Mega Schools, Mega Problems

With dwindling budgets many schools are attempting to cut costs by consolidating schools. But what effect does this have on the community and the children who attend these schools? Historically schools played a major role in communities, in  neighborhood centers. But now with school consolidation, communities are closing schools in favor of mega-schools located on the edge of cities. Larger schools have been proven to have lower graduation rates and higher crime rates than smaller neighborhood schools. Attendance rates are also lower due to the long distances that kids need to travel which eliminates their ability to walk or bike.

Suburban Mega School with lots of parking but no nearby houses
Image courtesy of http://www.jmrengineering.com

Parent surveys have shown that they do not want their kids to walk or bike to school because of distance and safety concerns resulting in current school planning designed to discourage walking while other schools have banned biking. However these policies lead to increased traffic and traveling speeds which is the cause these safety concerns, further compounding the problem. A school in Seattle has made efforts to increase biking and has seen the opposite result, an increase in safety due to decreased traffic. These planning guidelines can help reverse this trend, detailing the needs of schools, from site selection to size.

Another paradox within school planning is the need for busing. While schools consolidate to save money they are spending their savings on an increased demand for busing, or pass the financially/time burden to parents to drive their kids to school each day. Smaller, neighborhood schools can cut cost by eliminating busing within one mile. Students who live within a mile are able to walk or bike to school. Surveys have shown that kids prefer walking and biking to school because it gives them an opportunity to socialize outside of school with their friends. Students also do better academically if they get some physical activity in the mornings. Safe Routes to School is a national program that aims to promote walking and biking to school to increase health and safety within the community.

Silicon Valley Advances Ahead of Apple

When Apple unveils its latest creation the rest of the tech industry scrambles to follow in its footsteps, thankfully that is not the case when it comes to urban planning and the wellbeing of their employees. Last year Steve Jobs announced Apple’s plans for a new corporate office in Cupertino, California. When asked by the city council how Apple will help the city Steve Jobs simply replied that they will pay their taxes. The building’s sleek looks and futuristic design astonished many people. Unfortunately when planners see this plan they view it as a missed opportunity to improve the community. The single use building sits on 175 acres with parking for 12,000 employees, with easy access to highway 280. Apple again emphasized their pro-car stance when introducing their new maps features in iOS 6 whose key features include turn-by-turn navigation, real-time traffic updates, and the ability to sync with your new car.

Area plan for Apple’s new “spaceship” campus
Image courtesy of http://www.9to5mac.com

Most people spend many hours of their day at work and commuting to and from work, leaving little time for exercise. One way to include physical activity into our work day is by walking or biking to/from work and using breaks/lunch to go outside and be active. Employers benefit financially from healthy employees. Many companies are starting employee wellness programs, which in turn will boost employee productivity and lower costs of employers. Employers can encourage healthy lifestyles by promoting public transit use and encouraging walking and biking to work through design and infrastructure: open stair wells, bike racks, sidewalks, and office location close to public transit and in mixed use neighborhoods.

When Google decided to expand their headquarters they reached out to their community of Mountain View, CA to change the course of the city’s development. Mountain View’s updated master plan includes mixed-use infill development, walking and biking paths, increasing public transit, and a focus on community connectivity. The largest portions of the development is residential aimed at younger professionals working for the tech giant. The goal is for all components to work together to form a sustainable 24/7, live/work community.

Amazon headquarter plans
Image courtesy of: http://allthingsd.com

Amazon announced their plans in March to develop three blocks in downtown Seattle. The massive project will include three new office towers as well as retail and near by residential. The site in South Lake Union is a great neighborhood that has a both an extremely high walkscore and transitscore. The site Apple has chosen for their project only scores a 49 for walking and even worse for public transit. Amazon’s new development will create 15% more leasable space than Apple’s project on just a fraction of the acreage.

Apple’s new headquarters is aptly named “the spaceship campus” because of its perfectly round shape that resembles a flying saucer. This building and surrounding area is really something from another world, unfortunately it will be built on this world, for real people.

Stormwater Management

Aging sewers and their increasing maintenance costs are a big topic for Honolulu’s 2012 election, other cities across the United States are flooded by the same problem. Seattle is making a splash with its new RainWise program by encouraging citizens to mitigate storm water runoff by using their yards as rain gardens. The goal is to direct water flow to a natural water filtering system like landscaping and rain gardens and away from sewers, which can flood homes, overflow sewers, and quicken erosion. It can also cause other disgusting problems like in the following picture of an otherwise beautiful marina in Honolulu.

Ala Moana Marina (yes, that is a mattress)

So why does water runoff matter? Stormwater runoff can create a cesspool of disease and trash. When it rains or snow melts sewers can become overfilled causing water to flow out of the sewers and into our streets and neighborhoods. This runoff can not soak into our streets and sidewalks and eventually returns to our waterways causing two problems, 1. water from the sewers going into our natural water has not been treated and causes contamination 2. water on the roads and sidewalks pick up debris and carry that to the nearest waterway. Human waste and pollutants that are often picked up by water runoff include, cigarette buds, animal waste, pesticides and other lawn chemicals, motor oil, and plastic bags. Contaminated water can get into our drinking water sources, close beaches, and have effects on wildlife. Contaminated water increases cost of water treatment.

