Making the Case for Public Markets as Job Generators

Help us quantify the economic benefits of these community gathering places

Markets are vibrant community centers that contribute to local economies and social interaction

Public markets are much more than quaint alternatives to grocery store chains; they can become popular multi-use destinations that contribute to local, sustainable economies.

One defining characteristic is that public markets feature local businesses that employ local people and, especially in the case of farmers markets, sell local products. Markets were historically social crossroads, places where the first towns and cities sprung to life. Today there are still vibrant community centers where friends and strangers mingle and meet. In fact, according to psychologist Robert Sommer, people enjoy sociable conversations four-and-half time more often at a farmers market than in a supermarket.

The Union Square Greenmarket in Manhattan, founded in 1976, has become the flagship farmers market in the Greenmarket network, featuring up to 75 regional producers and 60,000 visitors daily during peak season. At the market’s beginnings, Union Square was home to less reputable businesses, and often drug dealers were the only people making money. Today, in no small part to the sustained presence and success of the Greenmarket, Union Square is an economic powerhouse in New York. According to an October 2009 New York magazine article, while storefront vacancies around the city have hit 10 percent, Union Square boasts vacancy rates of just 3.4 percent, and retail rental rates are now $300/square foot, prices once only commanded by Midtown and Soho locations. In the last five years alone, foot traffic has increased by 59 percent. Traditional retailers are not the only businesses contributing to this micro-economy. The Greenmarket pays over $99,000 in fees to the city for use of the space four days a week, and rough estimates report that the annual sales of Greenmarket are some $12 million annually. An annual holiday market, which operates from Thanksgiving through Christmas, and shares the square with Greenmarket, pays the city nearly $1 million in rent and brings in about $2.5 million in sales for its 100 vendors. Even the area’s falafel and hot dog vendors do well, reporting grosses of up to $60,000 a year.

So it is no surprise that the ability of markets to generate real economic growth is at the center of “FoodWorks New York,” an exciting new initiative recently put forth by Christine Quinn, speaker of New York’s City Council that proposes to take advantage of the local food system to improve health, protect the environment, and create sustainable jobs. The initiative calls for improved infrastructure for the city’s markets and an expansion and development of jobs in the city’s food industry, including supporting more market vendors. From a Placemaking perspective, it’s exciting to see a government official talk about creating jobs and economic opportunity within a local food system, especially in relation to the city’s network of public markets. And, we know that these public markets can be great economic generators for our communities based on our work to help revitalize the Moore Street Market in the troubled East Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn, NY. Working with Bay Area Economics, we were able to conclude that, with market operation and design changes, as well as improvements in the surrounding market district, the Moore Street Market’s estimated direct and indirect economic impact would increase from $3.6 million to$5.7 million per year.

By working to strengthen the complex web of exchanges and interactions that go into producing, buying, transporting, selling, cooking, and consuming food, “FoodWorks New York” shows great potential to help keep the millions of dollars generated by these transactions in the New York region, creating place-based jobs that strengthen local communities.

Councilwoman Quinn’s vision of supporting New York’s public markets to create local, sustainable jobs aligns with research PPS conducted in 2002 with the support of the Ford Foundation. Our study “Public Markets as a Vehicle for Social Integration and Upward Mobility” details how markets offer a relatively inexpensive opportunity for entrepreneurs (especially minorities, immigrants, and women) to start their own businesses: 83% of vendors surveyed used personal savings to start their business and 54% spent $1,000 or less to start their business. By their very nature, public market jobs are place-based, and because becoming a market vendor often requires relatively little investment and risk, public markets foster the creation and growth of local businesses .

While farmers, crafters, artists and even flea market sellers want to tap into the opportunity a market can bring, many don’t know where to begin. To help foster more of these place-based businesses, PPS is excited to release How to Start Your Business at a Local Market: a Vendor Handbook (for a $15 PDF copy of this report, please email: mmaciver@pps.org) which provides clear and concise guidance on how to determine what to sell, how to pick a market, manage your business, set up a stall, tips for customer service, advice on attracting repeat customers, and more. We hope that this tool will encourage more people to become market vendors, improving not only their well-being but the economic well-being of their entire community.

It’s obvious that public markets are great incubators for sustainable jobs and local businesses, but there’s a great need for research evaluating the full extent of their economic impact in quantifiable terms that make the case for greater government, foundation and civic support. And while there are some tools out there to help a market evaluate its economic impact, such as PPS/Econsult Corporation’s Estimating the Economic Impact of Public Markets and Marketumbrella.org’s The Sticky Economics Evaluation Deice (SEED). PPS believes that there is no better time than now for a comprehensive evaluation of public markets, big and small – rural and urban, to determine exactly how much markets contribute to our country’s economy.

Markets have never garnered as much attention and respect as right now. New York’s “FoodWorks” initiative and the White House Farmers Market are two high-profile examples illustrating how public markets are community destinations that support local businesses and create jobs while providing unlimited health and social benefits for the surrounding community.

PPS is calling for a national study on the economic impact of public markets, and we want your input. It’s relatively easy to count the number of jobs directly created by markets: even a quick glance down a row of market stalls is enough to see how many vendors are busy behind fruits and flowers. But what about the secondary ripple of jobs created and sustained by a public market; the complex web of interactions and relationships that are all in some way a part of this scene?

And we need your help in forming topics for this far-reaching economic study that quantifies the far-reaching economic benefits of markets. What do you need to know in order to help provide tangible evidence of your market’s valuable direct and indirect economic impact? Here are some of topics we’d like examined:

• The number of jobs created by a public market – directly and indirectly. These could include farmers, seasonal farm workers, market stall employees, market managers, and even seed salespeople.

• The economic impact on the businesses around the market.

• The economic benefit of participation in a public market for the farmer/producer’s business, including an understanding of their cost of production and the cost of their market operation.

• The economic impact on the participating farmers’ rural communities.

What else needs be evaluated? And how can this study take shape?

All of us—market advocates, developers and managers—would benefit from making compelling, hard data about the concrete, demonstrated economic benefits of markets widely available.

Please email your thoughts to info@pps.org and indicate “Markets Economic Impact Study” in the subject line.



Putting Our Jobs Back in Place

How Placemaking Generates Lasting Prosperity

Campus Martius, a reinvigorated park in Detroit, brought many new jobs to the city

Concern over jobs has been a constant refrain in politics, business and everyday conversation for decades, becoming even more urgent during the current economic crisis. Yet, for all the intense discussion of the subject, the local job-creation strategies pushed forward by politicians, business leaders and economists narrowly focus on luring new companies, developments or tourist attractions to a community instead of leveraging the substantial assets that exist within most communities. As a result, one city is pitted against all others, desperate to offer anything—free land, reckless tax breaks, low wages, etc.—to beat out potential competitors.

