Cross-Blog: The No-Excuse Zone

This is the first-ever Cross-Blog entry that we are pleased to draw to your attention. From our creative colleague in Vancouver, Gordon Price, Director of the City Program at Simon Fraser University, sustainability activist and local politician, this time leading us to a concept called the No-Excuse Zone for urban cycling, which he in turn picked up from colleagues in Australia (more evidence of the small world syndrome).

You can pick it up from Price Tags: Perspective from Vancouver at http://pricetags.wordpress.com/2009/03/02/no-excuses/. You will see space for comments there.

Thanks Gordon.

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Cross-Blog Dialogues

* * * Click here to check out all Cross-Blog postings to date. * * * __________________________________________________
One of the consistent themes of the New Mobility Agenda for a very long time has been the importance of finding ways to "connect the silos" of all the sprawling universe of programs, projects and discussions that are going on in our common area of interest in various corners of this big/small planet. This is not an easy task, but given the high opportunity cost of these dispersed and unconnected efforts, often meriting to be better known, it is certainly one is worth tackling. So off we go.

This section of World Streets is intended to provide an open door for creative two-way interaction on discussions and issues that are taking place on other blogs and program sites. If you have suggestions, it would be much appreciated if you would leave them in the Comments section just below.

For the record, another tool for "silo connecting" of the Agenda is the specialized Knoogle New Mobility browser which you can pick up by clicking here.

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2 March 2009: Welcome to World Streets

Welcome to World Streets, the 21st century newspaper published by the New Mobility Partnerships that has a single job: to provide you with high quality, readable , concise food for thought, and leads specifically on the topics of sustainable mobility, sustainable cities, and sustainable lives, world-wide. Today's Front Page also displays postings for latest week.. _____________________________________________

* * * Go to Today's front page * * *

We want to make sure that Streets is a good read, and a fast one, for our overloaded colleagues working on these issues in cities and countries around the world, as well for others trying to follow the full range of issues involved. And while the exact organizational mix is still being played with in these early months to determine what combination is going to work best, we start out by providing each day one longer thinkpiece reporting on a specific project, policy, program, or person working to break the old mobility stasis somewhere in the world, and add to that one or two other items or leads that our readers may find of interest.

Streets adds new dimensions to the New Mobility Agenda, offering useful new tools and an extended forum for contributions, challenges and comments reaching beyond the focus group postings of the New Mobility Cafe. And it has a definite ethic and strategic approach to the issues involved. The first wing of this approach is our complete independence of any interests, government, commercial or others. Our party line, our doctrine, is sustainable development and social justice. And that’s it. Please take a minute to review our basic platform for all we do in this broiled sector, which you will see at http://www.strategy.newmobility.org.

Streets is regularly indexed by all search engines, ensuring a wide reach of all that appears here. The content is regularly provided on a volunteer basis by more than one thousand colleagues actively working on these issues with whom we have taken contact since the outset of the New Mobility Agenda in 1988.

World Streets takes the challenge of a polyglot world seriously. Click the Languages/Translations link on the top menu to see how we are trying to be useful to our non-English language colleagues.

The defining characteristics of World Streets are that it is not only a specialized daily newspaper, but also that it provides lead-ins on a steadily expanding set of useful tools, along with a searchable archive of information and past postings on the various topics that constitute our focus. To get a feel for how this works, we can think of nothing better than to draw your attention to Contents section that you will find on the top left menu.

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For this reason we have long tried to do our best to use free machine translations to help our worldwide friends get at least a grasp of information that is otherwise available only in English. You will see in the left menu bar, our best 2009 effort at linking machine translations to this site.

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National Journal Panel: Tear down those walls, Secretary LaHood

Reinventing Transportation in America

Contribution to the National Journal Transportation Panel
- Eric Britton, 12 Jan. 2009, New Mobility Partnerships, Paris and Los Angeles

Summary:
The greatest single challenge the incoming Secretary of Transportation faces will be to tear down the walls of the past that have worked to hold back the development of a more effective and more sustainable transportation system for the United States. The challenge facing the new team is nothing less than that of “reinventing transportation in America”, which is exactly what we need to do now. And in the process seizing this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to do just that.

But we understand that this is not going to be an easy challenge -- because the day Secretary LaHood walks through the door of his new office there will be an incredible number of people, problems, projects, details and interests clamoring for his attention. Many with projects "ready to go" -- but many of which must not be simply approved before making them pass through the critical tests which are outlined here. The real issue here and now, is whether urgently funding more-of-the-same projects will continue making things better . . . or worse. It’s important to scrutinize each proposal very very carefully.