Permeable surfaces allow water absorption into the ground before it can become contaminated and infect our water systems. The soil also acts as a natural water filter as it fills local aquifers. Roof gardens are a way that architects help mitigate stormwater when  creating new buildings. Combined with complete streets cities can promote green streets, which have many of the walkable/bikeable benefits of complete streets plus added green space and stormwater mitigation. We can all do our part to help prevent stormwater runoff and keep our community looking beautiful. Take pride in your community.

Sample of a Greenstreet
Image courtesy of land perspectives.wordpress.com

Suburban Nation

Suburban Nation: The rise of sprawl and the decline of the American dream
Andres Duany, Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, and Jeff Speck

Despite its textbook appearance and feel, Suburban Nation is full of passion about the future of the American city and its sense of community. The authors take great care to go into every detail on the cause of urban sprawl and the effects it has had on the public at large. This passion may be viewed as bias but every claim made is backed up with evidence indicated by the several footnotes that appear on almost every page. Small pictures in the margins help to illustrate their points and give their arguments a more human like quality. Although the book has a few complex words and ideas it is still understandable. Suburban Nation is a must read for all people interested in the future of our nation, states, and communities. This book is a great reference for anyone dealing with the subject matter or to argue with friends at a dinner party. Our official recommendation is BUY.

Hawaii’s Bike Plan

Why drive when you can bike? Biking offers a number of health benefits including increased physical activity and lessened environmental impact from automobile emissions. Having proper bike facilities, such as marked bike lanes and bike parking, encourage biking and is safer for all users of the road. Some communities are investing in bike sharing programs that are proven to save transportation dollars as well as offer an environmentally friendly, healthy transportation option. The best bike sharing programs offer competitive rates and are easily accessible. Others communities are looking into new types of bike lanes to expand their network. Bike lanes are the safest way for bikers to travel, on the road and in the same direction as traffic, the only exception being young children who belong on the sidewalk.

Biking in Hawaii
Image courtesy of http://www.justjared.com

Just as every city has a Master Plan for development, it is important to combine other plans including a parks and recreation plan, transportation plan, and non-motorized transportation plan. If a city has a plan in place it is easier to see which direction the city is headed, allowing for more funding opportunities to make projects a reality. As these types of plans will affect everyone in the community, public input is a valuable step in the process. Another specific type of plan the communities are beginning to include are bike plans.

The State of Hawaii enacted a Bike Plan in 2003. Citizen participation was key  to development of the plan, by holding public input meetings, workshops, and surveys. Important stakeholders, such as bike groups, schools, and other community action groups, were invited to give specific input for the plan. The plan deals with issues such as bike facilities, public education on bicycling, construction of new bike lanes, bike maps, connectivity and more. A bike plan is a great way for a city to evaluate needs of bikers and make plans for the future. In cities where traffic congestion is an issue, offering an alternate safe biking routes may help to ease congestion.

If we spend more money building more roads the only outcome will be more traffic, so why not spend the money to create biking infrastructure which can reduce traffic and make all of our lives easier.

Scoring Your Community

When people imagine an ideal neighborhood or community for their families they envision a place that has a cozy downtown, they can walk to parks, has mass transit, and is bike friendly. This neighborhood feels safe and friendly, with high social capital. But how does one find such a community in this age of urban sprawl? We summarize some user-friendly online tools to help you check your current community or prospective home.

Walkscore.com is a great resource that evaluates the walkability of a neighborhood. Walkscore has collected data around the United States (and some international locations) and scored neighborhoods based on their walkability from 0 to 100. Community members of cities a with higher walking scores are happier, weigh 6-10 lbs less, and have less stress. Not only is walking good for you and the environment, it also increases land value. According to this recent report one walkscore point adds $3,000 to a homes value, think about that next time you wonder why certain neighborhoods cost so much.

Community with a high walkscore
image courtesy of http://www.walklive.org

Walkscore was such a huge success they created two other databases, for bikeability and transit. Bikescore.com scores communities based on their bike lanes, hills, destinations and road connectivity, and bike commuting mode share. Currently bikescore only evaluates the top 10 most bikeable large cities in the U.S. and Canada, they encourage you to “Tweet” to ask for a bikescore of your city. Transitscore.com grades the largest 25 cities in the United States on their transportation network. It values things like frequency, types of transit available, and distance between stops. This is a great tool for people in larger cities looking for a new apartment wanting access to public transit.

The Trust for Public Land created Parkscore and has info about the 40 largest cities in the United States and promises more to come. Parkscore evaluates a city’s entire park system and grades it on acreage, services, and access. They also rate each aspect of the park system to show where the city needs improvement.

Using these tools in your community can help to show areas that are lacking and help to create sustainable, healthy, complete streets. Although these tools offer guidance and a starting point for evaluation there are certain qualitative aspects of a community that are unquantifiable, such as place-making, social capital, and its citizens.

Is Your Street Complete?

