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Can Cars Become folklore? Exploring the Future of our Streets Post-Coronavirus

It’s 7:30pm on a Monday night in August. We are in the heart of our nation’s capital. Yes, D.C. always clears out around this time of year, and yes, it is raining right now, but this summer night is different. We are on month six (give or take) of the coronavirus pandemic here in the United States, and our streets have undergone a drastic transformation. In the time it took me to write these first few sentences, only 5 cars have driven by my window. This would have been unheard of in the heated rush hours of Before Times. As Taylor Swift languidly reflects in her song, august, “But I can see us lost in the memory / August slipped away into a moment in time.” While maybe Taylor isn’t contemplating automobile ephemera like me, her sentiments about fleeting memories have never seemed more true. Our society has entered a new normal in every facet of our lives, and our streets are no different. Coronavirus has presented us with both extreme challenges and opportunities, leading many to question if we can leverage the positive, interim changes and seeming concessions into permanence.

It seems as if our view on cars being indispensable to the American Way of Life is immutable, however many are hoping to change this. Farhad Manjoo, an opinion columnist for the New York Times, recently published a piece titled, I’ve Seen a Future Without Cars, and It’s Amazing. His thesis: Why do American cities waste so much space on cars? While this idea may be nothing new, Manjoo’s angle of focusing on space came at an apt time as society reckons with isolating in small, urban spaces, quarantining in cities once as dynamic as its transient residents, and transitioning to experiencing our neighborhoods at street level. We are being forced to confront truly living in our immediate surroundings, in a way that we may not have wanted to, or been conscious of, before. I thought I knew my neighborhood like the back of my hand, but my quarantine walks have taught me that I was sorely mistaken. In the past month I have discovered 3 community gardens, 2 cemeteries, and 1 park all within a 30 minute walk of my apartment.1 Greenspaces have become a refuge for me now more than ever. Having worked with the Parks Research Lab at William & Mary and ParkRx America in Washington, D.C., greenspaces have always been a research interest of mine. Pro-tip: If you are yearning for some ecotherapy like me, you can utilize ParkRx America’s database (located on the homepage) to “prescribe” yourself a local greenspace to visit. Now, the idea of space, be it “green” or other, has taken on a whole new meaning during the pandemic. As I type, limited to my small, city apartment, I am reflecting on Manjoo’s visceral appeal for us to optimize how we are using and creating space.

ParkRx America’s mission is to decrease the burden of chronic disease, increase health and happiness, and foster environmental stewardship, by virtue of prescribing Nature during the routine delivery of healthcare by a diverse group of healthcare professionals. Source: ParkRx America Resources

As an environmentalist, I have been celebrating the recent dearth of cars in my own city, and the proliferation of “Open Streets” and “Open Restaurants” movements across the country as the pandemic progresses. Notable examples include: Oakland's Slow Streets, Seattle's Stay Healthy Streets, and Paris' “Corona Cycleways.” Many of these initiatives have been championed by individual communities or tactical urbanists for years, but for the general public these ideas are just now becoming mainstream as we adhere to Stay at Home orders and live more locally. Scenes like Karsten Moran’s photo, below, of Mulberry Street in Manhattan evoke the plaza-culture of cities abroad. Having traveled often outside of the U.S., I always wonder why our streets don’t feel like theirs. Is it a problem of planning? Of people? Of both? Cars seem like an easy culprit, but maybe they are just a scapegoat symbol for the individualism of American society. As public health experts reckon with the threat of American individualism in combating coronavirus, can we instead channel this obstacle into collective action to improve our streets?

NYC Open Restaurants’ Siting Criteria has ushered in a new era of ‘tactical urbanism’ founded on quick-fixes, often utilizing the mishmash of materials on hand. Source: NYC DOT

“New York City’s sidewalks and streets have sprouted oases that evoke destinations from the Greek isles to the New Jersey Turnpike. In Manhattan, Mulberry Street, which was dotted with sidewalk seating before the pandemic, now features in-street dining.” Photo Credit: Karsten Moran; Source: Outdoor Dining Offers Fresh Air and Fantasy to a City That Needs Both