This process of tearing down the key walls is likely to be the most important single initial decision that the new Secretary can make as he assembles his new team and prepares for the critical four years ahead. This, breaking with the past and redefining the future, is the one decision that will shape all the rest. With this in view I propose that we now put our heads together to gather our ideas and recommendations on the following ten-part action proposal for the leaders of the new team. I offer this to the panel as a starting point for their comments and refinements.

Contents
1. Modify the Mission: 2
2. The external walls: 2
3. The internal walls: 4
4. Learning from others: 4
5. Tighten timeframe: 4
6. Full cost pricing: 5
7. Innovation from outside: 5
8. Civil Society 6
9. Jobs 6
10. The gender imbalance: 7


1. Modify Mission:

This has to be the starting place.

The traditional focus of DOT and all its many agencies and branches has in a phrase been “to be good at transportation”, which de facto boils down to being historically seen as . . . good at highways, good at aviation, good at transit, good at railroads, etc. etc. And while that has yielded extensive, sometimes sensational results on the supply side, it is not at all the kind of approach which is appropriate to the very different conditions and constraints of the 21st century.

So what under these radically different circumstances should be the target for the new Secretary and his department? Let me at this point just step aside and address this challenge to the panel, and indeed to anybody else who is interested, including colleagues in the halls of the Department of Transportation, to help us work out some real guidelines for this extremely important step in what I very much hope will be the new policy of the Department.

My own preferred single priority candidate capable of guiding and shaping all the rest will be to focus policy on investments and measures that serve specifically to achieve major reductions of carbon-driven vehicle miles travelled (VMT), and this across the whole transportation spectrum. As it turns out traffic management and reduction is a near perfect surrogate for all the key objectives associated with issues of climate, sustainability, economics, energy and systemic efficiency, among others. You figure out how to drive VMT down and the rest moves along in the right direction with it. Or will at least if we are careful about it.

This is a very doable strategy, one which if we get it right will not only support but even enhance the economy of the nation, while at the same time providing more choice for citizens and more affordable and equitable transportation for all.

2. External walls:

Eliminate walls between transportation and all the rest.

Our point of departure has to be to understand that transportation is a means and not an end. This is so well-known that it almost seems unnecessary to state it, however we have all too often failed to recognize this in the past. Fortunately the means to rectify this are at hand. A critical look at our past failures to be sufficiently inclusive to create really effective policies and practices is a good place to start.

If we can self-criticize the performance and results of our transportation policy, thinking and performance over the last decades, the crux would have to be that our investment and other key choices have been made without sufficient reference to the broader context and issues that shape and are in turn shaped by decisions made in the transportation sector. This long list includes such critical under-pinnings as climate, environment, land use, value capture, energy, city and community development, public health, quality of life, job creation (but the right kinds of jobs for our new century), community relations, aging populations, 21st century economic realities, the special problems of the rural and urban poor, entrepreneurship, the need for bold experimentation, the untapped potential of IT, the beauty of America, and the list goes on. Our sector and the investments that are now going to go into can succeed only if we bring all of these factors to the table in the decision process in a way that has rarely been done in the past. All of the time!

The point needs to be made that in the past most to these issues and interests have been treated as “soft” and as such relegated to the outer edges of the decision process, if at all. That is a huge mistake. They are hard and central, and it is going to take ea reorganization from the top to bring this about.

I propose we recommend that Secretary LaHood and his team convene in the first months of taking office a high-level, high-visibility, cross-agency, cross-platform review and brainstorming process which will assemble around one table the best placed strategic thinkers from the following key agencies – to give them a chance to look together at what the challenges, responses and priorities really are from the necessary broader perspective. Obvious candidates for such a fundamental outreach and redefinition effort include:

• Department of Health and Human Services
• Department of Housing and Urban Development
• Department of Commerce
• Department of Education
• Department of Labor
• Department of Energy
• Department of the Treasury
• Environmental Protection Agency
• Federal Communications Commission
• VISTA, USAID and Peace Corps
• DARPA

It goes without saying that my listing here is personal and incomplete. And while I'm sure there are other players who should be brought into such a rethinking process, I would hope that the core group would remain relatively compact so that the key factors and players are going to really get their message through.

Let's look at one example briefly, health: The health impacts of transportation are many, notorious and for the most part strongly negative. And while these factors are at times brought into the planning and decision process, it is my contention that, along with the critical concerns of climate and sustainability, they now need to be brought right into the strong center of transportation policy and practice. Starting at the federal level, and hopefully by its strong example flowing out and influencing the sector’s practices at state, city and other key levels.

