Walking

On Monday the Active Transportation Alliance released their action plan for a continuous Chicago River Trail, one that would provide a corridor for pedestrians and bicyclists along the north and south branches of the river, connecting with existing suburban trails. You can read an executive summary of their proposal here.

This article also ran in the Chicago Reader weekly newspaper.

The Argyle Shared Street project, designed to calm traffic, provide more space for pedestrians and sidewalk cafes, creating a safer, more pleasant, and more profitable business strip, is a great idea. But so far the layout for the streetscape initiative, which raised the street up to sidewalk level and blurred the lines between pedestrian and vehicle space, has not proved to be intuitive for drivers.

Back in 2012, the Chicago Department of Transportation put out the Chicago Forward Action Agenda and the Chicago Pedestrian Plan, with the stated goal of eliminating all traffic fatalities by 2022. Today Mayor Rahm Emanuel announced the city is finally launching a Vision Zero initiative, an interdepartmental effort improve roadway safety, which means we’re finally catching up with peer cities like New York, which has had a Vision Zero policy for years.

The motorist who struck and killed an as-yet-unidentified man in the Dunning neighborhood early Sunday morning has received two citations.

The Argyle Shared Street, a project to create a safer and more pleasant environment on Chicago’s Southeast Asian shopping and dining strip by blurring the lines between pedestrian and vehicle space, reopened to two-way traffic last week.

[Last year the Chicago Reader launched a weekly transportation column written by Streetsblog Chicago editor John Greenfield. This partnership allows Streetsblog to extend the reach of our livable streets advocacy. We syndicate a portion of the column after it comes out online; you can read the remainder on the Reader’s website or in print. The paper hits the streets on Thursdays.]

56-year-old Cynthia Tatman was fatally struck early Tuesday morning while jogging in the Norwood Park neighborhood on a four-lane, high-speed stretch of Devon Avenue.

A UPS truck driver who was making a right on red fatally struck a senior Monday afternoon in the North Park community, according to police.