Such a strategy might succeed in winning a few jobs over the short term, but that does not translate into genuine prosperity. From our experience working in more than 2,500 communities around the world, PPS came to realize the missing ingredient in most discussions about jobs—especially good, green jobs – is the fact that secure jobs are tied to a place. This is what truly generates prosperity and well-paid employment over the long haul.

“Making great places does not just mean that you are adding tourist attractions to your city,” explains Larry Lund, PPS Associate and a Chicago real estate consultant. “It’s way more powerful than that: it has to do with creating an environment that will be attractive for businesses,” places to host the dense organizational and social complexity vital to the success of so many industries that create and sustain great jobs.

After all, cities first emerged because people gathered together at crossroads, creating busy, vibrant places to exchange goods and ideas. Cities grew out of commerce. The same holds true today. Cities need great places that provide the settings for these kinds of interactions. This is what businesses seek. They want places that are attractive to employees, places where connections can happen, where productivity and creativity increase and where the professional networks foster collaboration and innovation.

Article Topics

Placemaking’s Pivotal Role in Prosperity
The Magic of Multi-use Destinations
The “Real” Market Economics
Third Place
Transportation Creates Place-Based Jobs

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“Placemaking”—the essential process used to create great places and strong communities—is fundamental to creating quality jobs that are well-paying and environmentally-friendly. It works like this: local people are the experts at knowing what works best in the place they live, so bringing them together in settings like market squares, community centers, main streets, and –surprise!- libraries to come up with ways that these places can be improved unleashes tremendous creativity and increases citizens’ abilities to remake their own communities.

Placemaking builds the necessary foundation upon which new enterprises rise and prosper. And there is mounting evidence that it can create lasting, sustainable prosperity for communities- even in places not usually associated with good news.

Job magnet: Compuware located 4000 employees in downtown Detroit because of Campus Martius

Consider Detroit. At the heart of the city is Campus Martius, which until recently was a small unused green space overwhelmed by the traffic that rushed past it. Yet, Mayor Dennis Archer imagined this pocket-sized park as a world-class public space, akin to Bryant Square Park in New York City, which would draw people and investment back to what had become a void in the center of what many considered a broken down city. At the initiative of a new civic group, Detroit 300, an entity formed to celebrate Detroit’s 300th birthday, the community envisioned Campus Martius as a lively town square—and in 2004 that vision became a reality when the park was reopened with gardens, a two retractable states for events, an ice skating rink, café and lots of benches for people to enjoy themselves. The transformation spurred major redevelopment which brought many new jobs and a half-million dollars in new investment in offices, shops, condos and a hotel to the city. Compuware, a leading IT solutions company, built their corporate headquarters housing 4000 employees across the street from the future park. “Compuware would not have come downtown without the park,” notes Bob Gregory, a former General Motors executive and head of the Campus Martius Conservancy, which was formed to manage the park. “They didn’t want just a building. They wanted a lively district, where their workers would have things to do.”

This is a prime example of how urban districts with a vital sense of place can take advantage of changes in the way business is done. Employees today are increasingly “thinking outside the cubicle,” working collaboratively in ways that find them spilling out from the office to make connections with other creative people. Accessible public spaces provide innovative workers with a setting conducive to exploring new idea on many fronts.

This trend explains why downtowns and other walkable environments continue to thrive, despite warnings of a decade ago that the internet would render them obsolete. It turns out that people still crave physical proximity to others in the same field, giving places with a critical mass of high tech, financial, legal, media, design, advertising and other industries a distinct advantage.
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All vital cities showcase at least one multi-use destination – an interesting place where people can go for a variety of activities that involve more than shopping. A multi-use destination that is the heart and soul of a community can both create an identity and generate good jobs and economic growth for that city.

Vancouver’s Granville Island market hosts nearly 100 vendors, providing important opportunities to incubate small businesses

A classic example is Granville Island, a tiny (38 acre) patch of waterfront in Vancouver, Canada, that is home to a public market, Emily Carr College of Art and Design, a children’s museum, community theater, community recreation center, local artists’ studios and galleries, cooking school, hotel, boatrepair and construction businesses, a cement plant (with a revolving cement truck painted like a strawberry) and a multitude of other unique and interesting uses that appeal to both locals and tourists. It is the most visited destination in British Columbia but has one of the smallest budgets (just $25,000 per year) for tourism advertising of any Vancouver destination.

The economic anchor is the Granville Island Market which has 50 full time local vendors that sell from market stalls, including a variety of small eating establishments with many different ethnic foods, and 45 spaces for part time vendors. And there are no chains! About 3,000 people are employed on the Island and it generates over $215 million in economic activity each year.

Balboa Park in San Diego is another great multi-use public destination, home to 15 major museums, renowned performing arts venues, fabulous gardens and the city’s world-famous zoo. It is known as “The soul of San Diego,” and “an economic, ecological, and spiritual engine that continuously pumps life into the metropolis.” The almost mystical qualities that make it a great destination also have real economic value. Ten to 14 million visitors each year use the Park and the average length of stay is 3.5 hours. On average, those who live nearby return about 20.5 times each year. Three thousand five-hundred people are employed in the park; and their work is complemented by the dedication of 7,000 volunteers who contribute to the overall vitality of Balboa Park all through the year. The same qualities of a great destination (a sense of place and belonging) that bring volunteers to donate their time are also attractive to businesses. Businesses (and volunteerism) thrive in the places that people treasure most.

Balboa Park, known as “the soul of San Diego,” generates 3500 jobs

People often think of both of these spots as tourist havens, with the usual low-pay, no-future tourist jobs. But a closer look shows that tourists are not the primary force behind the economic success of these places: Granville Island and Balboa Park are multi-use destinations that are heavily used by the local population. After all, at the Granville Island Market the highest-performing vendor is the meat market, which shows that it is a major attraction for locals. No one is going to take fresh pork chops home on the airplane or fry sausage in their hotel room. In fact, the market is busiest in the off-season when tourists are more scarce in rainy Vancouver.

Studies have shown that even tourists themselves are more interested in an authentic experience than artificial attractions created expressly for them. All over the world travelers are drawn to places—Paris, Tuscany, San Francisco, Kyoto, you name it—with unique qualities that make these destinations interesting and vital. The last thing many tourists seek is to mingle with other tourists. By making more appealing places for residents, you attract tourists better than if you are trying to attract tourists.
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More than fun, public markets incubate new businesses and employment

The power of “places” to create new economic opportunities and employment is especially evident in the 84 percent rise in the number of farmers markets created in the U.S. during the past nine years. They are now at an all time high of 5,274. The same phenomenon is occurring in countries around the world.

More than a picturesque, public-spirited, feel-good trend, markets are potent economic incubators. People go to markets not only because they can buy the fresh food they need at a price they can afford but also because markets are sociable, fun places that make for a rewarding experience. Markets are at the center of a new, New York City Council campaign, championed by Council Speaker Christine Quinn, called “FoodWorks,” that seeks to create jobs from the City’s food system. Read more here.
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Sociologist Ray Oldenburg first coined the phrase “Third Place” in his book “The Great Good Place” where he describes home as the “first” place, work as the “second” place, and that place where the community gathers as the “third” place – “homes away from home” – the place where unrelated people relate.

