I was journeying for 15 days in the south west. Many little towns like Sedona, Carmel by the sea, Monterey were awesome, but they could have been infinitely better and cozier if their center was made pedestrian only like almost all cities here in EU. Yea that made a big impact on my visit.
Streets like this are incredibly common in Europeans cities but so rare in America. It's a real shame, so much of our public space is exclusively for cars.
I've thought the same thing about the existing concrete barriers. They're so grey and bland. I feel like its a perfect canvas for an artists expression!
Seeing pedestrians, cyclists, children and mobility impaired people walking in the middle of a street in America just seems post-apocalyptic to me. More of America needs to be like this.
Hey Tim, I appreciate this video and the interesting insights in what's happening at Jackson Heights. However as a student of urban planning and fan of the Life-Sized city, I have to say that your proposals were quite disappointing, which is why I am writing this hopefully constructive criticism. You proposed to put a twodirectional bike line right on top of the existing interrupted green corridor in the center, which would require unearthing all existing trees and vegetation on the road and replanting the two lanes you proposed around the bike line, which would actually worsen the experience for bikers significantly. Both of these are really not good even tho I appreciate your emphasis on pedestrian space. A more comprehensive proposal could be to install unidirectional 2-2,5 m (around 7-8 feet) semi-grade sparated street level bike lines on each edge of the existing green space, while reshaping and advancing the pedestrian space from the sidewalk edges to install more vegetation, benches, functional areas (restaurant/cafe seating, cargo bike delivery areas, bike parking, ..) and more useful urban furniture and public ammenities like drinking fountains, public toilets, trash cans and the like. Looking forward to see what your chanel still has in store for us in the future tho and best wishes, Leo
Hey Leo, First off let me say, thank you so much for the feedback! I am certainly no professional urban planner, I'm merely a software engineer who is interested in community building and as you mentioned Life-Sized cities. I whole heartedly agree my plan is very idealistic, especially considering that this approach would require unearthing the median. This was way more of a "if we were starting from scratch idea". I do have some follow up questions. You mentioned having the bikes be surrounded by the two grass medians would worsen the experience for bikers, can you explain why? In NYC we have a lot of street bike lanes that run parallel on opposite sides of the road. I always thought this was a horrible and car centric design since it means the bike still needs to do a full u-turn across the street if they need to turn around. I've also seen these bidirectional bike lanes used in other places in Europe and some NYC parks. What is your disagreement with them? Thanks again, I definitely will consider the existing environment next time I do one of these planning videos.
@@timwalks hey tim, firstly thanks for considering the existing environment next time - it's a must in urban planning. Secondly, concerning the bidirectional bike lane surrounded by the grass medians and the u-turn problem. If the bike lane is surrounded by grass medians all the way, it creates a relatively narrow corridor (espacially when considering the length-width ratio) where it does not feel right or even safe to stop and leave the bike lane at any given point, say to go to a house on the block or just to check the route on the phone. This is to say is no easy exit. This is why I proposed 'semi-grade separation', meaning that there is grade separation or a barrier, but with several points of exit every dozen meters or so, woven into the other spaces. I see your point with the u-turn being difficult with unidirectional lanes. In this particular case when putting the bike lanes as proposed stilly centrally around the green lane, the u-turn issue is not really there tho, as the distance would still be not far and there would especially be nothing in the way when needing to u-turn. With the proposed width, there is also no issue if someone wildly rides against the unidirection rule for one single block before crossing the road at the more conveniently located intersection to the right side. In general though and on streets with cars especially, unidirectional lanes are still more useful when compared to central bidirectionals because they allow for much easier intersections and connectednes. For example seemless right turns, easy straigth continuation (although sight protection for right turns and of course car and park lane separation as well as appropriate left turn waiting space are necessary) Unidirectional lanes can also almost always be implemented in the same fast, easy and cheap way, which is not always the case for central bidirectionals (for example in the street of the video). I hope this made sense. This video has some interesting explanations and explain this pretty well: ruclips.net/video/ZZXGmsY9Kw4/видео.html Best wishes, Leo
Watched the video and I understand his argument in regards to being surrounded by cars and being unable to exit. I think this is less of in issue in my case where you don't have any cars surrounding you. There are also fewer points of necessary exit because 34th Ave goes through only a residential neighborhood. People take this route to move through various points of jackson heights quickly and safely. All of that being said, your original concern of the cost that comes with tearing up the median already makes my idea a non starter. I think making them closer to the median on opposite sides would make more sense.
@@timwalks yeah I think you’re right that in this environment yeah I think you’re right that in this environment the exit issue would not be such a problem in general in the case the green bands surrounding the bidirectional allow for some exits (although that would somewhat lower it’s quality for biodiversity) or intersections are close enough together, or bike traffic is really low. However if it’s really residential only, the neighborhood probably would also benefit from some more mixed use like a neighborhood shop and bar somewhere, but that’s another story. Btw the biggest problem I see with taking out the median is actually the environmental cost to it, but the financial cost of it is definitely also a big negative point. Yes if you put trees somewhere else, they will also one day be as green as what’s there now, but everything until then is a net loss (less shadow, less pollution reduction, less instant rainwater runoff reduction, less CO2 reduction through photosynthesis, etc), especially considering that you could easily keep almost all vegetation that is already there and just add to it to improve the situation. 🌳
I was journeying for 15 days in the south west. Many little towns like Sedona, Carmel by the sea, Monterey were awesome, but they could have been infinitely better and cozier if their center was made pedestrian only like almost all cities here in EU. Yea that made a big impact on my visit.