At the other extreme of the above lists you will see DARPA – the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. By adding this agency to the group, my intention is to point up one simple truth of the future of our transportation systems, and this is the update are going to find much of the content of their success by becoming ever more aggressive users of the kinds of technology that DARPA has assisted and championed in the past. In the old days transportation was about metal boxes moving about on rails or roads, in the air or on water. Today while we still have the boxes and their supporting media, however the full versatility of performance depends on the extent to which they take full advantage of the kinds of information, communications, and logistics technologies that groups like DARPA and several other government organizations have helped jumpstart. There is plenty of room for that in the four years ahead.

More generally, we need to see a far tighter integration of government and research powerhouses into the mainstream of transportation policy and practice.

This would be an important thing to do now because here we are not only in a new century but in the opening phase of a period of new government ideas and initiatives. So now's the time to start to think far more broadly and far more strategically about the issues and choices now before us.

(Incidentally, if these meetings and exchanges are carried out in a way such that they are fully open to the public, through public broadcasting and the Internet, it can be argued that this form of citizen oversight can be one of the guarantors of the effectiveness of this important initiative. Inclusiveness of the public is part of the solution, no doubt about it)

Finally, it is certainly worth mentioning that there are a considerable number of projects and programs going on which are already trying to reach across these traditional lines and barriers to collaboration. These efforts need to be highlighted, reinforce, and support. They are the makings of the future.


3. Internal walls:

Eliminate walls within the DOT family.

By creating specialized agencies with specific modal and sectoral mandates, we have laid the base for a policy which at best is going to sub-optimize within each of those areas of competence. This chronic tendency to sub- optimization is endemic within the thick-wall structures (silos) that the most part today permeate and handicap the various agencies and programs.

I would also respectfully suggest that the continued existence of pretty rigid bureaucratic structures and routines within the department serves to stifle good ideas and new sources of energy that I and others have encountered at junior administrative levels within the various agencies. More facilitation of bottom-up flow of ideas and cross-agency collaboration strike me as appropriate for a 21st-century operation.

It is my guess that as the new LaHood team presses ahead with the challenge of redefining the mission of the Department in the far broader ways suggested here, it will begin to be clear how it will be possible to go to work on the task of thinning those walls. (It goes without saying of course that this is hardly the sort of job that can be handled from the bottom up.)


4. International walls

Eliminate walls between the rest of the world.

As much as it may hurt to say it, America is not among the world leaders when it comes to many aspects of transportation, and in particular when it comes to sustainable transportation.

There are many ideas and concepts which are doing heavy duty everyday on the roads, rails, and waterways in Europe and in fact in other parts of the world, which the US should be looking at far more closely. And when they pass the acid test adopted and adapted for effective application here. Our programs for international exchanges and joint work should be strongly ratcheted up as part of the new Department’s revised walls-down mandate.

There are international exchange and collaborative programs in the sector that are already out there and making their contributions, They should be made better known, multiplied and supported.


5. Tighten timeframe (2009-2012)

Mr. Secretary, it is my respectful recommendation that at least 50% of all investments and programs be geared to getting visible results within the first four years of this administration -- whether measured in terms of where and how dollars are spent, or in VMT changes or in trip pattern changes, etc. All these and more appear to be appropriate measures to see where we are heading and to measure changes.. And just because it concentrates attention on the four years directly ahead, this need not be a policy that throws away the longer-term future.

To the contrary by focusing attention on projects and investments which are expected to be sustainable (i.e. geared to the long-term) and achieve concrete results within this very short timeframe, it is reasonable to expect that once we have lived this very different experience and actually achieved these goals, we will have some rather different thoughts about the longer-term future and strategies that we do today.

The target and results period is 2009-2012. Let's focus and meet the priority challenges before us first. And then rich from this experience and our successes in really making a difference where it counts, we will be better equipped to tackle the most important long-term investments and challenges.


6. Full cost pricing

Eliminate the walls that keep out appropriate evaluation of externalities.

Let's get rid of the free riders all the way down the line? Any person or mode consuming scarce resources without paying a fair price for them needs to be reassessed and brought in a coherent manner into the Department’s new transportation and pricing strategy. Those of us who use our cars regularly and fly at the drop of a hat are famously not paying our way. Likewise the cost of goods transport is often heavily subsidized, and though this is very comfortable for us as consumers is definitely not part of a sustainability strategy for the sector. The key of course in all cases it is a matter of externalities which need to be brought into the pricing equation. This can and should be done.

The means for getting this important job done will be to mandate a cost-benefit analysis of any publicly backed infrastructure spending so as to recapture all “external economies” (such as windfall real estate price gains) as the first line of financing such investment.

In some cases the assessments needed to assure accurate pricing are both easy to do, where as in others, especially where there are many different types and levels of benefits, the calculations are more tricky. Still we know enough about how to carry out these exercises that there is no reason not to do so.

