While long-term safety initiatives like updating street design standards or starting a crash response team are important, they must be paired with immediate action. A recent crash in Rochester, New York, shows why.
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A mysterious plastic sign appeared on a Houston street, raising the speed limit to 60 mph — double the actual limit. Drivers didn’t seem to notice the difference.
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After a fatal crash, Rochester citizens and officials got to work, identifying factors that contributed to the crash, updating street design policies to make streets safer, and establishing a Community Traffic Safety Team to address other dangerous factors before crashes occur.
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Fletcher Williams was hit by three cars in a 13-month period — all within a half-mile radius in Bradenton, Florida. And he’s only one of many crash victims. The design of these streets is inhumanely dangerous and must be changed.
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After a cyclist was killed in a car crash, residents of Indianapolis worked with Strong Towns to conduct the first Crash Analysis Studio. City officials have taken notice and instituted new initiatives to create safer streets.
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The terms chosen to describe upcoming road work often misrepresent the actual projects, ascribing a positive or negative bias that affects how political leaders interpret and underwrite them. The DOT Decoder is the perfect gift for decoding three common terms used by departments of transportation and their engineers.
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Conducting a walking audit is an quick, easy and free step that anyone can take to start improving their place. In this article, trained architect and urban designer Edward Erfurt demonstrates how to do so, using a recently completed sidewalk project in his community as an example.
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Buses are an important part of a city’s transportation system, but they’re considered a mode of last resort for many people. Here’s why it’s important to make bus systems more appealing — and a few ideas on to do so.
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In this episode, host Norm Van Eeden Petersman is joined by Sully Israel, a Local Conversation leader, to discuss his group’s efforts to keep their city’s main street closed to cars.
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Driving from my dismal exurban hotel to the walkable downtown of a Florida beach town led me to a resolution: Start seeking out the kind of lodging that accentuates the best reasons for visiting a place, and hopefully discourage the kind of development that’s contributing to its demise.
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To build a Strong Town is to develop governing habits and shared cultural understandings that result in a long run of small wins that may be individually imperceptible but cumulatively result in broad and meaningful change. Today, I want to share one of those small wins with you.
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The East Coast Greenway spans 3,000 miles and is one of the most popular biking routes in the world. But as much as 65% of this route puts bikers in close contact with vehicles that are moving at high speeds. This has predictably terrible results.
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Liability caps mean that a city can’t be forced to pay victims of traffic crashes above a certain amount, even in cases of gross negligence. This may seem unjust, but this kind of protection can encourage city officials and employees to be proactive in addressing past mistakes and making streets safer. Here’s how.
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In the battle for street safety, crossing guards are on the front lines. Their verdict: The streets outside of schools are extremely unsafe. One crossing guard in Denver decided to do something about it.
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On this episode of the Strong Towns Podcast, Chuck discusses safe streets advocacy with Amy Cohen, the co-founder and president of Families for Safe Streets.
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You’ve just completed a Crash Analysis Studio and you have a report in hand. Or you found the "Beyond Blame" report compelling and you want to share it with your community. Now what?
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"Be the change you want to see in the world." It’s a slogan many aspire to live by, including Professor Gingrich of Dordt University in Iowa. He’s doing just that this year, bringing his students to the forefront of the evolving traffic engineering field by training them in crash analysis and safe street design.
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Like many Strong Towns advocates, you may struggle with imposter syndrome, feeling like you’re not qualified enough to talk to city officials and staff about changing the way cities are designed or operated. But it’s essential that you keep speaking up. Here’s why.
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All of the land used in cities can be divided into two categories: Places and Non-Places. Places are productive destinations, while Non-Places are unproductive padding between destinations. Once these Places and Non-Places are marked on a map, it becomes obvious how much land cities waste on Non-Places.
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Strong Towns ideas have started permeating the wider culture at an increasing rate. But even as many cities and organizations embrace the movement, others twist it to serve their own agendas. Now more than ever, the movement needs advocates who uphold the true principles of building strong towns. It needs you.
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