Latest news with #JeffSpeck
Yahoo
6 days ago
- Automotive
- Yahoo
Mobile traffic signals to be removed
MOBILE, Ala. (WKRG) — A few intersections in downtown Mobile will soon lose some of its traffic signals. Theodore man killed in deadly crash According to a release from the City of Mobile, work will begin on Monday, Aug. 11, to remove traffic signals as part of the Downtown Street Optimization Plan. The City of Mobile and Downtown Mobile Alliance, along with the leadership of 'renowned urban planner,' Jeff Speck, created the plan to make downtown safer and more efficient for commuters of all kinds. Starting on Monday, 26 signals in low-volume intersections will be removed and replaced with four-way stops. The $1.1 million project also plans to install ADA ramps and restripe crosswalks. The signals scheduled for removal will flash red beginning on Wednesday, Aug. 13, for 90 days to allow traffic engineers to observe motorists' behavior and give time for drivers and cyclists to adjust to the new patterns. Baldwin County tasing incident leads to arrest, officials say The project, set to be completed in Spring 2026, will be completed in stages so as not to disrupt the downtown area. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Solve the daily Crossword
American Press
25-05-2025
- General
- American Press
Walking the line: A safer, more walkable Lake Charles starts here
Walkability expert Jeff Speck stopped by Lake Charles last month to tour the city and bestow his walkability wisdom. (Special to the American Press) To begin making Lake Charles more walkable, the Community Foundation of Southwest Louisiana called in the big guns. Walkability expert Jeff Speck stopped by Lake Charles last month to tour the city and bestow his walkability wisdom upon city officials, city planners and curious citizens alike. Speck is an American urban designer known internationally for his books 'Walkable City: How Downtown Can Save America, One Step at a Time' (the century's best-selling book on walkability) and 'Walkable City Rules: 101 Steps to Making Better Places.' With 30 years of experience, he has become a global advocate for new urbanist walkability principles. He consults cities looking to take actionable steps, some simple and some complicated, to improve walkability. After assessing the city's current layout, he determines strengths and weaknesses in walkability and assists in drafting a more walkable design. 'If you've got a lot of good things going for you, I can be most helpful by making suggestions about things you can change. I really see it as my responsibility to share with cities the stuff I notice,' he said. He was brought to Lake Charles after the Community Foundation of SWLA Board Chair Jim Rock attended the Congress for New Urbanism annual conference last year. Speck spoke there, and Rock became enraptured with his philosophy on urban development and walkability. After a chance meeting, the two connected and coordinated Speck's trip. While not a full consultation, he toured the city and presented his findings at the Lake Charles Event Center. The Philosophy Walkability is a 'window into good planning.' Most of the benefits of greater walkability are clear. Walking benefits public health by encouraging pedestrians to exercise and getting them outside. But Speck is more interested in the bigger picture. 'Walkable City,' which came out in 2012, lays out these benefits to discuss why cities need to be more walkable and how to do it. 'While people think of me in the framework of walking for health and all the different aspects of the walkable lifestyle … I'm not so interested in that as I am in what makes cities great,' he explained.'I just happened to learn through the years that if you design around walkability, you do make cities great.' Enhanced walkability helps the environment by limiting motorist emissions, boosts the economy by supporting neighborhood businesses, and supports a strong, tight-knit community, to name just a few. He believes it is not only a good framework for design, but it is also a concept that is digestible for the general public. 'Walkability' is just the 'best practices in urban design,' but walkability is an accessible idea that allows pedestrians to advocate for themselves, he said. The 'general theory of walkability' poses the question, 'How do cities encourage people to walk in a society where driving is heavily subsidized?' 'Once you own a car, the smart thing to do is to use it all the time. Every mile you drive costs less than the mile before,' he said. 'The smart thing to do is drive. The car is there in the driveway between you and everything, and it's just natural to fall into the car.' The solution is simple at first glance. To get people to walk, the walk has to be better than the drive. Speck's walkability foundation is built on four components of a great walk: useful, safe, comfortable and interesting. The concept of a 'useful walk' has become less common. Speck said there are two ways to design a town: the traditional neighborhood or the suburban sprawl. The traditional neighborhood is compact, diverse and walkable, with most of an individual's need within five minutes from their home. City planners strayed away from traditional neighborhoods in the 19th century with the invention of Euclidean zoning, or single-use zoning, which was created to keep residential areas away from industrial activity. Now, it's the most prevalent type of city planning in the United States. But by dividing large plots of land into areas that just have one use, Euclidean zoning limits a walk's ability to be useful. The traditional neighborhood places essential services like housing, grocery, gym, park, dining, entertainment (and coffee) all within a five-minute walk. These neighborhoods also mitigate traffic congestion by not only keeping cars off the road, but by allowing traffic to easily flow through several connecting streets. By contrast, the suburban sprawl hinders a resident's ability to easily walk to resources and burdens multi-lane roads with more traffic. The suburban sprawl is also less safe. The United States has a 'traffic violence epidemic,' he said. In the last 15 years, there has been a 78 percent increase in the likelihood of being killed as a pedestrian. Pedestrians are 290 percent more likely to be killed by a car in a suburban sprawl, he said. 