Inspired by Oldenburg’s book, Ron Sher, real estate developer and owner and principal of Sher Partners sought to create a “third place” in Seattle where people in the community could gather and businesses could thrive. He found space in an under-used shopping center surrounded by acres of empty parking lots in the suburb of Lake Forest Park. Third Place Books and Third Place Commons opened its doors in 1998. It consists of an indoor “town square” with public seating, an information desk run by volunteers, a life size chess set on the floor and picnic tables for working or playing games. The squa

re is surrounded by the Third Place bookstore which sells new and used books, several small independently operated food stalls and a stage where musicians and actors perform, discussions and debates are held, and authors give readings. Over one thousand free public events occur there every year.

Third Place Commons—an indoor town square—enriches a Seattle suburb socially and economically

Third Place Commons is managed by a community organization, Friends of Third Place Commons,and supported by Third Place Books, the City of Lake Forest Park, and the merchants and management of Lake Forest Park Towne Centre. Sher, who has done a lot of thinking about how development will occur in the future given the state of the economy today, said “we are going to come out on a different trajectory, hopefully a more sustainable one. A bright side of the economic situation is that we will find a way to have a higher quality of life without consumptive goods. And we shouldn’t be afraid to be ‘off the wall.’”

Centers like Third Place Commons add a benefit to the community that can’t (and perhaps shouldn’t) be monetized. As a gathering place and a community hub, it createsthe conditions for new connections and relationships to arise. The many uses within this great destination draw a diversity of people to the shopping center, increasing the potential for surrounding stores to perform better, which generates good business and jobs.
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The restored Wright Stop Plaza is now a centerpiece of downtown Dayton, Ohio

According to the U.S. Department of Transportation, every $1 billion investment in the nation’s transportation infrastructure supports approximately 28,000 jobs. But not all transportation projects are the same. Expenditures on public transportation yield on average 36,000 jobs, and generate $4 billion in economic return as well as boosting environmental quality, improving job access for low-income people and strengthening our sense of community.

The billions we spend on transportation of all kinds will make a bigger impact on creating jobs over the long haul if we pay more attention to the kinds of places where people want to go—places that are walkable and offer a variety of things to see and do.

A case in point is Dayton, Ohio, where a Placemaking approach to transportation led by the local transit agency resulted in significant community improvements that went beyond simply providing transit service.

Just a few years ago, the center of Dayton looked almost empty. With the addition of a new transit hub, Wright Stop Plaza, a busy town square was created. A waterfront park, ballpark and performing arts center were also part of a revitalization strategy to bring more business, jobs and transit riders to the downtown core.

A transit station in Dayton fosters public activities, which helped revive the downtown business district

The head of the local transit agency Minnie Fells Johnson championed the unorthodox idea that public transportation should do more than move people from place to place; it should create lively gathering spots where people can interact with each other. The agency became what Johnson calls “a connecting machine” — linking people to local institutions by creating corridors of public destinations along transit routes.

This innovative strategy increased ridership as well as the use of these destinations, resulting in more business, jobs, and transit riders. Since Johnson left the agency in 2005, her successor has completed phase II of the downtown hub regional complex. This development remains one of the finest redevelopment projects in a region which is still struggling economically. By using transportation to create this connecting tissue, Dayton is now in a better position to consolidate its assets into good jobs.
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How PPS is Advancing Job Creation and Growth through Placemaking

The continuing global economic crisis has showed us, in so many ways, that the development strategies of the last 50 years no longer work. Business as usual has proved unsustainable. What’s needed now are creative approaches that result in great places and local job development for the long haul. For example, we can transform how we think about all types of public spaces and public institutions: every park, school, square, library, and street has the potential to become a great gathering place. As Ron Sher explains, “without a place, many interactions and transactions will simply not occur. This can translate into a significant loss of economic and social benefit.” Work with us to define new economic strategies for the “city of the future”, centered around “Placemaking” as its engine of change. We think that the following agendas have the potential to become the backbone of a new economy.

• Markets and Local Economies – Around the world, markets are time-honored strong economic incubators and great community gathering places. If we take the concept of a local hub of social activity and commerce and bring it to squares, libraries, schools, and parks, these places could all become catalysts for economic change and sustainability because they help growcommunities around local assets and create an atmosphere of self-reliance and support.

• Multi-use Public Destinations - The best destinations are those that are “owned” by people in a community. They are authentic because they are revered and sacred to the local population. As such, they have a big impact on creating local jobs.

• Building Community through Transportation - Creating a transportation system that supports the use of local places (as in Dayton, Ohio or throughout the Netherlands) can transform a city, region or a country if the transportation system is designed to connect and reinforce local destinations and emphasize walking, biking and transit, not just driving.

• Toward an Architecture of Place – Community institutions can be designed to take on new roles as generators of a wide range of local community activities such as job fairs, repair markets, etc.

The urgent task before us now is to transform dull areas into vital hubs where connections grow and innovation thrives, creating the settings for a sustainable future of healthy businesses and robust job growth.
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Building Community through Transportation

As we are faced with ever rising gas prices and mounting evidence that how we have planned and shaped our communities over last 50 years is a major contributing factor in the degradation of our natural and human environments, more and more people are beginning to recognize that this is a key moment to make wise transportation decisions that will influence our quality of life for years to come. This is imperative because America now faces a public health crisis; uncertain energy supplies; global climate change; loss of our natural environment; ever-increasing social inequity; and declining civic and community engagement. Planning transportation for community outcomes, rather than merely moving cars, will also help protect our nation’s irreplaceable cultural and historic resources and serve as an economic catalyst for towns and cities.

Towards this end PPS is undertaking a major campaign called ‘Building Community through Transportation..’

The overarching goal of Building Community through Transportation is to support Placemaking and transform federal, state, and metropolitan transportation policies and practice that currently prioritize moving people and goods over creating walkable, healthy and sustainable communities. This campaign is also focused on influencing the design of streets and transit facilities so they become assets and gathering places for civic life.

Through research, advocacy, training, and tool development, this campaign will inspire and organize citizens, policy makers, and the transportation industry to reshape community transportation networks and streets into places that provide greater economic vitality and more opportunities for civic engagement, as well as promoting the priorities of human health and environmental sustainability.

The campaign has three specific goals:

The campaign will achieve these goals by focusing on two major areas:

Streets as Places

Approach: Transforming the design and construction of public streets into places that improve the quality of human life and the environment rather than simply move vehicles from place to place.

Thinking Beyond the Station

Approach: Influencing the planning and design of transit centers (bus, railway, subway stations) to become catalysts for increased economic vitality and environmental sustainability as well as improving health, civic engagement, and servicing people’s transit needs.

