The Hoddle Grid that dictates the flow of vehicles and people in central Melbourne has had its day. It can be remade to reduce the dominance of cars and create a liveable city for the 21st century.
Traffic crashes kill and injure millions worldwide every year and are a major drain on economic development. Improving road safety would produce huge payoffs, especially in lower-income countries.
Aging U.S. infrastructure: Rust on the underside of the Norwalk River Railroad Bridge, built in 1896 in Norwalk, Conn., and scheduled for replacement starting in 2022.
AP Photo/Susan Haigh
Carlo Ratti, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
As you’re walking through city streets on your way to work, school or appointments, you probably feel like you’re taking the most efficient route. Thanks to evolution, you’re probably not.
While the road toll has come down over the decades, it’s largely a result of fewer car occupants dying. Pedestrian deaths have barely changed for a decade, but they remain a road safety blind spot.
Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, D.C.
Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images
COVID-19 has underscored the value of parks and public spaces. A new survey shows that US mayors have gotten the message, but post-pandemic plans for public spaces remain largely undefined.
Instead of free parking, our post-COVID CBDs need a big vision to become attractive destinations that aren’t car-friendly at the expense of being people-friendly.
An autonomous vehicle has no driver to communicate with about whether it’s safe to cross.
Saklakova/iStock/Getty Images Plus
Pedestrians are wary of autonomous cars, but they trust traffic lights. Researchers suggest driverless cars could communicate directly with the signals to make their own actions more predictable.
If a vehicle was coming through this intersection would this pedestrian have right of way?
Stephen Di Donato/Good Free Photos
Most people do not know the right-of-way rules, but a starting point should be that pedestrian needs and safety take priority. Current road rules are biased towards driver convenience
People expect drivers to stop for them at pedestrian crossings, but what if they know autonomous vehicles will stop any time someone chooses to step in front of them?
Varavin88/Shutterstock
How will people respond once they realise they can rely on autonomous vehicles to stop whenever someone steps out in front of them? Human behaviour might stand in the way of the promised ‘autopia’.
The science of getting quickly and safely to the bottom.
Ryan Tang/Unsplash
In many cities, convention holds that there’s a lane for walking and a lane for standing on the escalator. But human systems engineers suggest this isn’t the most efficient option for the system.
Cycling advocates set up ‘ghost bikes,’ like this one in Brooklyn, in memory of bikers killed in traffic.
Nick Gray
Arnaud Exbalin, Université Paris Nanterre – Université Paris Lumières
The debate over the place of cars in cities may seem recent, but pamphlets published during the French Revolution show that the battle was raging before the first automobile even saw the light of day.
Look both ways! Public education was the only thing policy makers did to help the rising number of pedestrians killed by cars. Staged image from Ontario Safety League 1923 safety campaign.
City of Toronto Archives
Torontonians have been experiencing pedestrian and bicyclist fatalities since the advent of the automobile. The one way to stop the deaths is to ban cars but since that won’t happen, what can be done?
A man in downtown Atlanta with an electric scooter on June 26, 2018.
Brinley Hineman/ AP Photo
Electric rideables are making life less comfortable and more dangerous for pedestrians. Here’s how makers of rideables could help make cities safer for everybody.
Paul Salmon, University of the Sunshine Coast and Gemma Read, University of the Sunshine Coast
Collisions at intersections between motor vehicles, cyclists and pedestrians cause many deaths and injuries. Design that considers how each group approaches intersections improves everyone’s safety.