Transportation Alternatives Green Car Advisor Blog on Edmunds' Inside Line

August 18, 2008

Think Car-Less Downtowns Won't Work? Hey, If New York Can Try It....

Pedestrian malls are nothing new, a number of cities have closed thoroughfares - some intermittently and some permanently - to reduce congestion, promote leisurely shopping and even to help clean up the air.

But when the biggest city in the nation tries it, on famed Park Avenue and nearby streets, that's news.

We dispatched Green Car Advisor contributor Robert E. Calem to the scene to see what he could see, and what he found was a crowd of happy people.

No one we talked to wanted the car to be banished forever, but the ability to walk, bike, skate or run in downtown Manhattan without having to dodge traffic came as a welcome breather - literally and figuratively - for most.

We think it's an ideal that every town - big and small - ought to try. Think of the fuel we'd save, and, who knows, some of us might find we actually enjoy walking once in a while.

Here's Calem's dispatch:

New Yorker Chris Natale and daughter Emilia, 4, enjoy a Saturday bike ride on a car-free Park Ave.

By Robert E. Calem, Contributor

NEW YORK, N.Y. - In a bid by New York City's Department of Transportation to promote greener forms of transit, automobiles were banned from nearly seven miles of Manhattan streets for six hours on Saturday. And in typical New York fashion the void was quickly filled - by joggers, walkers and throngs of people on bicycles, skateboards and in-line skates.

It was exactly the scene the city government had intended for Summer Streets, an experimental program that is closing a usually congested route between the Brooklyn Bridge and Central Park from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. on three consecutive Saturdays this month.

The program started August 9 and will conclude next Saturday, August 23. And while there is still no official count of how many people participated, talk about the first Saturday led to an apparently bigger turnout on the second, according to Dani Simons, director of the Summer Streets program.

The weather was sunny and warm with low humidity, and if it is as nice next Saturday, Simons says, she expects attendance to be up again.

Summer Streets is an experiment, but if the agency officially deems it a success, it could be continued and even expanded in future years.

Most of those enjoying a stroll or bike ride on the startlingly empty streets told us they thought it very successful -although merchants along the newly car-free streets seemed divided.

Tom Hochfelder (left), a New York native who has lived in Manhattan for 35 years, called the program, "One of the best things I've seen in the city in a long time."

He was walking north in the center of Park Avenue when we interrupted his stroll. It was his dark sports coat - a standout among the casually clad bikers and joggers - that caught our attention.

"It's great," Hochfelder said about the absence of cars. "I think they should continue it, if they do it on Saturday or Sunday mornings, when you don't have that much traffic. The more we can encourage people to walk, the better it is for the city. Less pollution, better exercise for everybody, and it will create more of a sense of community."

Hochfelder is a realist, though, and said he wouldn't expect a no-autos policy anytime other than on weekend mornings. It would be too disruptive to try it other times, he said.