Why Transportation Needs Transformation through Placemaking

Over the last ten years, PPS has begun to address the critical role that transportation plays in the big picture of creating sustainable places and communities. As Carol Murray, former Commissioner of New Hampshire DOT, has often said, “Transportation is the game board upon which all other factors are played.”

The transportation system is everywhere, and its impacts are a major issue for virtually every community. If we can influence decisions on the dimensions and designs of transportation networks and facilities so that they are perceived as public places and improve the quality of the human and natural environments, rather than simply moving vehicles from place to place, we can open the door to visionary community planning and design. With an estimated 140 million new US residents expected in the next 50 years, community planning needs to change, and it needs to change fast.

The transportation industry, too, is poised for a change. More than any other government entity, transportation agencies possess the largest public works budget, giving them the greatest capacity of any government agency to reshape the landscape. DOTs have also begun to face project and program resistance brought on by regulatory change, community dissatisfaction, flat funding resources, rapidly decaying infrastructure, and pressure from reform advocates. This has led to increasing awareness that we need to find new ways of doing business which advance transportation programs while satisfying the triple bottom line of economic, social and environmental goals.

The transportation establishment has clearly organized itself into a well-structured, disciplined, and cohesive profession, designed to deliver on its perceived mandate to provide people with a system for high speed and safe travel. It only follows that if we transform the way the transportation establishment views its mandate, we can positively affect community building.

Categories: Articles, Building Community Through Transportation, Transportation



Streets as Places

PPS is undertaking a major initiative called “Streets as Places.” This initiative seeks to engage citizens, policymakers and the transportation industry at-large to reshape the planning and design of transportation networks and streets to promote and support economic vitality, civic engagement, human health, and environmental sustainability, while simultaneously meeting peoples’ mobility needs.

Our transportation networks must shift from supporting vehicle throughput...

...to supporting pedestrians, transit, and a community vision.

STREETS AS PLACES CAMPAIGN GOALS

The overarching goal of Streets as Places is to transform the design and construction of public streets into places that improve the quality of human life and the environment rather than simply move vehicles from place to place. This campaign seeks to support Placemaking and produce beneficial community outcomes through the transformation of federal, state, and metropolitan transportation policy and practice that currently favors and prioritizes movement of vehicles over people and community, as well as influencing the design and construction of the highways and streets that reflect these policies.

Through research, advocacy, training, and tool development, this campaign will inspire and organize citizens, policy makers, and the transportation industry to reshape community transportation networks and streets into places that provide greater economic vitality and more opportunities for civic engagement, as well as promoting the priorities of human health and environmental sustainability.

Activities

The campaign will meet these goals by encompassing a variety of activities to achieve its mission, including developing educational tools, communications, research, training individuals and groups, web-based outreach, and pilot-projects to serve as positive examples. PPS is also changing the transportation paradigm through its fee-for-service projects. These activities fall into the following categories:

1) Transforming Transportation Practice: To mobilize state and local transportation professionals and communities interested in using transportation to create great communities;

2) Influencing National Policy: To change national planning and funding policies to support more community-friendly transportation planning;

3) Supporting Innovation at the Community Level: To foster innovation at the local level, leveraging the passion and commitment of local citizens, governments, and funders;

4) Developing Educational Tools: To develop training programs, guidance tools, and networking opportunities to influence reform efforts and best practices in community and transportation planning and design; and

5) Expanding Research: To conduct more research on street design to move us beyond anecdotal and intuitive conclusions.

THE OPPORTUNE MOMENT

A fundamental shift is occurring in the way that streets are planned and designed. This shift has been inspired by the ever-expanding realization that how we have planned transportation and our communities over the last 50 years have not only had detrimental community impacts, it has also failed to improve mobility and access to destinations.

To date, transportation engineering, design and planning in the United States has focused mainly on the efficient and safe movement of vehicles. While these are serious concerns, this single-minded focus has had crippling social, community, and environmental impacts, without adequately addressing congestion and cost. Car-centric planning has encouraged sprawling development and adverse human health conditions such as asthma and obesity. By failing to take into consideration the character of communities or the needs of an entire spectrum of users (including bicyclists, pedestrians, and neighbors such as residents and local businesses) this capital-intensive approach has missed the opportunity to use transportation design to shape communities, not just connect them.

If this New York city street was re-designed with community goals in mind...

...it might look more like this.

A transformation towards more context sensitive means of travel will empower citizens, design practitioners, transportation planners and government officials to use transportation projects to promote and enable civic engagement, health, environmental sustainability, and economic vitality. It will ensure that we maximize our return on the billions of public dollars we invest annually in our transportation system.

The Streets as Places movement is a far reaching campaign that will inspire communities, designers, and planners to build and invest in transportation systems, stations, and streets that not only serve the narrow needs of cars, buses, and trains but also infuse health, sustainability, and community building into the 21st century planning and design process.

Categories: Articles, Building Community Through Transportation, Transportation



Smart Transportation Investments for Our Future

By Craig Raphael & Renee Espiau

On Election Day 2008, American voters made an impressive commitment toward the future vitality of our economy and society, supporting measures that will enhance public health and public transit. From Honolulu to Milwaukee, tax levies and bond measures supporting new and existing public transit systems were approved by local voters. Nearly three-quarters of all transportation initiatives on ballots nationwide were approved 1, resulting in $75 billion towards future transportation investment.

A train station in South Orange, New Jersey served as a catalyst for nearby development.

The significance and timing of this overwhelming support for a new transportation policy cannot be underestimated.  The impact of rising congestion levels, volatile gas prices and climate change—direct results of decades of car-oriented transportation planning—have never been more apparent.  With an administration coming to Washington in January that is sensitive to the importance of transportation alternatives and the potential of a major reauthorization of the federal transportation bill scheduled for next fall, now is the time to push for wise transportation decisions that will affect our quality of life for years to come.

There is still a lot of work to be done.  Only fifty percent of Americans have access to public transit, and for many it is not a convenient option. Zoning and planning practices in most areas still favor low-density, single-use development that renders transit use impractical and discourages the kind of high-quality gathering places that create a strong sense of community.

Current planning policies prevent many communities from enjoying the benefits that come from transit and mixed-use developments   On the other hand, investment in public transit saves people money, which is more critical than ever in these economically troubled times. The average American family spends 19 percent of household income on transportation, while those who live near public transit spend only 9 percent on transportation.

But equally important is the fact that investment in transit spurs other investment in the community.2 Charlotte, North Carolina (where PPS is involved in plans to create a more livable downtown) has seen major financial returns on their investment in light rail transit, as well as ridership figures that far exceed initial projections. Developers are flocking to the areas around the new stations. In addition to already-built residential, office and retail space along the lines, plans call for 7,000 new housing units.3 New transit lines in cities as diverse as Portland, Dallas, Minneapolis and Salt Lake City are experiencing similar increases in local property tax rolls.