It is critical to explore who we are “improving” our streets for, who these changes will benefit, and who is calling for them. How would open streets impact BIPOC? People living with disabilities? Essential workers? Many urbanist activists are “challenging the practice of quick-build infrastructure projects like Slow Streets that eschew multi-year and multi-stage construction projects in favor of timely progress and rapid feedback.”2 In D.C., Ward 8 Councilmember Trayon White effectively banned Slow Streets from his ward, which is over 92% Black according to DC Health Matters, with an amendment to the law permitting them stating, “Many residents in Ward 8 have not supported bike lanes and other measures that appear to force aspects of gentrification and displacement.” Dr. Destiny Thomas, a Black transportation planner and organizer, explores these ideas and more in the article, ‘Safe Streets’ Are Not Safe for Black Lives. I highly recommend reading her article first, before I outline a few of her ideas here. Dr. Thomas explains that the onslaught of slow streets and bike lanes during the pandemic was a “nightmare” due to their lack of participatory planning. She states, “by design, their ‘quick-build’ nature overrides the public feedback that is necessary for deep community support. Without that genuine engagement, I feared that pandemic-induced pedestrian street redesigns would deepen inequity and mistrust in communities that have been disenfranchised and underserved for generations.”3 If planning is to become anti-racist, it must center and amplify the voices of communities members through inclusive methods such as participatory planning and budgeting, youth engagement, and other targeted outreach efforts. As we know, racial justice and environmental justice are interconnected, and Dr. Thomas goes on to explain how these initiatives “fail to address the environmental factors at the root of these health disparities. Encouraging Black residents to go outside without addressing the environmental crises that lead to COVID-19 complications is a tell-tale sign that Black well-being was a secondary (at best) intention of these projects.”3 Black access to the outdoors has long been limited, as illustrated by national park visitation statistics: although Black Americans represent 13.4% of the U.S. population, a 2018 study, People of Color and Their Constraints to National Parks Visitation, indicates that they represent less than 2% of national park visitors. Keya Chatterjee, a D.C.-based climate activist who organized ad hoc street closures in the first few months of the pandemic, believes projects like Slow Streets can mitigate harm to Black residents, including from air pollution and COVID-19. Chatterjee argues, “I do think that building things quickly, that result in a lower loss of life, in a situation where that loss of life is clearly based on racial injustice, is the only way to move towards justice.”2 Decreasing the number of cars operating in our cities would lead to significant reductions in toxic air pollution which currently disproportionately affects communities of color. However, we must not make these decisions in a vacuum; input from affected populations is indispensable.

Black visibility in public spaces and streets challenges the racist, ableist, and classist ideas historically underpinning “who should have access to ‘outside’ and how they should be allowed to access it. Without a plan to include and protect Black, Brown, Indigenous, trans, and disabled people, or a plan to address anti-Black vigilantism and police brutality, these open streets are set up to fail.”3 Dr. Thomas outlined seven concrete ways to address racism and inequity in transportation planning specifically:

Public works and transportation agencies should produce and publish a concrete plan for divestment from police agencies. This includes both fiscal and values-based components: Enforcement should be replaced with accessibility and accountability, and funds to police should be redistributed to community-based organizations, direct service providers and behavioral health specialists that are equipped to uphold dignity and care for everyone within the built environment.

Quick-build projects don’t solve the disparities caused by the legacy of racist planning and disinvestment. In order to be transformative, infrastructure projects should have a comprehensive environmental justice plan as a prerequisite, and basic public works should be up to date prior to implementation. This includes proper drainage and floodplain planning, addressing pavement heat indexes, upgrading underground utilities, reducing toxic industry in the vicinity, accessible curbs and crossing opportunities, adequate shelter and shade, and dignified support for curbside residents.

If you want to ban cars, start by banning racism. Planners should make an intentional effort to address scarcity across all modes of transportation so as to empower freedom of movement and choice in mobility. This should include free assistive devices, bikes and bike accessories, free transit, subsidized rideshare, and economically equitable access to zero-emissions vehicles. Until Black people are no longer being hunted down by vigilantes, white supremacists and rogue police, private vehicles should be accepted as a primary mode of transportation.

Design low-stress street networks that specifically center the safety of and joy-filled travel by Black people. These routes, networks, wayfinding elements, and reparations-centered policies should derive from a participatory process that includes the voices of Black people, people living with disabilities, trans people, elders and youth.

If your leadership can’t speak to racial equity, you should not be releasing a statement. If your organization, agency, or firm is/has released a racial equity statement in solidarity with the Movement for Black Lives, you have an obligation to ensure that your workforce is reflective of those values and the treatment of your Black employees is consistent with these values. Stop asking your one Black employee to write your equity statement overnight.