As we here all know, these readjustments are going to make big differences in people's choices of when, how, and where they travel. And that is exactly what is needed to create a more rational and effective mobility system.


7. Innovation from outside:

Eliminate the walls hindering innovation from new sources.

When it comes to transportation in and around cities, for a variety of reasons and contrary to what one might think we are "innovation-lite”. This is a trap which has come about through a long sequence of historical events which now require immediate attention and prudent rectification. There are a large number of barriers to innovation in the transportation sector, and these need to be re-examined and reduced so that new ideas and practices can start to transform the sector.

There is enormous scope, indeed urgency, for sorting out and prioritizing these potential innovations, and because we have not done as well in the past thus far we have been wasting a lot of real opportunities. Much but not all of the push to do ideas, services, and policies will come from beyond the traditional actors in the sector. We can expect when we begin to remove the barriers, that substantial part of this of this innovation will push will come from the private sector. But the private sector is not the only source of innovative ideas and successful implementations for the transportation sector, so we also need to bear in mind and support good initiatives coming from more transformational public agencies, NGOs, local groups and players, and others.
 

8. Civil Society

Eliminate the civil society wall.

Based on my experience both in the United States and abroad, one of the things that strikes me as a major shortcoming of present practices, is the challenge of finding a way to integrate the enormous knowledge, competences and energies of civil society into the transportation decision and action process. This is not an easy thing to achieve, in part because it is unfamiliar and as such very different from past practices; and in part because it involves working with a very large number of very diverse groups, interest, and working styles. It is a real challenge to efficiency and diplomacy to find ways to factor them positively into the processes that now need to be engaged.

But we sit today close to the end of the first decade of the century, and we have an enormous array of tools and procedures that will allow us to bring these groups into the knowledge building and implementation process. Indeed when it comes to actually implementing many of the new measures which are more consistent with the objectives of sustainability and social justice, these same external players will be extremely important part of this process.

Let me cite one example which to my mind every city and community in America needs to have a good look at, and which the new DOT team can get behind fast, effectively and at very low cost. A team of citizens in New York City have combined to provide a serious, consistent, and high visibility voice for citizen activism and collaboration. This is an example, a template if you will which any city can follow. Have a look at the site of Transportation Alternatives at http://transalt.org. Since 1973 they have been a persistent and effective voice in favor of sustainable transportation, bringing together thousands of New Yorkers and others concerned with these problems in their city.

In parallel with this another approach which is being effectively demonstrated also in New York City is the citizen-financed and highly effective Livable Streets Network (LSN) at http://www.livablestreets.com/. LSN has created an online community for people working to create sustainable cities through sensible urban planning, design, and transportation policy. Their first high-quality citizen’s transportation blog, Streetsblog at http://www.streetsblog.org/ aims to (and succeeds) to influencing policy in New York City. And beyond that they have developed a blog package, template, which is currently being put to work in other cities.

To my mind there are many parallels here with the successful campaign that was waged by incoming President Obama as he moved away from the old models of working with narrow corridors of interest and power to a far more inclusive style. It is my recommendation that in redrawing the structures and routines of the new Department, the Secretary and his team will do well to look hard at these lessons from the very recent past.


9. Jobs

Break down the labor wall.

We have, without necessarily wanting to do it per se, created high walls between jobs and the transportation sector. This has been a very costly error.

The key phrase in this ongoing shift has been "labor saving". On the one hand it has been a natural enough force for change, given the fact that in most transportation operations labor costs are the largest single item, accounting for two thirds or more of total costs. And as technology got smarter one of its primary achievements has been to reduce the labor content of the sector. Hmm. Given the importance of jobs in society as well as the economy, this is a trend which is worth at least seriously thinking about.

Likewise in our rush to privatize things with the idea that fast privatization is going to be too higher productivity and lower costs, we seem to lost sight of a number of important things that cannot be properly measured from a short-term perspective. So a longer-term view to understanding the real impacts of privatization, social as well as economic, as well as the effects that it has on the traditional public service function which is always been a very important part of the task facing sector, would seem to be called for as part of the overall of arrangements at the top.

But now we have an opportunity to revisit our transportation arrangements, thanks to what one can hope it is a bit of fresh air being brought in by the new transportation team at the top. This possible pattern break can give us a chance to be a bit more clever in a future in the way we combine the special talents and contributions that human beings can bring to a system or service, together with all of the smarts that 21st century technology puts in our hands.

In much the same way, many of the tasks that are associated with building and operating transportation system provide opportunities for combining immediate productive output on the one hand together, with carefully integrated programs of education and training that will permit us at the same time to upgrade the skill level and confidence of all of the individuals who constitute the transportation labor force. Think of it perhaps as the "Transportation University", a school without Ph.D.'s for sure but plenty of creative programs in which work and learning are concatenated in ways which leave us with a brighter, more competent, and more optimistic America.