These experiences show that transit investments are effective in revitalizing communities and encouraging economic development when stations and transit stops are comfortable, welcoming places that are well connected to the surrounding neighborhoods and offer a variety of uses and activities. Project for Public Spaces runs a comprehensive program devoted to making that happen, Thinking Beyond the Station . We worked closely on the “Transit Friendly Communities for New Jersey” initiative, a partnership between New Jersey Transit, various state agencies, and non-profit organizations. PPS provided technical assistance to municipalities on promoting walking, biking, the concept of traffic calming, new types of developments, new zoning strategies, the revitalization of shopping districts adjacent to transit stations, the creation of an effective community visioning process and other changes that could transform transit stations into important community places and stimulate the development around them.

PPS launched our national “Thinking Beyond the Station” initiative, in conjunction with the Center for Transit-Oriented Development, to popularize this approach to transit planning. The work includes training of transit service providers, establishing pilot projects that showcase station improvements, and advocating for policy changes that support the funding and construction of community-friendly transit facilities.

Light rail brings sustainability and urban revitalization to Houston, Texas.

PPS is also a major supporting partner in the Transportation for American campaign (www.t4america.org) , a broad coalition of groups that seek to link national, state, and local transportation policies with efforts to improve economic opportunity, energy security, public health, climate change, housing and community development.  Transportation for America publicizes the fact that a shift in our transportation priorities to build new transit infrastructure (much of which has already been planned) would create 6.7 million jobs in 78 metro areas throughout the country.4 These new jobs are producing significant and immediate benefits for local economies.

Federal and state allocation to highway infrastructure spending will certainly continue, but these projects should be carried out in a way that respects local communities, encourages walking, biking and transit, and supports opportunities for Placemaking.  Rather than constructing new roads and highway lanes, which only serve to reinforce our overdependence on the automobile, we should focus on making existing roads more conducive to multiple modes of transportation. This strategy will also aid efforts to revive the economy, since road maintenance and repair create an estimated nine percent more jobs than construction of new road capacity.5

The facts are impossible to ignore: focusing on places, health and walkability requires increased public transit infrastructure, which creates new jobs, enlivens neighborhoods, creates local business opportunities and connects communities, both vulnerable and thriving, to vital amenities and resources.

Click here to donate to PPS’s Building Community through Transportation campaign, to help bring vital transportation training and research to communities and leaders around the world.

  1. APTA
  2. Transportation for America campaign outline.
  3. Marshall, Alex. “More than Just a Train.” Governing Magazine, June 2008.
  4. Transportation for America campaign outline.
  5. Ibid.
Categories: Articles, Building Community Through Transportation, Newsletter



9 Great Streets Around the World

They teach us how roads can become prime public spaces

A central part of PPS’s work is helping communities get the most out of their streets, both as transportation links for all modes of commuters and as vital places for people to enjoy. That’s why we showcase many of the world’s best streets in our website’s Great Public Spaces listings, which begins with people’s nominations of their favorite public spaces- streets, parks, squares, markets, buildings and others.

This article below and the complete listing features the recommendations of people from around the world as well as PPS staff. These streets are successful for a host of reasons, among them automobile, pedestrian and bike accessibility; a variety of activities and land uses; comfortable places to sit and gather; and creation of a positive and unique image for the city or neighborhood. We encourage you to contribute streets in your city or town that satisfy these criteria.

Unfortunately, too many streets today provide the exact opposite experience. Along these lines, we encourage you to contribute to “The Hall of Shame” of bad streets so that we can lay out a strategy to fix these streets so that they not only serve all users, but also contribute vitality to the places in which they are located.

Boulevards

Montreal, Canada: Boulevard Saint Laurent

Summertime brings frequent festivals to Montreal's main drag. Submitted by: Murray Shostak

Why It Works

Affectionately known as “The Main,” it bisects Montreal down the middle, linking affluent residential neighborhoods to the north with the garment district, Little Italy, the Plateau district, Chinatown, Vieus (Old) Montreal, and the seaport. Fourteen distinct nationalities call The Main theirs. There are people walking about 24 hours a day, and enjoying the sights and smells of the various cultures that call this street home. It is trendy, eclectic, nostalgic and packed during summer festivals. Summertime is when The Main is closed to traffic in the Plateau neighborhood as festivals take over the street.

Click here to read more about Boulevard Saint Laurent.

More Great Boulevards

Avenida de Mayo
Buenos Aires, Argentina

Kungsportsavenyn
Göteborg, Sweden

Passeig De Gracia
Barcelona, Spain

Avinguda de Gaudi
Barcelona, Spain

Las Vegas Boulevard/The Strip
Las Vegas, NV, USA

Click here for more Boulevard listings.

Commercial Streets

Camden High Street, London, England

People of all ages and nationalities flock to Camden Town's centrally located shopping street. Submitted by: Lisa Tomlinson

Why It Works

Camden Town throngs with locals, shoppers and tourists, no matter what the time or day of the week. Full of independent shops and markets, the streets are intertwined and pedestrian friendly, lined with old unique buildings, each one different from the next. Each street fosters new and unique experiences. Dozens of train and transit lines come here, with the main underground tube station right in the center of things. There is no dominating age group, race or gender, and if you wanted to meet people from every corner of the world in one day, Camden Town would be the place to do so.

Click here to read more about Camden High Street.

More Great Commercial Streets

Devon Street
Chicago, IL, USA

Venice Beach
Venice , CA, USA

Elmwood Avenue District
Buffalo, NY, USA

St. Mark’s Place
New York, NY, USA

The Loop
University City, MO, USA

Click here for more Commercial Street listings.

Iconic Streets

Las Ramblas, Barcelona, Spain

Las Ramblas is hands-down Barcelona's most popular and defining street.

Why It Works

A tremendous variety of eateries, shops, markets, and cultural institutions can be found here, along with a huge number of pedestrians and people-watchers. About 1.5 kilometers long, Las Ramblas is really a sequence of three pedestrian-oriented street/boulevards. Its central pedestrian promenade is unique in many respects, not the least being a clear aesthetic quality created by its pleasant proportions, relative to adjacent development. Landscaping and ample seating are two other big strengths. A mix of activities promotes diverse image and flexible character; Las Ramblas is universally seen as Barcelona’s most characteristic, most important, and best street. A huge number of different enterprises are in operation here — traditional retail, specialized vending, kiosk sales, markets and exchanges, fairs and exhibitions, shoe-shining, eateries and pubs, music and much more. There are also a number of museums and cultural institutions.

Click here to read more about Las Ramblas.

More Great Iconic Streets

Psirri
Athens, Greece

Passeig De Gracia
Barcelona, Spain

Las Vegas Boulevard/The Strip
Las Vegas, NV, USA

Champs-Elysees
Paris, France

Rua Augusta
Lisbon, Portugal

Click here for more Iconic streets.