Employee agreements for transit and transportation agencies need to be modified so that no one is forced to serve the needs of law enforcement. No one should face retribution or punishment for opting out.

Bikeshare operating agreements should include mandatory long-term anti-displacement and equitable distribution plans to ensure bikeshare as a mode choice is equitable across the geographic region.

As a new “student” of planning, I am just beginning my studies into the racist history of planning, however I am eager to share with you new resources I have found as I begin to educate myself and work to amplify BIPOC voices in planning. I recently attended a webinar titled “Design for Everyone: An intro to Urban Planning & Design” hosted by Form Function Studio featuring BlackSpace, a collective of Black urban planners, architects, artists, activists, designers, and leaders working to protect and create Black spaces. The BlackSpace Manifesto consists of 14 guiding principles encouraging us to Celebrate, Catalyze, and Amplify Black Joy, Protect and Strengthen Culture, Seek People at the Margins, Center Lived Experience, Be Humble Learners who Practice Deep Listening, Reckon With the Past to Build the Future, among many others.

BlackSpace created this manifesto to guide their growth as a group and their interactions with partners and communities to work towards a future where Black people, Black spaces, and Black culture matter and thrive. Source: https://www.blackspace.org/manifesto

As we return to the tension between cars and space in our cities, we must investigate who owns these cars, and how car-owners are profiting off this status. In D.C., only about 6 in 10 D.C. residents have a car, and those who do are overwhelmingly wealthy and white compared with those who don’t own one.5 Additionally, the federal government provides subsidies through the tax code for employer-provided and employer-paid automobile parking, transit passes, and other commuter expenses, but it does so inefficiently and inequitably.6

“Ultimately, the effect of the tax benefit for commuter parking is to subsidize traffic congestion by putting roughly 820,000 more cars on America’s most congested roads in its most congested cities at the most congested times of day. [Beneficiaries] tend to work in areas where parking is most expensive (such as downtown business districts), with those in higher-income tax brackets receiving the greatest benefits. The parking tax benefit represents $7.3 billion in reduced tax revenue that must be made up through cuts in government programs, a higher deficit, or increases in taxes on other Americans.”6 - TransitCenter and Frontier Group

Similar to how the pandemic is helping those who are already ahead to stay ahead, the parking tax benefit merely serves to hurt lower income populations and non-car owners, a demographic with a lot of overlap.

In I’ve Seen a Future Without Cars, and It’s Amazing, Manjoo is told, “instead of fighting a war on cars urbanists should fight a war on car dependency - on cities that leave residents with few choices other than cars. Alleviating car dependency can improve commutes for everyone in a city.” Focusing on urban scarcity, from accessible, alternative transportation to affordable housing, to inclusive food systems, will force us to question how we are often allocating space in our cities for the benefit of cars (as if they are CarsTM) rather than the people living in them. As Manjoo has outlined, “in most American cities, wherever you look, you will see a landscape constructed primarily for the movement and storage of automobiles.”7 We cannot “continue to justify wasting such enormous tracts of land” on cars as we strive for more equitable and inclusive urban spaces.7 It is also important to acknowledge that this piece comes at a unique time, when city dwellers and suburbanites alike are vying to escape the sprawl, antsy from months of quarantine. Even I have been wishing I owned a car to set out on some, any, kind of spontaneous adventure. The unknown of life post-coronavirus is daunting, but in the chaos lies a little bit of hope. Perhaps we can channel this sliver of optimism to design for the future we are all hoping for. I know I still want the “old Taylor” back, just not all the cars that came with that era.

But do you remember? Remember when I pulled up and said "Get in the car" And then canceled my plans just in case you'd call? Back when I was livin' for the hope of it all, for the hope of it all

Inspired by “august” by Taylor Swift. Stream on Spotify.

Citations:

Washington, D.C. greenspaces discovered during quarantine; Gardens: Columbia Heights Green, Upshur Community Garden, Wangari Gardens; Cemeteries: Rock Creek Cemetery, Glenwood Cemetery; Park: Crispus Attucks Park

Do DC's Slow Streets Benefit Everyone?

‘Safe Streets’ Are Not Safe for Black Lives

People of Color and Their Constraints to National Parks Visitation

Opinion | The high cost of DC's cheap parking

Subsidizing Congestion

Opinion | I’ve Seen a Future Without Cars, and It’s Amazing

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