Let's break down that wall.



10. The gender imbalance:

Eliminate the gender wall.

This particular transformative issue been addressed elsewhere in these conversations : the quality of our transportation choices and arrangements has suffered greatly from the historic practice of putting decision-making into the hands of a too narrow class of American citizens: for the most part male, educated, middle-class, and almost all car owner/driver's.

This is not a matter of trying to be politically correct or of kneejerk feminism. It is what I believe is the only responsible way to achieve a government that is “of and by the people”. Adequate gender representation and direct empowerment is a vital part of this process and one that we can address right now.

This forced, high-priority network expansion can open up another outstanding oversight in our present arrangements that also requires rectification. Specifically it can help us to increase greatly the range of backgrounds and skills we bring into the various decision fora. This therefore gives us a golden opportunity to rectify some of the debilitating historical inadequacies in the sector that have led to its underperformance in so many areas. Underperformance and abject unfairness.

So as we look to bring in more women, we need of course to bring in more expertise in the entrenched professional skills such as transport planning, traffic management, engineering, financial planning, technical modeling and the usual array of “hard skills” which have the front stage in the sector. But that is not enough.

But to get the job done right we also need greatly enhanced competence in such areas as environment, climate, land use, public health, cities, rural areas, community relations, demographics, local government, social services, behavioral psychology, education, childcare, job creation, poverty reduction, communications and all those other key areas of our daily lives which thus far have not received the necessary attention in the transport discussions and decision-making process. And in these, we need both women and men to enhance our understanding of these mission-critical issues and to inform policy and practice in the sector.

However to give this full scope we need to go beyond the usual token representation. We need their strength. And we need their numbers. A scattered handful of females does not appear to suffice to force the change. Put enough women into a forum and they will keep us on our toes. I promise. (The key being the ”enough”.)

One of my diligent Australian colleagues, Michael Yeates, offers interesting way of putting this with a question that I pass on to you with half a grin: "Dracula again in charge of the blood bank?" A bit violent I admit but the image is striking enough to remind us of the kinds of changes that are needed not only in terms of ideas and policies, but also in terms of the players.

More down to earth, here is what Swedish policy and law have to say on this subject:

“The transport system shall be equitable so that it covers both women’s’ and men’s’ transport needs and gives both genders equal influence over the transport system’s creation, shape and function. (To facilitate this goal, by 2010 no traffic/transport policy group will have less than 40% of its members from either gender.)”

I do think we can learn something from the Swedes (and the Norwegians, and the Finns) on this. It’s a bit about how many Americans have over the last couple of decades (and often to their great surprise) become something like color blind. The lesson of history is that once the whole thing is in place nobody even thinks about it any more (unless they walk into a conference or workshop of all (wo)men). That’s just the normal way to do things if you want great and equitable results in a great and equitable country.

* * *

Get this right and it could well signal the beginning of a major revolution in the transportation sector which just might turn out to be every bit as fundamental as President Eisenhower's Intrastate Highway Program that reshaped America (and by example so many other parts of the planet ) in so very many significant ways. Not all of them positive, as we now realize.

Beyond this, the fact is that attitudes and practices in the United States are observed very closely and often blindly copied by institutions and others working in other countries around the world. The American transportation example is an important one and we have every reason to make it one which is not only going to show the way to new thinking and better practices in the United States, but also to instruct and inspire the many other places in the world are looking to us for examples.

So rather than holding our heads and worrying about what India, China, and other nations are going to do in their transportation choices and practices to undermine life quality in their own backyards and destroy the planet at the same time, what about our stepping back and providing them with an example that they can understand, come to admire, and go about adapting and improving it for their own special conditions?

Leading by example, I believe it is called.

Eric Britton

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World Streets / The Resource Base

World Streets has four main functions: (a) It is a specialized daily journal. (b) A collaborative international network. (c) An in-depth international resource. And finally (d) an active lobby for sustainable transportation, sustainable cities and sustainable lives, supporting projects and programs all over the world. Here we introduce the resource/research function which, as you will see, provides exceptionally deep and broad coverage of the sector from a truly international perspective.

Please start here:

We cordially invite you to give this a careful read the first time you come to this site, because this is your key to getting full value from this carefully constructed toolset.

The resource base and toolset introduced here has been specifically pieced together with our readers and their needs in mind. Our readers come from many different parts of the world, with often very different cultures and historical endowments, and levels of available resources for dealing with all these issues that vary hugely. What they have in common is that overwhelmingly they either work with cities or public agencies concerned with matters of transportation, environment, city development, land use, public health, etc., or are activists or researchers, professors or students, operators or regulators, consultants or concerned citizens. Or are representatives of the media, new and old.

