[*BCM*] LivableStreets Alliance Street Talk: Thursday Aug. 21st 7-8:30pm

[dorothy fennell]

*STREET TALK! *

* "Transportation reform for the US- are Americans ready?"
Thu. Aug. 21, 7 - 8:30 pm
*by Gary Toth, Director of Transportation Initiatives for the Project for
Public Spaces<http://www.pps.org/info/bulletin/back_to_basics_in_transportation>
@ LivableStreets office space, 100 Sidney Street, Central Square, Cambridge [
map... ] <http://www.livablestreets.info/node/530>

*free and open to the public, donation suggested, beer/sodas provided
compliments of Harpoon Brewery!*

<http://livablestreets.info/files/first_project_pic.jpg>*"The decisions
engineers make will affect people's lives. The street can't be looked at as
just a vessel for cars. It's a place with many uses. What we want to do is
try to help foster sustainable, livable communities," *Toth says.

That's strong stuff coming from an engineer with 34 years experience inside
the highway bureaucracy. And it's not just a line he throws out to soothe
angry citizens' groups--Gary Toth during his tenure at NJDOT actually
changed the way engineers think. In the old days, NJDOT would give most
street widenings the green light, but Toth is dedicated to halting this
vicious cycle. Instead of funneling all traffic from every residential and
commercial property onto the strip, NJDOT is encouraging towns to create
networks of streets with mixed-use developments, dispersing traffic over the
whole system. The idea is to create livable corridors rather than endless
sprawl. Sounds simple enough, but it's actually a revolutionary change in
suburban transportation and land use planning. He notes how Kentucky, Utah,
Florida, Vermont and other states are joining New Jersey in seriously
studying Context Sensitive Solutions--the discipline's name for looking at
streets and roads as something more than simply a way to move traffic. "It's
becoming a national movement with 20 or 25 states already showing some signs
of getting away from the same old myopia."

Gary has left NJDOT to focus on bigger transportation reform in America. He
is an integral member of the T4America Coalition, which is working to shape
the content of the next federal transportation bill. He is currently one of
the eight instructors for USDOT's "Training Course on Transportation and
Land Use." He is also a member of the Sustainable Urban Design Working Group
of the American Public Transit Association and a member of the Strategic
Highway Research Program's Technical Coordinating Committee for Capacity. He
was also part of the Sustainable Transportation Study Team charged with
creating a conceptual plan for presentation to the US Congress, which
ensures that the surface transportation system will continue to serve the
needs of the U.S. throughout the 21st Century. Gary works part time
for the Project
for Public Spaces<http://www.pps.org/info/bulletin/back_to_basics_in_transportation>as
Director of Transportation Initiatives.

Gary was featured in the article, "Rethinking the Urban
Speedway,"<http://livablestreets.info/files/governing_oct2005_engineeringspeed.pdf>(For
decades, highway engineers focused on designing wider, straighter,
faster roads. Now, moving traffic quickly is no longer the sole goal),
Governing Magazine, October 2005. "The traditional engineering solution to
road problems is to make the road wider, straighter and faster," Toth says.
"Well, wider, straighter and faster is not always better."

*This event is sponsored by LivableStreets Alliance*

Click here for more information <http://www.livablestreets.info/node/1605>
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