Sidewalk Materials: What Are You Walking On?

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Not only did this recent post from the Infrastructurist make me realize that there are blogs about absolutely everything out there, it got me thinking about what we use to build our sidewalks.

Concrete is the most common choice, as it meets several key criteria for sidewalk design: it's cheap, durable, and slip-resistant. On the other hand, it's pretty boring to look at and--a factor that's becoming increasingly important as stormwater runoff regulations become more stringent--it's impervious.

In the past bricks and similar decorative pavers have been used to spice up the look of sidwalks, but cobbled surfaces can be difficult to navigate for folks with disabilities (not to mention those of us who wear high heels). As an alternative, the FHWA recommends stamped concrete or concrete pathways with brick trim. WALKArlington has been working with that Virginia city on a similar "field and border" design concept that relies entirely on textured concrete slabs with a smooth concrete border.

Then there's the issue of permeability. With pavement covering so much of our urban surfaces, it's important to finds materials that allow water to drain directly into the ground. The City of Olympia in Washington state has been installing pervious pavement in projects throughout the city since 1999. Although pervious concrete sidewalks are more expensive than traditional sidewalks, they can significantly reduce overall construction costs by eliminating the need for expensive "stormawater controls" adjacent to roadways (see the full report on Olympia's pervious sidewalks here).

The uber-green may opt for rubber sidewalks, another porous option, made entirely recycled tires. My knees are particularly intrigued by the proponents' claim that the flexible rubber surface is more comfortable to walk on. Sounds cushy to me.

Transportation For America: Take Action

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Transportation for America is heading to DC this week to advocate for Rep. Earl Blumenauer's Active Community Transportation Act (H.R. 4722). This bill would create a $2 billion competitive grant program to fund safe networks for biking and walking, and it needs your support.

You can find more information on the Active Community Transportation Act here, along with links to send a message to your representative asking them to co-sponsor the bill.

This Week on Foot

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Some weeks it sure seems hard to find any good news on the pedestrian front. Seems like I shouldn't have to scour through pages and pages of headlines about pedestrian deaths before I discover anything positive.

Take this story from the small Washington state town where my family is from, which describes a Day of tears: Driver gets prison for hitting, killing pedestrian (the tears must have made a difference for that driver, who only received a three-year sentence, as opposed to the Swedish Rapper Sentenced 15-to-Life for Killing Pedestrian here in LA).

Or there's this story from Long Beach, California, where LBFD rescues pedestrian pinned under Metro Blue Line in downtown Long Beach. Or the sad tale from Detroit, where a DDOT test-drive ends in a pedestrian's death.

All that mayhem makes the fact that Berkeley Police Focuses on Pedestrian Safety in March to Remember Zachary Cruz (a six-year-old killed on his way to an after-school program in Berkeley) seem almost cheerful.

But all is not completely bleak on the pedestrian front. In the UK Road safety group C76 triumphant as Kings Langley C76 route repairs commence. At least London pedestrians will have safer access along one major roadway soon.

Today's Disheartening Quote

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"When did it become the responsibility of the federal DOT to build sidewalks?" asked Missouri Senator Kit Bond during today's transportation appropriations hearing (full story here on Streetsblog).

How about: around when we realized how much treating the obesity epidemic, driven in part by our auto-centric society, costs us? Or, when we discovered how expensive it was to deal with the health and environmental impacts of relying only of vehicles to get around? When we saw how many pedestrians are killed or injured each year in traffic crashes? When we learned that poor walkability contributes to serious social and economic disadvantages for people who can't drive or can't afford a car?

Sigh.

Safe Routes to School Travel Data Report

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In its recently released report Safe Routes to School Travel Data: A Look at Baseline Results from Parent Surveys and Student Travel Tallies the National Center for Safe Routes to School summarizes two years of travel data from the national safe routes to school program. Some of the key findings:

• Most children travel to school by car or school bus, although walking does make up a fairly significant portion of school trips (11 percent in the morning and 15 percent in the afternoon)
• Walking peaks in fifth grade, when nearly a quarter of kids walk or bike to school, then drops when children enter middle school (possibly due to middle schools being further from home than elementary schools)
• Distance is the biggest factor in parents' decision to allow their kids to walk to school, and makes a dramatic difference in walking rates. Over 40 percent of children who live less than a quarter-mile from school walk to school. However, the percentage of walkers drops to nine percent for children living between 1/2 and one mile from school--and to two percent or less for children who live more than a mile away from school.
• Although distance was important, traffic speed, traffic volume, and intersection crossing safety were also major factors in whether or not parents allowed their children to walk to school. Weather also made a difference to parents, but not as much as has been shown in previous studies.

Based on this data, the National Center for Safe Routes to School suggests that in the short term safe routes to school programs focus efforts particularly on areas within a mile of schools, where many children already walk. Since safety concerns are a major reason that parents don't allow their children to walk to school, identifying strategies to lower traffic around schools, reduce traffic speeds, and provide children with safe crossings could have a strong influence on the number of kids who walk to school.