Walking in Mexico

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Every time I hit the pavement in Latin America, I'm reminded of its penchant for pedestrian contrasts. On one hand you have narrow, cracked sidewalks that trip up even the most able-bodied person out there, a complete dearth of street furniture, choking diesel fumes, and a general disregard for the rights of those on foot--not to mention a nearly complete lack of marked crossings.

But then one block over you have lovely landscaping, narrow streets, relatively wide sidewalks:

Pleasant plazas accessed by pedestrian-only streets, with lots of engaging public space:

Or even really cool things like parks built on top of parking lots:














And crossing guards at the main downtown intersections:

So I just can't ever decide if Mexico does pedestrian design worse or better than us in the U.S.