Octavia Boulevard, San Francisco, California via Strode to Boulevard
Happy New Year!
My first post of the year is about a tumbler I stumbled upon “Stroad to Boulevard” by @Neil21. For those who do not know, a stroad is:
A street-road hybrid that frustrates everybody who uses it. Roads efficiently connect clusters of destinations. Streets are the spaces between those local destinations. Roads are fast, wide and straight. Streets have intersections, crosswalks, parking, cyclists and sidewalks.
A Stroad is both a bad Road and bad Street: the worst of both worlds, frustrating and harming drivers, cyclists, pedestrians, businesses and homeowners.
Stroads are commonly called Arterials in North America. They are an anachronism, surviving only by inertia from 1960s traffic engineering guidebooks.
The tumbler exhibits examples of Boulevards across the world. I share Neil’s enthusiasm for boulevards as an alternative to Arterials. Adopting a boulevard approach would be one of the best strategies for improving walkability along post war arterial roads.
Inspiration for the tumbler is drawn from Allan B. Jacobs’ wonderful The Boulevard Book, which also provided me with a great deal of insight while working on my graduate research project. I have been meaning to add this book to my personal library.
So check out Neil’s tumbler and buy the Boulevard Book!
Amalgamated 