Streets like this are incredibly common in Europeans cities but so rare in America. It's a real shame, so much of our public space is exclusively for cars.
Amazing street diagram and explanation, would be great to get local artists to craft funky traffic barriers to be harder to move
I've thought the same thing about the existing concrete barriers. They're so grey and bland. I feel like its a perfect canvas for an artists expression!
The difference of being east or west of Flushing in Queens is like being south or north of Olympic for LA folks
Seeing pedestrians, cyclists, children and mobility impaired people walking in the middle of a street in America just seems post-apocalyptic to me. More of America needs to be like this.
If any city in America can do this, it is NYC
I hope you are correct.
Maybe Sanfran could too
Hey Tim,
I appreciate this video and the interesting insights in what's happening at Jackson Heights. However as a student of urban planning and fan of the Life-Sized city, I have to say that your proposals were quite disappointing, which is why I am writing this hopefully constructive criticism.
You proposed to put a twodirectional bike line right on top of the existing interrupted green corridor in the center, which would require unearthing all existing trees and vegetation on the road and replanting the two lanes you proposed around the bike line, which would actually worsen the experience for bikers significantly. Both of these are really not good even tho I appreciate your emphasis on pedestrian space.
A more comprehensive proposal could be to install unidirectional 2-2,5 m (around 7-8 feet) semi-grade sparated street level bike lines on each edge of the existing green space, while reshaping and advancing the pedestrian space from the sidewalk edges to install more vegetation, benches, functional areas (restaurant/cafe seating, cargo bike delivery areas, bike parking, ..) and more useful urban furniture and public ammenities like drinking fountains, public toilets, trash cans and the like.
Looking forward to see what your chanel still has in store for us in the future tho and best wishes,
Leo
Hey Leo,
First off let me say, thank you so much for the feedback! I am certainly no professional urban planner, I'm merely a software engineer who is interested in community building and as you mentioned Life-Sized cities. I whole heartedly agree my plan is very idealistic, especially considering that this approach would require unearthing the median. This was way more of a "if we were starting from scratch idea".
I do have some follow up questions. You mentioned having the bikes be surrounded by the two grass medians would worsen the experience for bikers, can you explain why? In NYC we have a lot of street bike lanes that run parallel on opposite sides of the road. I always thought this was a horrible and car centric design since it means the bike still needs to do a full u-turn across the street if they need to turn around. I've also seen these bidirectional bike lanes used in other places in Europe and some NYC parks. What is your disagreement with them?
Thanks again, I definitely will consider the existing environment next time I do one of these planning videos.
@@timwalks hey tim, firstly thanks for considering the existing environment next time - it's a must in urban planning.
Secondly, concerning the bidirectional bike lane surrounded by the grass medians and the u-turn problem.
If the bike lane is surrounded by grass medians all the way, it creates a relatively narrow corridor (espacially when considering the length-width ratio) where it does not feel right or even safe to stop and leave the bike lane at any given point, say to go to a house on the block or just to check the route on the phone. This is to say is no easy exit. This is why I proposed 'semi-grade separation', meaning that there is grade separation or a barrier, but with several points of exit every dozen meters or so, woven into the other spaces.
I see your point with the u-turn being difficult with unidirectional lanes.
In this particular case when putting the bike lanes as proposed stilly centrally around the green lane, the u-turn issue is not really there tho, as the distance would still be not far and there would especially be nothing in the way when needing to u-turn.
With the proposed width, there is also no issue if someone wildly rides against the unidirection rule for one single block before crossing the road at the more conveniently located intersection to the right side.
In general though and on streets with cars especially, unidirectional lanes are still more useful when compared to central bidirectionals because they allow for much easier intersections and connectednes. For example seemless right turns, easy straigth continuation (although sight protection for right turns and of course car and park lane separation as well as appropriate left turn waiting space are necessary)
Unidirectional lanes can also almost always be implemented in the same fast, easy and cheap way, which is not always the case for central bidirectionals (for example in the street of the video).
I hope this made sense. This video has some interesting explanations and explain this pretty well: ruclips.net/video/ZZXGmsY9Kw4/видео.html
Best wishes,
Leo
Watched the video and I understand his argument in regards to being surrounded by cars and being unable to exit. I think this is less of in issue in my case where you don't have any cars surrounding you. There are also fewer points of necessary exit because 34th Ave goes through only a residential neighborhood. People take this route to move through various points of jackson heights quickly and safely.
All of that being said, your original concern of the cost that comes with tearing up the median already makes my idea a non starter. I think making them closer to the median on opposite sides would make more sense.
@@timwalks yeah I think you’re right that in this environment yeah I think you’re right that in this environment the exit issue would not be such a problem in general in the case the green bands surrounding the bidirectional allow for some exits (although that would somewhat lower it’s quality for biodiversity) or intersections are close enough together, or bike traffic is really low. However if it’s really residential only, the neighborhood probably would also benefit from some more mixed use like a neighborhood shop and bar somewhere, but that’s another story.
Btw the biggest problem I see with taking out the median is actually the environmental cost to it, but the financial cost of it is definitely also a big negative point. Yes if you put trees somewhere else, they will also one day be as green as what’s there now, but everything until then is a net loss (less shadow, less pollution reduction, less instant rainwater runoff reduction, less CO2 reduction through photosynthesis, etc), especially considering that you could easily keep almost all vegetation that is already there and just add to it to improve the situation. 🌳
@@TheDasKanal Really love all this constructive commentary. You really learn the most from your mistakes 😅