These are the kinds of people and institutions who we have set out to serve.

How to make best use of the site and toolset:

The blog itself is divided into two main sections. The one that most people are immediately aware of and turn their eye to is the larger central column which presents the main content of the daily newspaper. That is our intention.

However, day after day, month after month the sheer quantity of articles and commentaries that appear here tend to gradually enter into something which is analogous to a close drawer on your desk. It is there, it is maybe important for you at some point, but how to get at it when you need it? That is the second part of our challenge.

So to this end, we will focus here entirely on the smaller column just to your left here, the "rest of the iceberg" if you will. This turns out to be a bit more complicated and is worth introducing carefully so that you can get best use of it. We are confident that the time you invest to familiarize yourself initially with this extensive tool set will be well compensated.

Let us start by simply listing the main headings/categories. that constitute the resource base. And then once you have a quick look at the overall collection we can then examine each in turn and in more detail.

Here is the overall listing as it stands at this date:

1. First time visitor ABC's
2. World Streets in World Languages
3. Search World Streets: 2009/2010
4. The latest from World Streets
5. Featured series for (month)
6. Featured video clips for (month)
7. Latest news from the world's streets (Headlines and links)
8. Editorial/volunteer team
9. New Mobility building blocks
10. Subscribe, support World Streets 2010
11. Free daily delivery: RSS
12. New Mobility combined search engine
13. World Streets weekly archives
14. Search all key sources (See below)s
15. Key sources, links, and blogs
16. World Streets sentinels
17. World Streets correspondents
18. In Memoriam
19. They are talking about . . .
20. (Some draft sections)

Now going into more detail:

It is our hope that the entire process will be sufficiently well labeled and logical that most of our readers will simply be able to click through them to see where they lead. But we thought it might be useful as well if we supply some more detailed indications, which is what we shall now do, taking each in the indicated order.

1. FIRST TIME VISITOR ABC'S - This important introductory section is divided in turn into five parts:

A. Start here / The Brief- This 4 page/4 minute introduction is proposed is must reading if the readers to understand fundamentally what this initiative is all about. It is a fast read, quickly setting out the main defining points and characteristics of World Streets, and the New Mobility Agenda just behind it.

B. New Mobility / The Strategy -- Plan A: Goals, strategy, building blocks. Once again we propose this as an essential read for the first time reader, since it sets out the basic issues and political philosophy that underlie entire approach and selection of the journal. This is not just any collection of "interesting articles" that involve issues of transport in and around cities. It is about sustainable transportation quite strictly defined. Please read.

C. World Streets / The Resource (this page)

D. Expert views / The reaction -- 101 readers report their critical views on World Streets. Replaces here because we believe it provides important perspective from readers with high expertise in many areas and for many parts of the world. As editors we can tell you how good we think we are all day long, but these words from entirely independent people provide you with something you can count on.

E. Implementation / Now what: -- contribute, subscribe, support, get involved in making World Streets of success. This is for us an extremely important section, though life being what it is and timing as short as it is, we have to keep in mind that many readers will be too busy to give this their attention. We hope you will, because your collaboration is part of what is needed to make this collaborative venture work. Thanks for taking the time to read this.

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2. WORLD STREETS IN WORLD LANGUAGES
This is tricky, but very important. It is easy to have prejudices on this in terms of the violence of the translations can do to your language; but be patient, there is more to it than that. There is a language reality out there of which many people working in the field internationally are not necessarily aware. And that is that the bulk of the people on this planet who are involved in transportation policy and practice in any given place where English is not the primary language, simply do not have the time to devote to reading articles, even summaries of articles, that are in something other than their main working language. That is a reality. But since World Streets has the pretension of being a truly worldwide cross-cultural source, we have tried to figure out how to make some kind of inroads into this seemingly intractable problem. With that in mind and making use of this borrowed toolset, from our very first day of publication we have tried to take advantage of best available technology in order to provide workable translations for the roughly 6,000,000,000 people on this planet for whom English is not their main working language. For more on this, have a look at http://tinyurl.com/ws-languages .

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3. SEARCH WORLD STREETS: 2009/2010
Remember our analogy that the past content of World streets runs the risk of being equivalents of potentially interesting papers and reports that are caught in a closed-door of your desk? As an example as of March 2010 have been more than 500 articles and commentaries published in the course of the first year. But these are not just articles were given day, but potential resources. This search function scans via your selection of keywords the entire contents of World Streets from its inception. The same familiar approach as for Google. Try when you need it and we think you will not be disappointed. (In other parts of this resource section you will see additional Combined Search Engines which we have created to scan the contents of hundreds of related sources worldwide. You will see more on that below.)

