Well, the Sacks site is gone, and in its place is a new [...]
H-GAC Livable Centers Study of the Ensemble/HCC Station Area in Midtown
Tomorrow night at 7 PM at the Trinity Episcopal Church located at 1015 Holman Street at Main (map) is a public meeting for the H-GAC Livable Centers Study of the Ensemble/HCC Station area in Midtown. You can click on the flyer for the details, but the basic idea is to figure out how to enable [...]
It’s hard out here on a pedestrian
I’m sure it will come as no surprise to learn that Houston is not a good city for pedestrians, at least from a safety perspective. Houston ranked eighth on a new list of the most dangerous urban areas for pedestrians. And the hundreds of deaths and injuries to pedestrians can’t all be written off as [...]
Ashby’s developer defends his project
Let me start by saying that I agree with Kevin Kirton, the CEO of Buckhead Investment Partners, also known as the developers of the infamous Ashby highrise, when he says that the “trip number” justification that the city used to block that project for as long as they did was bunk, and that the highrise [...]
Seven sidewalk sins
Sid Burgess presents seven examples of how to be pedestrian-unfriendly. How many of them have you seen in the Houston area? I can say I’ve seen all seven. Thanks to neoHouston for the link.
Peter Brown’s traffic plan
Today I want to take a closer look at Peter Brown’s traffic plan, the highlights of which you can see here, with the longer and more detail-filled form here (PDF). My thoughts: – As with Annise Parker’s crimefighting plan, I am in general agreement with Brown’s priorities, and believe there is or would be general [...]
How to do (and not do) urban streets
neoHouston says: One of the big problems in development today, in particular in the area of city planning, is distinguishing between good urban infill and mediocre urban infill. At first glance the two may look very similar, but they are not. Good urban infill has a great interface, like what you see in the photo [...]
Midtown not feeling the recession
Good to know some parts of town are still thriving. The recession seems to have forgotten about Midtown. A drive around the neighborhood reveals forgotten buildings undergoing restoration and new apartments being framed. This area between the Central Business District and the Texas Medical Center began its transformation in the late 1990s when Post Properties [...]
Neighborhood concerns about the transit corridors ordinance
I think most people who choose to live in Houston’s urban core would agree that density is a good thing as a general rule. Density done in a half-assed way, which has been Houston’s trademark, not so much. Density hasn’t been kind to Cottage Grove, a small neighborhood with narrow streets, few sidewalks, poor drainage [...]
Where that new transit corridors ordinance came from
Christof takes another look at the proposed urban transit corridors ordinance, and asks a simple question. Days after the City of Houston’s draft corridor urban corridors ordinance was released, Houstonians For Responsible Growth – a developer group that generally opposes any new building regulations – endorsed the new ordinance. Why would developers be so enthusiastic about a new [...]
More on the urban transit corridors ordinance
I mentioned last week that the city was getting set to do an overhaul of its planning codes. In particular, there’s a proposed transit corridor ordinance that is up for public discussion on Thursday and a City Council vote in July. I wasn’t sure what to make of it but had heard some early feedback [...]
Enabling pedestrians
I don’t know how big a deal this is likely to be, but it’s nice to be talking about it. More than five years after inaugurating its light rail system, Houston is taking its first, tentative steps to make it safer and more convenient for passengers to walk from train stations to homes, shops and [...]
Multiways
Andrew continues the ongoing discussion of transit options in Houston with a look at multiway boulevards. Basically, a multiway is an urban thoroughfare combining express through lanes in the middle with local access lanes on the sides. These local lanes are where the real magic is, they provide parking and a space for pedestrians and [...]
Give bikes a little space
MTBLawGirl passes on word of a bill that will be of interest to bicyclists. Earlier this month, Texas Senator Rodney Ellis and Representative Linda Harper-Brown filed the Safe Passing Bill in the Senate (SB 488) and House (HB 827) respectively. In addition to requiring more than three feet passing distance when a motorist passes a [...]