LA Mayor Eric Garcetti has released a strategic plan to turn streets into safer "21st century" public spaces for everyone, with help from LA City Councilmember Mike Bonin, new LADOT chief Seleta Jewel . . . and former NYC Janette Sadik-Khan, credited with turning Times Square into a pedestrian friendly "crossroads of the world” -- meantime expanding bus service, bringing into existence the largest bike share in the US. and 400 miles of bike lanes.

She told a crowded UCLA auditorium that “New Yorkers now talk about traffic calming. . . bike sharing . . . way-finding. There is a completely different set of transportation options and designs on the streets of New York.”

She noted that younger people today are looking for choices that include not taking on the burden of car ownership.

 

The rebirth of Santa Monica's Third Street Promenade in 1989 is one of then-Mayor Denny Zane's many legacies. "The promenade turned Santa Monica into a community with both a beach and a quality urban environment," Denny tells the LA Times, which notes that it was an "urban planning gamble that paid off spectacularly." Read more here.

LA Metro has a list of 515 crowd-sourced recommendations on which rail stations should feature bikeshares — all in DTLA except for one at the Expo Park/USC station and another in downtown Santa Monica . . . Read more.

Bike-sharing had a banner year in 2013, with a 60% increase in new programs launched worldwide. That momentum hasn’t flagged; 68 cities around the world have launched bike-share programs this year, says Russell Meddin, who manages The Bike-Sharing World Map. That’s an average of two a week, and it brings the total number of bike-share programs internationally to 730.

This UC-Berkeley study compares the roles of taxis and ridesourcing companies in urban transportation, and asks whether ride-sourcing complements or competes with public transit and the impact on VMT.

Among the findings:

• Ridesourcing wait times are markedly shorter and more consistent than the wait for taxis


• Ridesourcing users tend to be younger, to own fewer cars, and to more often travel with companions

The conclusion? Ridesourcing fills an important urban mobility gap.

In a city of 470 square miles, DTLA is just a 5-square-mile speck, barely 1% of the land area. And yet, since 1999, approximately one-fifth of all residential construction has occurred there. And there's lots more coming. Nearly 20,000 units have been built since the approval of the adaptive reuse ordinance in 1999. Another 20,000 are in the development pipeline and likely to be built in the next 5-10 years. This has made DTLA a Walker's Paradise, a Top 5 World Destination, and America's Next Great City.

But it doesn't bode well for affordability . . .

Very interesting story on the Better Institutions website.

Check it out:
1) The Measure R half-cent sales tax yielded $700 million for transportation last year in LA County;
2) The Los Angeles County Economic Development Corporation says 58% of the proceeds are paid by businesses and visitors;
3) The rest of LA County residents are paying 42% of the $700 million = $290 million;
4) There are 10 million people in LA County so each pays an average of $29/year;
5) $29 a year divided by 365 days = 8 cents a day.

That's not bad for an expanding transit system.

More amazing maps and charts here:

Councilmember O'Farrell tells the Planning Report that he believes the high cost of housing discourages companies from doing business in Los Angeles because it makes it hard to find and keep employees. And he says that he believes that within the next year the City of LA will have a permanent source of funding for affordable housing. He says:

"As you may have heard, the LA metro region recently earned another dubious distinction. According to a Harvard study, we are the most unaffordable metro region in the United States. Furthermore, Los Angeles is the only 'high cost' city in the country without a permanent source of revenue to fund the construction of new affordable housing. It is a stark reality that while income levels remained flat from 2000 to 2010, rents increased by over 30 percent. A majority of residents in Los Angeles are renters and over 60 percent of renter households are “cost burdened,” which means they pay more than 30 percent of their income for rent, diminishing their ability to afford the most basic needs, such as food.

Read more.