Now bike storage is hip, too!

Yesterday I wrote about how bicycles are the hippest thing since sliced bread. Now, bike storage is becoming equally hip!

I like the dog best.

READ MORE

Race to replace Bloomberg heats up

The race to be the Mayor of the most important city in the world is starting to get rolling. Here's a round-up of the news as reported by the most important newspaper in the world:

Marty Markowitz, the Brooklyn borough president, has got 774 Facebook friends. That's significantly more friends than anyone else has. This, he believes, makes him the front runner. I am not convinced.

Could Police Commissioner Ray Kelly be considering a run? Personally, I've never been a big fan of the Police Chief to Mayor or General to President transition. I don't think the skills are necessarily comparable. This is perhaps best seen in President Grant (great General, lousy President).

The best article focused on Council Speaker Christine Quinn's dad. I've always like Quinn and now I'm definitely convinced about who should be the next Mayor of New York: Quinn, that is Mr. Lawrence Quinn.

READ MORE

Bloomberg introduces record number of Charter Schools

For any other Mayor it'd be a major initiative, but for New York's Mike Bloomberg it's just business as usual. Bloomberg has announced plans to launch 18 new charter schools this year, the most ever to be introduced in the city in a single year.

To describe it as "business as usual" is to get at precisely the type of thinking Bloomberg has applied throughout his reign. In this case, his thinking is that by introducing additional schools it will create the competition necessary to spark fundamental education change throughout New York. More below:

“It is the charter schools that will get the public to demand that the rest of them come up,” Mr. Bloomberg said. “It’s the charter schools that let parents vote with their feet and tell us what the parents think about the quality of the education, of the schools. And I can tell you, one of the reasons that the public schools in the city have gotten better is because the charter schools exist and give parents an alternative and let parents see that you can do something better.”

READ MORE

Two Takes on Parking

Personally, I don't understand the need for requiring developers to build parking. They're going to build what they need to sell or rent the place. You don't need to regulate business to protect business.

I have mixed feelings about limiting the construction of new spaces, so I'll sit on the sidelines of that discussion for now and just pass on these two recent articles:

1. Tacoma just finished a comprehensive look at their Downtown parking.

The preliminary recommendation, said committee chairman Marty Campbell, is likely to call for installation of the 21st-century version of the parking meter – electronic kiosks that spit out parking receipts that are attached to the inside of curbside windows for parking checkers to see. The system would be similar to one used in much of downtown Seattle and Portland.

The parking recommendations are the first baby steps in what could become a much larger and more ambitious plan to radically change the pattern of downtown commuting from one dominated by single-occupancy vehicle trips – 76 percent now – to one that relies more on transit, car pools, walking and biking to bring downtown workers to their offices.

2. The New York Sun reported that efforts to limit parking may slow development.

One proposed policy to reduce the increase in vehicles is to do away with zoning regulations that require new developments to contain a minimum number of built-in parking spots, ranging from 0.4 to one car a housing unit. Instead, the city would replace the requirements with a maximum limit on the number of parking spots based on how close the building is to bus and subway stops.

While proponents of the move say it would encourage tenants to ditch their vehicles, some are arguing that a cap on parking spots would be a drag on the city's housing market and tax base.

The CEO of the Partnership for New York City, Kathryn Wylde, said enacting a limit on parking would make it more difficult to attract tenants to developments in the boroughs other than Manhattan, where mass transit is sometimes scarce. Manhattan already has parking limits in place in most areas.

READ MORE

Bloomberg counts down

Billionaire New York Mayor (and, I'm still keeping my fingers crossed against all odds, possible Vice-Presidential candidate) Mike Bloomberg is known for his obsession with data. Heck, that's how he made his billions.

These days he is closely keeping track of a simple number and making sure that his staff does as well: how much time left they have to make a difference.

500 days might not matter much in most lame duck administrations, but Bloomberg has shown his ability to create huge impacts in short periods of time. Impacts that often spread outside of his municipality.

For the sake of all our cities, we can only hope that Mayor Bloomberg has a few major innovations left in him.

On a side note, for awhile now I've been thinking that America needs a figure to focus us on the power of local (rather than federal) government. I think Bloomberg could be that figure after he leaves office (heck, he's already doing it now). He has the money obviously to create a significant City-focused think tank and the experience to back up his bold ideas for urban transformation.

He also has the relationships with other Mayors to create a powerful political force that may well be able to get Washington to listen (if not actually respond).

If Bloomberg doesn't create this role for himself, whoever ends up the next President would be wise to stick him in a cabinet position and essentially give him this role - an ambassador from the Federal Government to our nation's Cities (and, of course, the reverse would apply as well).

READ MORE

New York vs. London

Guest host on WNYC's Brian Lehrer show leads a discussion comparing London and New York. For now, the Big Apple is on top - at least statistically.

READ MORE

Dinner Parties on the Street

Okay, so this article is a bit stale, but bare in mind that I'm a slow reader.

In the July 31st issue of The New York Times, Penelope Green wrote about New Yorkers using public spaces to hold private dinner parties. The subtitle of the piece, "Expanding the idea of home to include the city itself," is what caught my attention.

This is precisely the transformation in understanding that needs to take place if sidewalks, streets and even bridges are going to be seen as more than just transportation networks. Just like increased business activity can increase the value of a commercial neighborhood, public spaces should be understood as being more valuable the more activity they contain.

Public spaces too often have their uses defined by a special group of people - whether that's a bunch of buerocrats or some "citizens'" committee. Here's a radical idea: how about allowing the public to define what their public spaces are used for.

Of course, in many cases that means stripping away regulations that stop people from using particular spaces in ways that might seem to have the most obvious benefit to them. I can just imagine in a different City (or maybe in certain New York neighborhoods) these dinner parties being broken up to stop people from loitering.

READ MORE