Pedestrian Streets

Buchanan Street, Glasgow, Scotland

Buchanan Street is a vital pedestrian zone serving as Glasgow's retail anchor and the best spot to people-watch. Submitted by: Niall Murphy

Why It Works

With richly ornamented Victorian and Edwardian commercial buildings as a backdrop, Buchanan Street is Glasgow’s grandest promenade and the true heart of the city. Along its length you’ll find numerous small shops, two shopping arcades, two major shopping centers, a museum and library, and a design centre. There are regular displays of street theatre and a monthly farmers market. In 2003 it was voted Scotland’s favorite street in a BBC/CABE poll. In summer 2004 it was awarded a Congress for New Urbanism award for excellence. Glaswegians are renowned for their friendliness and sense of humor. Buchanan Street epitomizes this and is a very convivial place. It is the city’s main promenade where people meet up to shop or socialize. The ratio of locals to tourists is well balanced.

Click here to read more about Buchanan Street.

More Great Pedestrian Streets

Wall Street, Asheville
Asheville, NC, USA

Strøget District
Copenhagen, Denmark

Cat Street
Tokyo, Japan

Lincoln Road
Miami Beach, FL, USA

Locust Walk
Philadelphia, PA, USA

Click here for more Pedestrian streets.

Main Streets

State Street, Madison, Wisconsin

State Street is safe for cyclists and pedestrians alike. Submitted by: Judith Steinkamp

Why It Works

This main street is the meeting place and social center of Madison, connecting the University of Wisconsin campus and the Madison Capitol. It is vibrant and busy at all time of the day, week and year. The street is designed to be comfortable and accessible for all modes of transportation: pedestrian and bikes, trolley, bus and auto traffic. It is closed down for street fairs and other events, welcoming all ages and ethnic groups. It is an example of a wonderful “college town” main street that connects to the larger community and invites the community into the college’s public life. The shops and restaurants transition from student-oriented to more community-oriented as one approaches the Capitol. A farmers market surrounds the Capitol at the end of the street.

Click here to read more about State Street.

More Great Main Streets

West Main Street, Sackets Harbor
Sackets Harbor, NY, USA

Alleg Street
Borås, Sweden

Sainte-Catherine Street
Montreal, QC, Canada

President Clinton Avenue
Little Rock, AR, USA

Art Street
Taichung County, Taiwan

Click here for more Main streets.

Market Streets

Rue Mouffetard, Paris, France

A market in the morning, Rue Mouffetard becomes one of Paris's leading dining destinations later in the day.

Why It Works

Rue Mouffetard is a remnant of an old Roman road. Some buildings date from the 12th century, and many have distinct histories. In one sense, this street represents the history of Paris. The market of Rue Mouffetard fills every morning as people come to do their daily shopping. Its vitality is reminiscent of a scene from the Middle Ages. After the market closes, restaurants open up, offering a wide variety of ethnic foods as well as traditional French food at cafes and creperies. Colorful images of local produce, quaint Parisian shops, and diverse crowds along with the constant chatter of market buyers and sellers create a wonderful and long-lasting impression. The minimal vehicle traffic and the presence of shop vendors add to the feeling of safety and comfort for pedestrians.
Click here to read more about Rue Mouffetard.

More Great Market Streets

St. Mark’s Place
New York, NY, USA

Rue des Rosiers
Paris, France

Rue de Buci
Paris, France

Rue Montorgueil
Paris, France

Click here for more Market streets.

Transit Streets

Bahnhofstrasse, Zurich, Switzerland

Although world-famous for its upscale shopping, Bahnhofstrasse's real appeal lies in its pedestrian energy and effortless transit integration.

Why it Works

Bahnhofstrasse, which connects the main train station with the lakefront, is Zurich’s most famous and exclusive retail district. Individual retailers and high-end department stores sit side by side with art galleries, hotels, restaurants, renowned confectioners and Swiss bank headquarters, all of which draw a diverse crowd of locals and tourists alike. The real secret behind Bahnhofstrasse’s commercial success, and enduring appeal for the pedestrian. However, is likely its seamless integration of different transit modes, and the street’s hyper accessibility. Numerous tram lines service the Bahnhofstrasse, most of which interface at either end with rail, ferry, or bus. Private vehicles are prohibited for most of its length, while signaling and careful paving treatment ease their integration with bicyclists and pedestrians where permitted. Because of this restricted automobile access, the many pedestrian-only, cobblestone alleyways that lead onto the street, and the leisurely pace of window shoppers that stroll its sidewalks, Bahnhofstrasse feels largely like a comfortable, pedestrian boulevard.

Click here to read more about Bahnhofstrasse.

More Great Transit Streets

Istiklal Caddesi
Istanbul, Turkey

Kungsportsavenyn
Göteborg, Sweden
Bourke Street
Melbourne, Australia

Click here for more Transit streets.

Waterfront Streets

Acland Street, Melbourne, Australia

Known for its sidewalk cafes and superb people-watching, Acland Street is where everyone goes to relax and socialize. Submitted by: Freda Eisenberg

Why It Works

Acland Street has an intimate scale that brings pedestrians into close contact with its many cafes and street musicians, giving it the air of a bustling, linear party. Outdoor tables are prominent, and are often situated at the edge of the sidewalk, channeling passers by through cafes rather than around them; in this way pedestrians are integrated into the cafe scene, and are allowed a closer look at the wares displayed in the numerous bakery windows. Festive touches include a bold, checkerboard patterned sidewalk with decorative tile insets. Acland Street is a place of leisure. People go there to relax, socialize, and enjoy good food and music.

Click here to read more about Acland Street.

More Great Waterfront Streets

West Main Street, Sackets Harbor
Sackets Harbor, NY, USA

Nyhavn
Copenhagen, Denmark

Venice Beach
Venice , CA, USA

River Walk
San Antonio, TX, USA

Click here for more Waterfront streets.

Residential Streets

Toth Arpad Setany, Budapest, Hungary

Historical charm and great views make this cozy street one of Budapest's gems.

Why It Works

This wonderful spot for a promenade acts as a gathering place for locals and visitors who appreciate the beautiful architecture, trees, benches, fountains, and an incredible vista. The street as a whole is greater than the sum of its parts – but its parts are impressive: the architecture is historic and harmonious; mature trees make a shady canopy; a wide walkway follows along a spectacular view; old-fashioned street lights and benches line the street. At one end of the street is Budapest’s palace, which is a major destination for visitors. Go up any side street and there is a quiet restaurant, cafe, or shop. The street is a favorite place to walk or jog on a sunny day to enjoy a breath-taking looking out at the hills behind Budapest.

Click here to read more about Toth Setany.

