The American Planning Association developed a smart growth planning ‘newspeak‘ during the 90s. Planning departments all around the country are adopting this new language. Click here for more buzz words.
These photos are evidence that smart growth planning is occurring in your town or city. If you see this kind of activity, call your planning department to find out why they are doing these street alterations, did the public demand/request this, was it part of the budget, how much is it costing, are there additional plans for street altering in other sections of town? If the alterations make common sense and are economically sensible then great! If not, keep asking questions–don’t let city hall brush you off. You might open Pandora’s Box but better now than later when there’s nothing you can do.
Sustainable development is the precursor for smart growth. There are many aspects of modern day living that have been deemed unsustainable; cars are one of them.
The purpose of traffic calming is to slow down car traffic.
The purposes of a road diet are to slow down car traffic, increase equity of use between cars, bikes and pedestrians, increase the width of sidewalks by taking away car lanes, remove parking.
Traffic Calming on Valle Verde near an elementary school--this checks out.
Road Diet in Paso Robles
All corners and cross walks that connect to the green in the center of town are being pushed out into the existing street.
Narrowing of an existing street is called a road diet.
During construction pedestrians have to walk into the street to get around the corner.
This corner has not been altered yet. It faces the corner shown in the preceeding photo.