'So the idea that everyone wants their kid to grow up on a cul-de-sac, but once you leave the cul-de-sac, you're exposed to this extremely dangerous environment.' Pedestrian deaths are more likely in cities with little to no pedestrian accommodations and roads with multiple wide lanes, which directly correlates to the speed of traffic. Street designs with wider lanes, fewer intersections, one-way travel, big shoulders, and no trees create more freedom for drivers to speed. By eliminating 'elbow room' and 'forgiveness' for motorists, they are forced to slow down. As an example, Speck said studies show that motorists tend to drive seven miles per hour slower when the center line is removed from a street. 'It's contrary to common sense, but if you think about it, it makes sense,' Speck explained. 'That double yellow stripe makes you feel safe as a driver and makes you go seven miles an hour faster. That's the psychology we need to understand when we're designing downtown streets.' Most two-lane streets without turnlanes can handle average traffic, he added. Safety is the easiest tenet for cities to address because they own the streets. The best way to curb speeding is to design roads with narrower lanes. This is a change that doesn't have to be expensive. 'Don't rebuild. Restripe. You can restripe downtown for the price of rebuilding just a few streets, and we like to see that money go as far as possible.' The standard width for lanes is 10 feet, with an accompanying seven- to eight-foot parking lane. Parallel parking is paramount because it is an 'essential barrier of steel that protects the curb from moving vehicles.' Pedestrian safety can also be boosted by street medians with trees, wider sidewalks, and bike lanes that run between the sidewalk and lane parking. A comfortable walk can be achieved by aligning with design principles walkers feel secure. This can be done by creating a sense of enclosure with buildings and planting that line the sidewalks. And a walk becomes interesting with trees, vibrant architecture and street art that makes a walk unique. Walkability in Lake Charles In its current state, the region 'urban design adjacent,' Speck said. Downtown Lake Charles is well-situated to become more walkable, but the city's current infrastructure raises safety concerns for pedestrians. But he believes the new urbanist ways of thinking about pedestrian safety could greatly benefit Lake Charles because the city's street design process is 'broken.' 'I've heard that kids are walking to school on the four-foot sidewalk with the rollover curbs adjacent to 13 lanes on Nelson Road, and that shouldn't be happening. 'I'm sure the engineers working in your city want it to be safe. But this idea that safety comes not from forgiveness, but from actual constraint, is one that hasn't taken hold here yet,' he said later while acknowledging recently-striped 15-foot lanes. Pedestrian safety in Lake Charles can be improved by restriping roads, especially the downtown streets, to shrink lanes and add street parking. Kirby and Ryan streets could be reduced down to two lanes, he noted. To make walking more comfortable downtown, the street edges need to be developed. He highlighted the Lake Charles Event Center parking lot that faces Lake Shore Drive. The areas closest to the road could be developed into a safe sidewalk with street parking and trees. Speck also suggested a focus on foliage. 'Trees are vastly undervalued, and all I can say is, it's worth every dollar you spend on them. Palm trees, however, are not really trees,' he joked. 'You should stop using palm trees.'
American Press
29-04-2025
- General
- American Press
Sara Judson column: Walkability Wizard to Wow on Wednesday
(Special to the American Press) By Sara Judson Walkability wizard, Jeff Speck, is coming to Lake Charles this Wednesday! The community is invited to a free talk tomorrow, April 30th, in the Contraband Room at the Lake Charles Event Center. Networking and meeting Jeff begins at 5pm followed by his talk from 5:30pm – 7pm. The author's 'bible' on how to make downtowns more walkable, Walkable City, will be available for sale and book signing from 7 – 7:30pm. Speck's session is coordinated by the Community Foundation of SWLA. The desire to make a community's downtown and beloved areas more walkable is a national phenomenon. Walkability is such a movement that Jeff Speck has focused his city planning on this topic for over a decade. Last May, a group involved with the Just Imagine SWLA 50 Year Resilience Plan attended the Congress for the New Urbanism in Cincinnati to receive an international award for the Just Imagine plan. The whole conference was exciting, and we all learned best practices to help SWLA implement the 11 catalytic projects in the Just Imagine plan, including the project on Strong Downtowns. One workshop was led by Jeff Speck. Each local who attended that session agreed that we need to bring him to SWLA! After coordinating with partners including the City of Lake Charles, Visit Lake Charles and the Community Foundation, it is happening tomorrow. He will physically walk around downtown and then drive him around a wider area to see how adjacent neighborhoods and parks connect with downtown. Then, he will present recommendations unique to Lake Charles and give us a roadmap to make them happen. The walkability concept continues to gain momentum and enthusiasm from people of all ages and stages. As word got around that Jeff Speck is coming to Lake Charles, I heard that Lake Charles native, Isabela Walkin, interviewed Jeff Speck in a podcast for her Public Policy Master's program at Georgetown. Of course, I listened! Their conversation centered around public policy concepts that are being