More Great Residential Areas

Fenway
Boston, MA, USA

The Fan District
Richmond, VA, USA

Washington Square Park, NYC
New York, NY, USA

The Village of Arts and Humanities
North Philadelphia, PA, USA

Berkeley Hills
Berkeley, CA, USA

* Projects without reference to nomination were contributed by Project for Public Spaces

Categories: Articles, Building Community Through Transportation, Newsletter, Transportation



March 3rd, 2010 | Go to Placemaking Blog Home

Mobile Food Carts on a Roll

Posted by: Project for Public Spaces
The LA food fest was mobbed last month

Last month's LA Food Fest

Holly Whyte wrote in The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces, “If you want to seed a place with activity, put out food…Food attracts people who attract more people.” Mobile food carts often act as temporary destinations and gathering places for the culinarily curious; they also increase the number of reasons that people have to spend time in a place. From festivals to policy changes, food carts had a busy month across the country.

- As evidence of their popularity, the 2nd Annual LA Street Food Fest was mobbed this past month. On top of two hour lines to get into the event, you had to wait an additional two hours at some of the more talked about trucks.

- Also in LA, Food carts act as essential components of community events all over the city with multiple carts acting as mobile food courts at events downtown.

- Places like Roanoke, VA are in the process of drafting local legislation that would allow food carts and encourage them to cluster, as long as they don’t step on the toes of brick and mortar establishments.

- Here in New York City, trucks such as Calexico and Rickshaw Dumplings are using twitter to stay connected with customers and even offer up special promotions.

- This year, Pepsi decided to forego Super Bowl advertising in favor of providing community grants and asked the public to vote on which ideas they think most deserve the support. One idea in the running is to take the NYC Vendy Awards, which celebrates the best of New York’s food vendors, nationwide.

Categories: Blog, Places in the News, Public Markets and Local Economies





What Can We Learn about Road Safety from the Dutch?

How to shift away from an emphasis on speed to a focus on people and places

“If we can develop and design streets so that they are wonderful, fulfilling places to be – community-building places, attractive for all people – then we will have successfully designed about one-third of the city directly and will have had an immense impact on the rest.“
–Alan Jacobs

Thirty years ago, the Netherlands, a country about twice in size and population of New Jersey, was despondent over the high fatality rate on its roads. In the 1970s, 3200 Dutch citizens died each year in crashes, about 25 percent of them pedestrians. This rate was about 15 percent higher than that of the U.S.

Both countries have been actively focused on improving highway safety ever since. But there is a difference between what happened in the Netherlands and what happened in the United States.

What the Dutch Did Differently
A street in Amsterdam accommodates cars, bikes and pedestrians

The Dutch developed and implemented a major national campaign over the past three decades, called “Sustainable Safety”. Some say that we embraced the same goals in the US. But upon close inspection, if we are truthful with ourselves, Americans must admit that our effort was less comprehensive and far less effective. While we did significantly lower our fatality rate per vehicle-mile traveled, we did so via improved technology in cars, driver education, and in the 1960s, through the “Forgiving Highway” concept, which engineered roads to anticipate crashes.

The U.S. focus was on making cars and roads “safer,” in order to protect us from ourselves. This marks the biggest difference between the American and the Dutch approach to transportation planning.

While also taking advantage of technology and creating “Forgiving Highways”, the Dutch also committed themselves to designing urban roads that induced motorists to operate their vehicles in ways and at speeds that were appropriate for traveling through well-populated areas. The Dutch accepted that the post-World War II global approach to making roads wider, straighter and faster simply does not work on surface roads (i.e., non-freeways) in urbanized areas. Americans did not.

The photos below of a German highway illustrate the Sustainable Safety approach to urban roads pioneered in the Netherlands. You can see this road undergoing a gradual transition from high-speed traffic outside a community to the lower speeds suitable for urban areas, where space is shared with bikers and pedestrians.

Cars exiting the high-speed autobahn slow down thanks to design features such as trees and striping along the edge of the road.

Motorists reduce speeds further at the sight of a traffic island in the street and well-marked pedestrian crosswalk. Lower vehicle speeds are enforced by a mechanism that automatically triggers a red light if vehicles exceed 30 km an hour (19 mph).

Sidewalks and bike lanes are added to the streets as it enters a populated area, and the road eventually stops at a pedestrian district in the town center.

There are three significant differences between the American and the Dutch approaches to safety.

Cumulatively, these three differences represent a disciplined approach to street design that the Dutch call “self explaining streets.” This means that the design of the roadway itself offered motorists a clear sense of how to drive safely. Any American transportation professional would instantly agree that one of the biggest sources of crashes in the United States is roads where drivers do not know what to expect and how to drive appropriately. That is the problem that self-explaining streets are designed to solve.

One product of this philosophy is a concept known as “Shared Space,” originally pioneered by Dutch traffic engineer Hans Monderman. Shared spaces remove traffic lights, signs, crosswalks, lane markers and even curbs so that pedestrians, motorists and cyclists are allowed to negotiate their way through streets by gesturing and reacting to one another.

A truck approaches a Dutch shared space...

...navigates the intersection...

...and finally passes without incident

Gary Toth feels so comfortable in the shared space that he sets up a chair

How can we use the Dutch Approach to make our Streets Safer?

The American emphasis on safety over the last several decades has led to a reduction in annual traffic fatalities from 44,000 a year in 1975 to 37,000 a year in 2008. This is an accomplishment to be proud of and is particularly impressive in light of our population growth over that period.

During the same period, however, the Dutch have reduced their fatalities from 3200 a year to 800. If we calculate the rate per 1000 people, the Dutch fatality rate is now only 40% of the American rate. This is remarkable, particularly when one considers that in 1975 the Dutch fatality rate was 20% higher than that of the US!

If we had achieved a similar reduction in fatality rates, our annual fatalities would drop to just under 15,000 a year—22,000 less deaths than we currently experience. This means that every six weeks, we could save as many lives as were lost in the 9/11 tragedy! The U.S. has been motivated to spend tens of billions of dollars to redress the lives lost on 9/11. Where is the public outcry to address the tragedies occurring on our roads, the leading avoidable cause of death in the U.S.?

There are positive trends within the U.S. transportation movement as evidenced by the proactive roadway design philosophy prescribed in the Pennsylvania DOT/ New Jersey DOT Smart Transportation Guidebook. In addition, cities and metropolitan areas such as San Francisco, Denver, Savannah, Portland (Oregon) and Charlotte (North Carolina), have all begun to create transportation policies that move away from wider, straighter and faster street designs.

Looking forward, however, a dramatic commitment to saving lives must be a focus of the next federal transportation bill. Congress, transportation advocacy groups, and communities across America all agree that the American transportation system has lost its way; it has no overarching vision to excite our citizenry in the way that the Interstate system did in the 1950s and 1960s. The opportunity to save 7 times the number of lives lost on 9/11 annually could be the galvanizing force of a national safety initiative modeled on the Dutch approach to roadway safety. We can and must reframe our national goals around the idea of maximizing safety and maintaining our quality of life and prosperity.

We owe it to our children.

Recently, PPS staff Gary Toth, Fred Kent and Kathy Madden had the opportunity to spend a week touring the Netherlands (and a short time in Denmark) to learn more about the Dutch approach to sustainable safety, bicycle and pedestrian practices, and community-based transportation planning. To foster the infusion of the applicable Dutch transportation ideas into the US, PPS is about to enter into a partnership with the Dutch National Information and Technology Platform for infrastructure, traffic, transport and public space (C.R.O.W.).

