American cities are poised for a street design revolution

The following post originally appeared as part of a longer piece in Vital City.

In Unfinished Metropolis news, I have a couple more podcast appearances to share: a conversation with Timi Koyejo on the New Books Network, and another with Jeff Wood on Streetsblog’s “Talking Headways Podcast.”

I also have a live virtual conversation about my book coming up with the Parking Reform Network this Thursday at noon eastern. RSVP here.

As much as any political or pop cultural figure in recent memory, Zohran Mamdani is a creature of New York City’s streets. He launched his mayoral campaign doing man-on-the-street interviews in the Bronx. Since then, he built his brand by speed-walking, Citi-biking and sampling street food across the five boroughs. The Friday before the primary, he walked the length of Manhattan in his suit and tie.

As mayor, Mamdani will have a unique opportunity to redesign the city’s streets to better reflect the needs and wants of New Yorkers. In doing so, he could offer a model for the next generation of street design to the rest of the U.S.

In a recent piece for Vital City, upon which this post is based, I describe how city streets across the country were physically, culturally and psychologically reconceived in the early 20th century to be the sole domain of cars. This status quo held for the ensuing decades, until another New York City politician, Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan, began carving out new spaces for pedestrians, bikers and transit in the public right of way.

The street design revolution she kicked off has been the most visibly successful trend in U.S. urban planning over the past decade or so. Almost every bike lane, bus lane, shortened intersection, bikeshare dock, or outdoor dining parklet you see probably didn’t exist ten or fifteen years ago.

But as city dwellers know all too well, this revolution has been only partial. Cities are a very long way off from creating citywide networks of protected bike lanes, liberating all of the busiest bus lines from traffic, making safe streets the norm rather than the exception, and creating new opportunities for commerce and community on the asphalt.

Mamdani is clearly interested in these issues, not only as an avid Citi-biker and street food connoisseur, but in his policy statements. In his candidate Q&A with Streetsblog, for instance, he signaled his support for new pedestrianized neighborhoods, new bus lanes and bike lanes, and an expansion of outdoor dining and open streets.

It’s difficult to predict how much political capital he will devote to these ideas while simultaneously seeking to make progress on his signature campaign promises. But his voter base should be a significant factor in his calculus. Mamdani won majority public transit commuter precincts by 29 percentage points, one of the biggest demographic cleavages in his victory over former Governor Andrew Cuomo. He has a historic mandate to prioritize alternatives to the car, should he choose to pursue it.

There are three general areas that Mamdani has shown an interest in that could cumulatively represent a revolutionary leap in New York’s conception of its streets. If precedent holds, these boundary-breaking streets policies would then lead other cities to follow suit.

1. Car-free or “low-traffic” neighborhoods. It’s not as wild as it sounds. Advocacy groups, business improvement districts and local electeds have been calling for such plans for years. Generally, the city’s oldest neighborhoods, with narrow streets and lots of foot traffic, make the most sense for these kinds of schemes. With congestion pricing creating a little bit of breathing room in Manhattan, there’s never been a better time to reimagine some of that space.

The latest leader to echo the call is Lower Manhattan Council Member Chris Marte, who recently endorsed the pedestrianization of the Financial District. Similar plans have been floated for SoHo/Nolita, Downtown Brooklyn and elsewhere. The Times Square Theater District, the Lower East Side nightlife district, the Williamsburg shopping district, and the West Village brunch district are all logical places for at least part-time pedestrianizations, when crowds are at their peak.

These concepts come with fraught logistical challenges, including access for delivery vehicles and people with disabilities. But these are challenges that cities in other countries have solved in their own pedestrian districts. There’s also a wide continuum of people-centric street plans ranging from larger-scale neighborhood pedestrianizations to “low-traffic neighborhood” concepts that eliminate through traffic from narrow side streets.

In the middle of that continuum is the “pedestrian priority district” taking shape in the Meatpacking District. The neighborhood now features a mix of Sadik-Khanian pedestrian plazas at oblique intersections, temporary shared streets protected by elegant movable planters, and extensive landscaping in the style of the nearby High Line. One could imagine more populist pedestrian streets filled with independent vendors and food carts, or free concerts and events.

