QuoteEarlier this month, I wrote about New Brunswick's inability to complete a road diet on Livingston Avenue. The report that served as the basis for that piece concluded that city officials should be "less timid" about such projects in the future. In a formal letter responding to the CityLab post, sent via email, Glenn Patterson, New Brunswick's director of planning and community development, says that's true in general—but doesn't apply to his particular city in this particular case:
I agree with the report's statement, which you highlighted in the article, that public officials should not be timid in their approaches to improving public safety. My point is that the City of New Brunswick was not timid and was, in fact, leading the public discussion and action to make this a safer road.
Patterson explained that New Brunswick has been encouraging Middlesex County, New Jersey, to consider a road diet on Livingston since 2008. That effort gained focus in 2012 when the city partnered with the Alan M. Voorhees Transportation Center at Rutgers to study the situation more closely. The partnership produced a 2014 report touting the benefits of a road diet, as well as the new research study highlighted in the CityLab post.
I later spoke with Patterson by phone to discuss the general challenges that local governments and planners face when implementing a road diet. After all, if New Brunswick is still trying to gain momentum on the Livingston project after seven years, there must be many of them. Patterson says he can understand why the public might wonder what's taking so long, but that there's just a lot more to it than many people recognize.
"To do it on the permanent basis you've got to jump through these other hoops," he says.
Full article: http://www.citylab.com/cityfixer/2015/10/what-it-takes-to-get-a-road-diet-done/411034/