implemented at both the local and national level to make walking easier, safer and more interesting. Did you know that adding 'street trees' that provide shade also make streets safer for pedestrians? I've listened to Isabela's interview with him and probably 5 other podcasts, too, because these achievable improvements and their benefits are fascinating. Jeff Speck is a rock star who helps cities increase their walkability with some easy fixes and ones that require longer term solutions. A book club made up of young adult women are so excited about enhancing walkability that they have read Walkable City already and are attending the session together. That really excited my now 60-year-old self to know that people in their 20s and 30s are engaging in their community to make a positive, lasting impact. That is what we strive to do at the Community Foundation! Strategies regarding creating successful downtowns were also highlighted at the Big Towns conference last week in Lafayette. A team of Community Foundation and City of Lake Charles planning and public works departments heard from speakers like Mayor Tim Kelly of Chattanooga and David Dixon, an Urban Places Fellow who helps cities create livable neighborhoods, vibrant civic spaces, and vital downtowns. They and others shared examples of cities who are making downtowns more walkable and connected, adding public green spaces, outdoor sidewalk dining, changes in parking requirements and locations, economic diversity and more. Many concepts working in other cities are recommendations in the Strong Downtowns project of the Just Imagine SWLA plan. Best of all, the Strong Downtowns recommendations are scalable to be guides for any of our communities in SWLA. I hope you, too, are excited about making streets more walkable and you'll come out on Walkable Wednesday! We'll be looking for you in the Lake Charles Event Center at 5pm tomorrow for some visiting before the Walkability conversation begins at 5:30pm. • Sara McLeod Judson is the CEO of the Community Foundation SWLA. She can be reached at 337-491-6688 or sjudson@
Yahoo
09-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Boca Raton and experts team up to reenvision Palmetto Park Road
Safety improvements may soon be coming to one of Boca Raton's main roads as development and growth progresses in the city. Palmetto Park Road, which some concerned residents have even likened to a highway, could undergo enhanced and raised intersections, landscape buffers, high visibility and raised crosswalks, curb extensions, green paint for increased cyclist visibility and 'street furniture,' which could be benches, trees and public art, according to documents from the city of Boca Raton. City officials are now working with Speck Dempsey, a group that assists cities with walkability studies, transit-oriented developments, downtown areas, street networks, buildings and landscapes, new towns and neighborhoods, and urban and suburban infill, according to Speck Dempsey's website. The group is now putting together a design for the city of Boca Raton. Jeff Speck, the co-founder of Speck Dempsey, said during a public city meeting on Monday that the firm 'does the full range of urban planning work from regional planning to architecture actually, but if we have a sweet spot, it is definitely this category of streets and networks.' Alia Awwad, a principal with Alta Planning and Design, a firm that has analyzed traffic effects in the city, said Boca Raton is continuing the process of street improvement by bringing on Speck Dempsey. '(We) look forward to continuing to work with you all to really dig deeper into the design elements of the future of the corridor, and then we're really excited about what's happening in downtown including the campus master plan,' Awwad said during Monday's meeting. Speck called streets the main impediment to making 'great places' in most cities. 'Most American potentially walkable places are already useful, comfortable and interesting, but they're not safe,' he said. In pictures from previous projects completed by Speck Dempsey, sidewalks and bike lanes are the emphasis, not the road space for cars. The projects also feature places for pedestrians to gather, such as sites for games and shaded places to sit. Speck Dempsey also plans to integrate the safety improvements in a way that will be in harmony with the government campus plan, which is a project bringing new government facilities, homes, shops and places to eat along Palmetto Park Road. Boca Raton City Council members want the changes to be more than just street improvements. Deputy Mayor Fran Nachlas said the city is seeking a 'sense of place' and 'a landmark for our city.' Andrea O'Rourke is a former City Council member and also a member of the citizen collective Workshop 344+, which aims to enhance the city's pedestrian experience through connectivity. She said she and the other Workshop 344+ members are very happy to welcome Speck as a consultant and thanked the City Council for 'getting this finally done.' 'Workshop 344 has always been about connecting the dots in downtown Boca for more walkability, to be safe and have a memorable main street,' O'Rourke said during Monday's meeting. However, O'Rourke said the Workshop 344+ group felt ignored by the City Council after previously bringing forward 'creative, thoughtful, bold, iconic ideas' and being 'met with silence.' 'I will ask you to please foster space where the community voice feels that they are heard and/or at least acknowledged,' O'Rourke said. 'Traffic is not safe. It's unpleasant and frankly it's scary, and it's not good for business and it's not good for the community. Right now we have a highway cutting through what should be the heart of our downtown.' A design charrette will be held in the future so that the public may provide input. 'Community input is important to us both from the government0center perspective and obviously from Palmetto Park Road, so the more that we engage the community is always good,' Council member Yvette Drucker said.