2. World-class bus rapid transit. Making buses free might marginally help improve bus speeds as boarding times shrink, though this is not guaranteed. (On routes in the city’s 2023 fare-free buses pilot, travel times increased as a surge in riders led to longer boarding times. The same thing happened with Boston’s free bus routes. As MTA chair Janno Lieber points out, if people shift from subways to buses to save money, bus service could easily become strained.) The much more effective method of speeding buses is through infrastructure in and on the street. New York City has made some progress with bus lanes and busways in recent years. But the reality is that these lanes go disrespected far too often.

The best bus rapid transit systems around the world have physically separated rights-of-way, protected by concrete curbs or other barriers. They have dedicated boarding platforms, all-door boarding, limited stopping patterns, and transit priority traffic signals. Many even have level boarding for subway-style, wheelchair-accessible service.

Mamdani has committed to bringing “true bus rapid transit” to New York, though his campaign platform is relatively light on the details.

He’ll have a solid template with the Flatbush Avenue bus improvement project, which includes some of the attributes described above. In addition to offering better transit service than typical Select Bus Service routes, it should also work wonders on the streetscape, making the public realm much safer and more pleasant for pedestrians. After shepherding this plan to fruition, Mamdani could tout it as a demonstration project as he rolls out world-class bus service to wider thoroughfares across the five boroughs. Transportation researchers Annie Weinstock and Walter Hook already have a handy list of the most promising corridors.

3. Comprehensive curb management. Car-free streets and widespread rapid bus transit will inevitably necessitate better curb management. To see why, consider how the Flatbush Avenue redesign will mean that a single double-parked delivery truck will block the sole traffic lane. Or consider the potential demand for ride-hail pickups just outside the future FiDi pedestrian zone. To use road space more efficiently, curb space needs to be used more efficiently, too.

The Adams administration has taken some initial steps in this direction by creating new loading zones, starting a trash containerization pilot and encouraging companies like Amazon to use electric cargo bikes for deliveries. What’s missing is a comprehensive citywide curb management strategy that accounts for the many users and uses of the curb.

Such a strategy could include providing dedicated curb space for taxis, ride-hail cars and delivery companies on every block, while also making them pay their fair share for that valuable resource. It would consider other uses of the curb, including year-round outdoor dining, electric vehicle charging, and secure bike parking. Paid curb parking outside of metered commercial districts, and residential parking permit programs would need to be part of that discussion as well.

Making a revolutionary leap in streets policy — akin to the automobilization of city streets a century ago — will be a difficult political fight, to be sure. But once plans are agreed upon, they can be accomplished cheaper and faster than many of Mamdani’s other priorities.

Mamdani also has a chance to reset the political conversation around streets policy. Of course, safety is a central motivation, but it’s not the only one. Redesigned streets can better reflect the technological, economic, political and cultural realities of the contemporary city.

E-commerce and ride-hailing (including robotaxis, which will probably arrive in New York sooner or later) are facts of city life that the transportation system needs to accommodate through both pricing and design. Those ride-hail vehicles have gummed up traffic, while also giving more people a compelling alternative to transit. To compete, buses need to be much faster, which can be accomplished through bus rapid transit.

Bike ridership is already at historic highs, due in large part to the emergence of e-bikes and bikeshare. Those ridership figures can easily rise much higher, if people have safe places to ride in every neighborhood.

In the age of online shopping, restaurants and bars are increasingly the lifeblood of commercial neighborhoods. Giving them some extra room to spread out by way of outdoor dining can help drive more foot traffic to corridors that otherwise would feel desolate.

Meanwhile, gathering in public has taken on a heightened significance in an era characterized by so much loneliness and mediation. Better street design can take us back to the future, when streets were true public spaces. We need more places to commune, to protest and just to hang out. Surely, that’s a vision Mamdani could rally the people behind.