Grand Avenue is broken. Like countless other streets in Oakland, the design of Grand Avenue no longer serves the people and communities that use the street. However, while Oakland has developed a clear vision for many of its other arterials, the City’s approach to fixing Grand remains unclear. The 2.7 mile Grand Avenue corridor between […]
Several weeks ago we wrote about a proposed bill that would make San Francisco the largest U.S. city to adopt a stop-as-yield law for cyclists. Earlier this week San Francisco supervisors on the Land Use and Transportation Committee voted in support of the law, which would allow cyclists to treat stop signs as yield signs […]
Should Downtown Oakland be a great place to drive, or a great place to walk and bike? As Downtown lies on the cusp of rebirth and growth, these divergent transportation visions are taking shape. On the one hand, Oakland strives to be a leader in sustainability, health, and social equity by prioritizing active transportation and […]
As of yesterday, pedestrian safety banners are now flying in SoMa. The banners, proclaiming “Slow Down!” and followed with either “We live here” or “I live here” are part of the Vision Zero safety measure that hopes to eliminate all traffic related deaths in San Francisco by 2024. With about 60 percent of all pedestrian […]
A recent study conducted by the University of Bath, Department of Psychology, has concluded that, improving street safety for cyclists is more effective than information campaigns when it comes to encouraging people to start riding a bike. The study, published in this month’s Journal of Transport and Health, compared the effectiveness of various pro-cycling campaigns […]
If you’ve recently traveled along I-80 in the East Bay, you may have noticed new electronic signage and metering lights. Caltrans is currently putting the finishing touches on the I-80 Smart Corridor project, a new approach to managing traffic congestion along one of the region’s worst corridors. The Smart Corridor project uses a sophisticated Intelligent […]
Oakland has a lot of strange, poorly-designed pedestrian signals, but we think we’ve found the worst example in the City at the intersection of Grand Avenue and Euclid Avenue. By over-engineering a simple sidewalk, Oakland has created a more hazardous condition where thousands of people break the law every day. Along Grand Avenue at Euclid […]
The City of Oakland, in partnership with UC Berkeley, recently conducted a survey of shoppers in Temescal along a controversial segment of Telegraph Avenue to better understand the travel behavior of shoppers. The segment under study between 40th and 52nd street represents the heart of the Temescal business district. Temescal was left out of the […]
As protected bike lanes become more common across the U.S., the way in which we design intersections is also evolving. American cities are on the cusp of implementing the nation’s first protected intersections, a potentially revolutionary approach to intersection design for bicycle safety. This post offers an overview of what constitutes a protected intersection, why […]
Streetsblog California recently proclaimed a new bike lane in Orinda “The Worst Bike Lane in the World.” The bike lane sits outside of our office on Camino Pablo, straddling between two high-speed right turn lanes as it passes under Highway 24 and the Orinda BART Station. To put it simply, this bike lane is terrifying. […]