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4. THE LATEST FROM WORLD STREETS .
This tool sets out two searches, the first of which calls up the latest articles appearing in the journal with the most recent up top, while the second is the same for your comments.

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5. FEATURED SERIES FOR (MONTH)
The items under this heading vary from month to month depending on the goals and orientation of the overall program in that period. In all cases however they are standardized to the extent that the first item calls up the World Streets Monthly Report for the last full month, while the last item -- Check out (month's) featured clips -- provides an introduction to the selected video clips for the month, which appear immediately below and are directly clickable.

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6. FEATURED VIDEO CLIPS FOR (MONTH)
because we live in a multimedia world, and because in order to advance the sustainable transportation agenda we have to take advantage of every tool at our disposal, this section presents each month a selection of short videos which we propose for viewing, perhaps during your coffee break. As you can imagine, we give careful thought to the selection.

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7. LATEST NEWS FROM THE WORLD'S STREETS (HEADLINES AND LINKS
In the big and varied world in which we live the concept of creative linking is a very important one. On the other hand we must be extremely careful since, given the enormous wealth and great facility of making these contacts, you can always end up connecting to everything, and then at the end of the day have no time to do your own work. So in this case what we decided to do is to select a total of a dozen sources of news, generating for the most part daily news, which treat in various ways the main issues to which World Streets is dedicated. (Not necessarily reflecting our views and priorities but working energetically to make these issues and trade-offs better known.

The idea is that our readers will be able to run down that list in a minute or two, and then if they spot something that appears to be possibly relevant for their work, all they have to do is click to it and the original source will be at their service. And if you wish to see more from that source, you can also find them listed in the "Key Sources" section just below. There is considerable variety in the range and tgype of sources selected here, but that is as it must be in a world in which issues are complex and the answers are sure to be surprising. Let us use our peripheral vision to make sure we are not missing anything important.

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8. EDITORIAL/VOLUNTEER TEAM
This short section introduces the team of volunteers who are cooperating to lead and support this independent and until now largely unfunded effort in support of sustainable transport worldwide. The second part of this listing provides information such as guidelines for contributors, comments on fair use, and a rough shopping list setting out some of the technical and other innovations and competences that we would hope to build and program without too much delay.

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9. NEW MOBILITY BUILDING BLOCKS
-> Marquee: This running display has been set up in order to give someone who is sufficiently curious a review of the way that we view the main components and delivery modes that together constitute the New Mobility Agenda. Admittedly it is almost impossible to read in its present form, but the content is important and will be the subject of articles and clarification in the near future. The bottom line point is this: the future of transport and cities is not a question of cars used in the old way and/or public transit is delivered in the old way. There is a lot more to it than that, which indeed is what World Streets is all about. To continue.

-> Behind World Streets: the New Mobility Agenda: world streets is basically the unified publishing arm of the New Mobility Agenda, whose numerous programs, libraries, message services, and links feed into the Journal and provide it with much of its backing and content.

-> Knoogle search > 800 selected world sources: Knoogle is the Combined Search Engine and specialized knowledge browser that we initiated in 2008 and have subsequently continued to develop it into a search tool which provides access to a very large number of carefully selected sources dealing with sustainable transportation and sustainable cities worldwide.

-> Meet the World Streets Sentinels: The "sentinels" are colleagues working in this field around the world who have agreed to share with us their findings and observations within their cities and countries. (This program is and will continue to be under development.)

-> Read Nuova Mobilità: Nuova Mobilità is our sister publication, the first in what we hope will develop into a series of affiliated projects aiming to provide useful materials on our topic to professionals and others working in that country and language group. The site is in Italian, however on the upper left you will see there is the possibility of into English or other language of your choice. We invite you to drop in and have a look from time to time to see how our Italian sisters and brothers look at the challenges of sustainable transportation.

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10. SUBSCRIBE, SUPPORT WORLD STREETS 2010
This section invites our readers to be part of the solution and to join in to support this collaborative program through financial contributions, their willingness to work with us to find sponsors, their availability for writing articles and other forms of technical support, and in general joining in this international collaborative effort. The very important part of this concerns are invitation for readers who share our values to set forth in order to work with us as ambassadors in order to help us intensify and contact organizations known to them, and in particular within their own countries, for future collaboration and exchange.

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11. FREE DAILY DELIVERY: RSS
One click access to setting up your preferred RSS feeds for both articles and comments.

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12. NEW MOBILITY COMBINED SEARCH ENGINE
Just before we get to the Journal's archives, which organized by week and year, we thought it would be useful to place another search engine which gives the reader the choice of looking through those archives directory, clicking on yet more general look through the very large number of sources that are covered by our Knoogle knowledge browser. Or more generally the full Web.

