Wave Your Flag, Pedestrian!

A reader mentioned pedestrian flags in Berkeley, California in a comment and added "I'm serious!" so I thought I'd check out this fantastic example of victim blaming in Bubble Wrap Society.

He was serious. Is that scary or funny or both? Not sure. Flags are placed near intersections and the idea is that pedestrians pick one up and hold it when they wish to foolishly exercise their human right to safe urban mobility.

Most of the flags have been stolen and few use them apparently. Ironically, 48 hours after these went into [non]use, a pedestrian was hit by a car. Here's what Berkeley City Councilwoman Polly Armstrong said about it at the time:

"We hope over time - when drivers are paying a little more attention than that driver was - that the flags would be helpful." She added that, "Pedestrians have to be on guard and aggressive with their flags."

"After hitting the pedestrian, the driver swerved into the oncoming lane and collided with another vehicle. The driver was cited for failure to yield to a pedestrian. While saddened by the news, Berkeley officials saw the accident more as a testament to intersection's danger than the flags' effectiveness."

Read that first paragraph again... she hopes drivers will become 'a little more attentive' but pedestrians have to be "on guard and be aggressive with their flags."

Ignoring the bull. I don't know why Berkeley doesn't just go all out and legislate mandatory all-ages pedestrian helmets.

Or just ban walking altogether. Nevermind lowering the speed limits on the streets or installing traffic calming measures. Nah. Blame the squishy traffic users who are only stunting society's progress by showing up sans car.

The San Francisco Chronicle has an article about these pedestrian safety flags from 'back in they day' - 2002. Are they still in use in Berkeley?

7550 New Bike Parking Spots at Copenhagen Central Station

For all of Copenhagen's badassness as a bicycle city, there remains one thing that the City still completely sucks at. Bicycle parking at train stations. At Copenhagen Central Station there are only about 1000 bike parking spots. Danish State Railways can't even tell us how many spots they have. They're not sure. Even in Basel they have 800+. In Antwerp they have this . Don't even get me started on the Dutch. 12,500 bike parking spots are on the way in some place called Utrecht . Amsterdam has a multi-story bike parking facility, floating bicycle barges round the back and are planning 7000 more spots underwater . Even at the nation's busiest train station, Nørreport, the recent and fancy redesign failed miserably in providing parking that is adequate for the demand . Architects once again failing to respond to actual urban needs. It is time to remedy that. Here is my design for 7550 bike parking spots behind Copenhagen Central Station. Steve C. Montebello i...

The New Question for 21st Century Cities

It's all so simple if we want it to be. For almost a century we have been asking the same question in our cities. "How many cars can we move down a street?" It's time to change the question. If you ask "How many PEOPLE can we move down a street?", the answer becomes much more modern and visionary. And simple. Oh, and cheaper. Let alone the fact that the model at the top can move 10 times more people down a street than the model at the bottom. When I travel with my Bicycle Urbanism by Design keynote , I often step on the toes of traffic engineers all around the world. Not all of them, however. I am always approached by engineers who are grateful that someone is questioning the unchanged nature of traffic engineering and the unmerited emphasis placed on it. I find it brilliant that individual traffic engineers in six different nations have all said the same thing to me: "We're problem solvers. But we're only ever asked to solve the sam...

City Plan Vest and Søringen - 1958-1974 - Copenhagen

A couple of twists of fate and this location in Copenhagen would have been a 12 lane motorway. When looking back over the last century of cities infatuated with Car Culture, it's not hard to see how stupid we were - or almost were. In the 1940s the so-called Finger Plan was developed for Copenhagen . By and large an interesting concept and the foundation for the expansion of Copenhagen. The Finger Plan has, however, some dark secrets. Among them are two connected projects. City Plan Vest (City Plan West) and Søringen (The Lake Ring). The City Plan Vest, in 1958, proposed that Copenhagen be equipped with a Lake Ring. The #19 motorway from the north would continue over Hans Knudsens Plads - in a tunnel to Vibenshus Runddel - and then emerging again to continue along Nørre Allé in a 12 lane motorway down Tagensvej and Fredensgade. It would turn right along The Lakes to Vesterbro, where a comprehensive interchange would be built to lead traffic to the south towards Germany and ...

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