Road diets flatten the curve

Pedestrians and cyclists on Beach Drive in DC's Rock Creek Park during the covid-19 crisis. Sections of the road are car-free on the weekends, giving people an opportunity to move around outdoors while practicing social distancing. (Photo by me)

Covid-19 has spread empty roads, buses, and trains across the globe. 

In the midst of the deserted asphalt, however, people and person-sized vehicles have tested positive for resiliency. Biking, walking, running, and scootering have become go-to options for a variety of trip types, providing a socially-distant way to access work or the grocery store, or to simply get some fresh outdoor air.

In New York City, where Mayor Bill de Blasio encouraged people to bike more, CitiBike use rose 70 percent and cyclist numbers on major bridges rose 50 percent as the pandemic bore down. Anecdotally, the trails crisscrossing DC and its Maryland and Virginia suburbs have been busier than I’ve ever seen them during the past week, with a fascinating mix of experimental commuters, people just out enjoying themselves, and the spandex-clad who blow past everyone.

Here’s how we can inject safety and resiliency into the infrastructure for active mobility that’s getting society through this emergency, flattening lethal curves in not just the battle against covid-19, but also the wars on traffic violence and inequality.

Right-size our roads

When transit ridership fluctuates, as has happened during the covid-19 crisis, we’re told that headways and capacity need to be “right-sized” to compensate. Treating our highways and arterials the same way will ensure our public infrastructure better meets society’s needs.

Traffic violence costs the U.S. health care system more than $24 billion annually. And akin to coronavirus’s exponential spread, the risk of death or serious injury in a car crash doubles for every 5 km/h (3.1 mph) speed increase above 60 km/h (37 mph).

Thus, nudging driver speeds even just slightly down not only saves countless lives directly, but also frees up essential hospital capacity needed to treat people afflicted with coronavirus.  

Firstly, traffic planners should eliminate commute-oriented road capacity expansions that covid-19 has de-induced demand for.

For example, DC deserves kudos for suspending operation of the reversable traffic lanes on Connecticut Avenue. I live within steps of this pedestrian-quarantining arterial and have witnessed how wider roads – including temporarily wider ones – encourage speeding and other dangerous driving habits. Hard evidence backs up my observations – the Institute of Transportation Engineers found that Connecticut has three times as many crashes as Massachusetts Ave, a comparable DC arterial that doesn’t have reversible lanes – so local leaders should consider also suspending operation of similarly unneeded lanes on streets including Independence Ave, Canal Road, and Rock Creek Parkway.

Officials also should slash aspects of streets and intersections that endanger pedestrians or make them walk far out of their way. The aforementioned crash lethality curve is sharpest for people outside vehicles; the U.K.'s Transport Research Laboratory found that a person struck by a 30 mph driver has about a 90 percent chance of surviving, but the odds drop to less than 10 percent if the driver is moving at 50 mph.

More mid-block High-Intensity Activated Crosswalk signals, Barnes Dance Intersections that allow diagonal pedestrian crossings, and Leading Pedestrian Intervals that give people a head start; along with fewer right turns on red, slip lanes, and unprotected left turns across crosswalks, would reduce hazardous conflicts and flatten this curve.

Make usable urban space more abundant

Pilot repurposing of underused road space for people and person-sized vehicles would give people safer, more plentiful six-foot radii to enjoy. We can start by simply keeping spots that occasionally give pedestrians a little extra room, like Georgetown’s M Street or Rock Creek Park’s Beach Drive in DC, that way for the duration of the crisis.

Cities have spent a lot of time building networks of protected bike lanes on paper, but in this situation, the public needs those lanes to be reality.

DC’s decision to suspend the Connecticut Ave reversible car lanes, for example, gives the city a chance to try out the proposed cycletrack on that street that would fill a major gap in its network. Protected lane projects on 20^th and 21^st street also can proceed without worry because the Phillips Collection art museum, a prominent opponent of those lanes, is closed due to covid-19.

Bus connectivity remains essential to those onboard, so leaders should test out their similarly extensive networks of currently paper-imprisoned bus lanes. DC’s now-permanent lanes on H and I streets, people-oriented conversion of major thoroughfares in New York and San Francisco, and streamlined federal regulations on lane re-painting demonstrate how simple it can be to roll out these networks.

Even smaller improvements, like all-door boarding, signal prioritization, and queue jump lanes at intersections, can substantially reduce travel times for bus riders. Montgomery County, MD’s Ride On bus system, for example, was the DC region’s first to suspend fares and mandate rear-door boarding in its efforts to combat covid-19, and a number of the region’s other transit providers have followed suit.

And if our leaders are feeling really bold, they could give urban gems like New York’s East River waterfront, California’s Old Sacramento, or aforementioned Rock Creek Park back to people for a while, giving their constituents space to unwind and release some of the stress and adversity this virus has brought us. They could even create regional networks of open streets, akin to those Mexico City and other metropolises enjoy every weekend. Such additional space would address overcrowding issues that have arisen on high-demand routes like Dallas's Katy Trail, where the nonprofit organization that manages the path had to tell people to stay away due to concerns about covid-19 spread.   

When the pandemic is brought under control, those in charge could choose to either embrace these various types of people-oriented spaces or to return them to drivers. Even if they opt for the latter, officials will have collected troves of data that they and their staff can use to bolster our transit and active transportation networks in the future.

Provide people easy, affordable, and equitable access to person-sized vehicles

Many U.S. bike- and scooter-share systems operate without taxpayer subsidies, a testament to how high demand for sustainable, spatially-efficient personal mobility is.

However, some operators of these systems, particularly ride-hailing companies, have taken actions – such as suddenly hiking fares, neglecting low-income neighborhoods, or even ditching entire regions with little warning – that don’t align with the public’s need for connectivity. These actions block some people from accessing the systems; for others, they are just plain annoying.

To ensure we get everything we can out of our shared bikes and scooters during the fight against covid-19, we should publicly fund them for the duration of the crisis. Such funding would allow operators to set fare structures mirroring those of the transit systems they complement, appropriate given that people can use them for a similar array of trip types while practicing social distancing, and eliminate arbitrary barriers such as the two minute delay New York CitiBike riders are currently required to endure between docking and re-renting a bike.

To the extent feasible, operators should equip bike- and scooter-share systems to accept contactless smartcards and other transit fare media; this way, people could consistently access all person-sized vehicles in a given city instead of fiddling with a fleet of apps and payment methods. They also should coordinate their system rebalancing efforts to ensure regions have thorough and equitable access.

After things return to normal, operators and local leaders could assess whether to sustain a unified, publicly managed approach to shared bikes and scooters or return to a more siloed private-sector model. As with the re-purposed bike lanes, transit lanes, and public spaces described earlier, data gathered during the emergency would help them make a more informed decision.

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While humanity has its flaws, our ability to adapt amidst crisis has led to some of our greatest advancements and accomplishments.

Against covid-19, basic re-purposing of our urban space – including how we interact with and move through it – may be not only our key to short-term resiliency in our efforts to flatten the curve and fight this disease, but also a way to make places more livable and connected for decades to come.