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13. WORLD STREETS WEEKLY ARCHIVES
Every week somewhere between five and seven new articles are posted, and these archives are intended to be handy to check out daily postings going all the way back to the first edition in March 2009. In most cases when one is referencing anything more than a week or two back, unless you know the approximate date, probably the best way to locate the items you are looking for is via the preceding search engine. Another excellent possibility is to use the key word items that are associated with each article.

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14. SEARCH ALL KEY SOURCES (SEE LISTING JUST BELOW)
Yet another search engine, this time aiming at the more than 200 carefully selected sources that are listed just below. So put in other words, if you are curious as to what this collection of outstanding sources as to say on any given subject, you have a very simple tool here in order to carry out your research.

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15. KEY SOURCES, LINKS, AND BLOGS
This is a potential gold mine for researchers. We give great importance to this collection of sources and are continuously soliciting our readers to review them and suggest further additions, or if they feel the source is not up to the standard to be dropped from the listing. At the time this page was prepared there were some 204 sources identified on that list, all available with a single click. And all fully searchable through the preceding customized search engine.

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16. WORLD STREETS SENTINELS
This world map identifies the first one hundred-plus people working in more than forty countries on all continents who have stepped forward with offers to share with all interested latest information and clues from their cities, good news and bad news that has perhaps lessons for others. This listing is continually in process, and recommendations for qualified people are much appreciated. (For more, click here - http://newmobilityagenda.blogspot.com/2009/03/world-streets-correspondents.html )

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17. WORLD STREETS CORRESPONDENTS
List of some of the people reporting on projects, problems, etc. in their cities in different parts of the world. (Ever in process)

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18. IN MEMORIUM
If you are familiar with the work of these pioneering figures, you will understand why we are here and working to build on the foundation they have so generously given us.

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19. THEY ARE TALKING ABOUT . . .
this is not a particularly sophisticated collection of links, but we at least find some use in reviewing them from time to time to get a better feel for the extent to which World streets, Nuova Mobilità and the New Mobility Agenda are being referenced or in the news.

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20. TABLE OF CONTENTS (working draft)
This is at this point a catch-all with ideas for bits and pieces to be integrated, perhaps, into the resource base at an appropriate time

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# # #

Dear reader.

I have to admit it. This has been a long slog, for us to write and you to read. But that is exactly what sustainability is all about: new mental architecture, carefully thought-out philosophy, breadth of vision, consistent criteria, great energy, unremitting discipline, deep collaboration, and an ability to hang in there for the long slog. This is not a job for lazy people. :-)

Eric Britton
Editor, World Streets

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Fighting Traffic: The Dawn of the Motor Age in the American City

The author of this careful and quite extensive book review of the battle for America's streets is Karthik Rao-Cavale, a graduate student at Rutgers University and an associate editor of our sister publication, India Streets. He writes: "This review was originally written for a class I am taking with Prof. John Pucher here at Rutgers University. I am putting up this review here even though the book reviewed talks mainly about the United States, because I feel that the lessons learned are most immediately applicable to developing world. It is a lengthy read, but I hope you will enjoy it."

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More on public, private and social space. Andrew Curry reports from occupied London - Part II

Hopefully we have learned at least one hard lesson of life, and that is that a crisis is a terrible thing to waste. And here right before our eyes we have a case in point with the Occupy movements that are sweeping Europe and North America, a public crisis that is most unexpectedly taking place on "public land". And then suddenly, with no advance notice, everything starts to morph and the issues involved start to encompass not only the continuing unchecked egregious abuses of the financial community but also important (for democracy) issues of public  space -- one of our consistent concerns here at World Streets. So in an effort to make sure that we do not miss the opportunity behind this crisis, we pass the word back to Andrew Curry so that he can build further on his article under this title earlier this week

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International Advisory Council on Sustainable Transportation

17 November 2012. With one eye to laying the base for our work and collaborative programs for 2013, we are in the process of updating and extending this list of distinguished international colleagues, each of whom is hard at work day after day on challenges, projects and programs, alone and with others, all in support of the principles of sustainable development and social justice, in cities and countries around the world. The voices of sustainable transportation. It is our intention to have the revised and expanded version of this panel listing online in the first months of 2013.

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International Advisory Council on Sustainable Transportation

Paris: 8 May 2011. We are, as of today, in the process of updating and completing this list of international colleagues, each of whom are working day after day on challenges, projects and programs, alone and with others, all in support of the principles of sustainable development and social justice, in cities and countries around the world. It is our intention to have the revised and expanded version on line in June.

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