Categories: Articles, Building Community Through Transportation, Newsletter, Transportation



The Benefits of Public Markets

Public markets are not just places of commerce. Successful markets help grow and connect urban and rural economies. They encourage development, enhance real estate values and the tax base, and keep money in the local neighborhood. Public markets also offer low-risk business opportunities for vendors and feed money back into the rural economy where many vendors grow, raise and produce their products.

The spin-off benefits of markets are numerous. From increasing access to fresh, healthy food to providing important revenue streams, markets positively impact local businesses, governments and residents. But, perhaps most important is the way markets serve as public gathering places for people from different ethnic, cultural, and socioeconomic communities. As one of the few places where people comfortably gather and meet, markets are our neighborhoods’ original civic centers.

In 2002, PPS, with support from the Ford Foundation, researched the impacts markets have on their communities. Six of the most prominent impacts are below. These findings helped frame a three-year grant program funded by Ford and the W.K. Kellogg Foundations, and in our on-going project work we continue to see that successful public markets are more than just business enterprises, they are public spaces that shape communities and economies for the better.

Click on the interactive chart below to learn more about the benefits of markets!

economic opportunity urban and rural economies bring together diverse people promotes public health creates active public space renews downtowns and neighboorhoods
Categories: Articles, Markets, Public Markets & Local Economies



Fred Kent

President
Fredkent@pps.org

Fred Kent is a leading authority on revitalizing city spaces and one of the foremost thinkers in livability, smart growth and the future of the city. As founder and president of Project for Public Spaces, he is known throughout the world as a dynamic speaker and prolific ideas man.

Traveling over 150,000 miles each year, Fred offers technical assistance to communities and has given talks across the U.S. as well as internationally. Each year, he and the PPS staff train 10,000 people in Placemaking techniques.

Audiences Fred has addressed include the Smart Growth Network, Federal Highway Administration, U.S. General Services Administration, American Society of Landscape Architects, American Public Transit Association, U.S Forest Service, the World Bank, New Jersey DOT, New York DOT, Ford Foundation, Caltrans, Connecticut Main Street Center, and the Princes Foundation. He has trained over 1,000 transportation professionals from statewide DOTs, in addition to many thousands of community and neighborhood groups across the country.

Fred studied with Margaret Mead and worked with William H. Whyte on the Street Life Project, assisting in observations and film analysis of corporate plazas, urban streets, parks and other open spaces in New York City. The research resulted in the now classic ‘The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces’, published in 1980, which laid out conclusions based on decades of meticulous observation and documentation of human behavior in the urban environment.

In 1968, Fred founded the Academy for Black and Latin Education (ABLE), a street academy for high school dropouts. He was Program Director for the Mayor’s Council on the Environment in New York City under Mayor John Lindsay. In 1970, and again in 1990, Fred was the coordinator and chairman of New York City’s Earth Day.

He has taken over half a million photographs of public spaces and their users, which have appeared in exhibits, publications and articles.

Education

Columbia University, Bachelor of Arts in Economics

Columbia University, Graduate Program in Urban Geography

Selected Professional Presentations and Lectures

World Design Conference 2010, Panelist, Seoul, Korea, December 2010

Aspirations and Inspirations: Imagining the Buffalo Waterfront, Buffalo, NY, November 2010

Interdisciplinary Design Institute: Design Research Conference, Spokane, WA, October 2010

North Louisiana Travel Conference, Speaker, Shreveport-Bossier, LA, August 2010

Pedestrian Symposium, Speaker, LA County Metropolitan Transportation Authority, May 2010

Ochsner Hare & Hare 100th anniversary conference, Keynote address, Kansas City, KS, May 2010

Greater East End Forum Lunch,Keynote address, Houston, TX, January 2010

48th ICCA Congress & Exhibition, Keynote address, International Congress and Convention Association, Florence, Italy, November 2009

19th Annual Toronto Planning Gala Dinner, Keynote address, Toronto Planning Alumni, Toronto, Canada, November 2009

Michigan Municipal League Annual Convention, Keynote address, Michigan Municipal League, Kalamazoo, MI, September 2009

“Transforming the Metropolis” Delange Conference, Rice University, Houston, TX, March 2009

Destination Italy: Scenarios, Trends and Strategies to Enhance Italian Tourism, Keynote address, Fondazione Rosselli, Confturismo, Turin, Italy, January 2009

“Future Cities” Keynote address, City of Bergen, Bergen, Norway, November 2008

“National Congress on Public Space” CROW, the Netherlands, November 2008

Gold Coast City Council, Gold Coast, Australia, September 2008

Subtropical Cities Conference, Brisbane, Australia, September 2008

Place Leaders Association Workshop, Melbourne, Australia, September 2008

“Power of Ten” Committee for Perth, Perth, Australia, August 2008

“Placemaking and Tourism” Destination Marketing Association Internations (DMAI) Annual Conference, Las Vegas, NV, July 2008

“World Cities Summit” National Parks Board, Singapore, June 2008

Uncommon Ground lecture series, NY Parks and Recreation Department, New York, NY, June 2008

“The Quality of Density” Third Congress for Israeli Urbanism, Movement for Israeli Urbanism, Tel-Aviv, Israel, May 2008

“What If We Built Cities Around Place” Keynote address at Mary Donaldson lecture, Saskatchewan Library Association, Regina, SK, Canada, May 2008

The Benwwood Foundation, lecture series, Chattanooga, TN, April 2008

BC Library Association, Richmond, BC, Canada April 2008

“To Be or Not to Be a Great Waterfront” Windy River Institute, Bullhead City, AZ, February 2008

“Sarasota International Design Summit 2007” Ringling College of Art and Design, Sarasota, FL, November 2007

“The Trail Ahead” Waterfront Conference and Trail Ride, Waterfront Regeneration Trust, Toronto, ON, September 2007

“Aspen Ideas Festival” Aspen, CO, July 2007

Mayor’s Roundtable, Oklahoma City, OK, May 2007

“Annual Conference” North Carolina American Society of Landscape Architects, Keynote address, Charlotte, NC, May 2007

Bergen Chamber of Commerce; Nordic Urban Design Conference (NUDA), Keynote address, Bergen, Norway, April 2007

“Catch the Neighborhood Spirit” Regional Neighborhood Network Conference, Keynote address, Bowling Green, KY, October 2006

“Public Spaces, Public Life” Copenhagen, Denmark, September 2006

“The Evolving Planner” 2006 Northern New England Chapter of the American Planning Association Annual Conference, Keynote address, Meredith, NH, September 2006

“Creating Valuable Cities,” keynote presentation, and closing panel session, Hong Kong, China, May 2006

“The Living City” Conference, Amersfoort, The Netherlands, May 2006