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Urbanists, design a better grid
New York State transportation officials are gathering crucial input to ensure the successful transformation of Route 81 in Syracuse into a Community Grid.Public comments are now being accepted to influence one of the most important Freeways Without Futures projects ever, and the design ideas and expertise of new urbanists are needed. New York State Department of Transportation (NYSDOT) has endorsed the “Community Grid” option for transforming the...Read more -
Freeway cap would restore grid
Since 2012, grassroots coalition Reconnect Austin has advanced an alternative, human-scaled vision for the I-35 corridor for the Texas capital city. The north-south section of I-35 that cuts through downtown Austin carries a high amount of traffic—more than 200,000 vehicles a day—but inhibits...Read more -
New York State DOT picks ‘Community Grid’ in Syracuse
Since 2008, CNU has highlighted the advantages of transforming the elevated I-81 through the heart of the city.New York State DOT has selected the “Community Grid” as the preferred alternative for Interstate 81 in Syracuse, a plan that would allow the elevated viaduct that has severed city neighborhoods since the 1950s to revert to a grid of streets. I-81 leveled African-American and ethnic neighborhoods,...Read more -
Crash diet for a freeway corridor
Conversion to a boulevard would reduce the right-of-way of I-980 in Oakland by 75 percent, connecting neighborhoods and allowing mixed-use development where land now generates no tax revenues.I-980 remains a testament to the intense disapproval for freeway construction at the end of the highway-building era. Public opposition to its construction was so strong that the project was abandoned in 1971, only to be resurrected and finally completed over a decade later. Now, the excessively...Read more