So just when is a street “complete”? Streets are complete when the design gives access for all users, regardless of mode of transportation, age, or ability. The street is more than just a road for cars. Legally, they extend from one property line to another, this is what is known as the “public right of way.” This is an area the city as set aside as public space for everyone to use, not just cars, but the design sometimes limits use for non-motorized users.

Typical Section of a complete street
Image courtesy of http://www.kauai.gov

While all streets look different, the above section shows the public right of way, when designed correctly, gives even access to all modes of transportation. The width of each lane is key to the overall success of the street. If the travel lane is too wide cars will speed and bikers and pedestrians will feel unsafe. Using trees serve as a buffer between the travel lanes for cars and the pedestrian walkways causing cars to slow down, making everyone safer, they also are a great way to beautify the community.

Complete streets offer economic benefits for the community. A recent report documented added economic benefit to communities that are more “walkable.” With this new data developers are trying to push for walkable neighborhoods so that both they and the community will profit from their development.

Complete streets also have many health benefits including increased safety for pedestrians and cyclist, increased access to free and safe physical activity in the way of cycling, walking, and public parks, plus it decreases automobile use which is better for the environment and air quality. According to Richard Jackson, M.D., Director of the National Center for Environmental Health, “It is dishonest to tell our citizens to walk, jog, or bicycle when there is no safe or welcoming place to pursue these life-saving activities.” Complete streets gives the community the option to have a safe routes to school program which aims to reduce obesity in children as it has in Alabama. It is important for public health professionals and community members to understand and advocate for complete streets, especially in low-income neighborhoods, where people are more likely to depend on non-motorized and public transportation.

Completed Street
Image courtesy of http://www.completestreets.org

Who we are

We just updated our Authors page and wanted to share it with everyone.

We are Michelle Conway and Brent Wozniak and welcome to our blog. We are young emerging professionals in the fields of urban planning and public health, living in Honolulu Hawaii. Michelle works for the state Department of Health and Brent works for the state Department of Transportation and is a Master of Urban and Regional Planning candidate at the University of Hawaii. This blog is a way for us to bring our interests together and express our views on current events. We both use public transportation, shopping totes and recycle but we are not hippies.

WHAT WE BELIEVE

• Public health and urban planning is the key to humanities future
• All people have the right to social justice
• Healthy citizens make healthier communities
• Healthy communities make healthier citizens
• Our environment affects the way we live
• The way we live affects our environment
• We love cats

Food Deserts

The increase in fast food and convenience stores and simultaneous decrease in supermarkets and grocery stores decreases access to healthy foods. This phenomenon,   called a food desert, usually occurs in low-income neighborhoods, making where you live determinant of what kinds of foods are easily available. According to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) a food desert is a low-income area that has limited access to a grocery store or supermarket. They occur in either rural or urban environments. To see if you live in a food desert check out the Food Desert Locator. This interactive map has information on the continental 48 states about their access to healthy food. Using tools like the Food Desert Locator can help us find areas of concern and where we can come together to help solve this issue.

Image courtesy of thedasslereffect.wordpress.com

In order to combat this issue a two-pronged attack is necessary, increasing access to grocery stores while limiting fast food and convenience stores. There are many ways to encourage access to healthy food sources such as business incubators and local farmers markets. Community-wide efforts are now underway in Philadelphia and Detroit, two of the nation’s poorest cities (and largest food deserts). In many communities corner stores are a main source of food for people. Healthy corner stores initiatives are ways to include fresh produce in smaller convenience stores. These efforts make sure it is easy and affordable for everyone in a community to have access to healthy foods. The other approach is through fast food zoning which can limit the number of joints in a given area or ban them altogether. To fix the problem of food deserts communities must work together to come up with creative solutions that work for them.

Working to end food deserts is just one of the many steps needed to combat the obesity epidemic in america. Public awareness about eating healthy and making healthy foods affordable compared to convenience and fast foods are also needed. Making sure everyone has access to healthy food is an important step in the process, that involves the community, urban planners, public health, businesses, and producers.

Public Health and Urban Sprawl

In addition to our weekly posts we will also occasionally submit book reviews that deal with our subject matter. The purpose of these reviews is simply to share with you what we have read and give recommendations to guide your own reading choices. Instead of giving a traditional rating (4 stars out of 5) we’ll give you one of three recommendations: “Buy”, “Read”, or “Leave.” For us book reviews have been helpful for us to decide what books we want to read next and hopefully we can do that for you. Please note that these reviews are only our opinion and we do not benefit in any way from them or any purchase of a book. Our first book review is Urban Sprawl and Public Health, an obvious place for us to start.

Public Health and Urban Sprawl:
Designing, Planning, and Building for Healthy Communities
By: Howard Frumkin, Lawrence Frank, and Dr. Richard J. Jackson

Public Health and Urban Sprawl: Designing, Planning, and Building for Healthy Communities, the title says it all. This book is a must read for anyone in public health or urban planning and is a good read for everyone else. Public health officials want to create healthy communities and this book shows that collaboration with Urban Planning can do this. The book starts out by explaining what urban sprawl is, how, and why it started. It then goes into the effects that urban sprawl has on our communities and how that in turn has affected our health and well-being. It is relatively easy to read and understand and is full of research and studies on each topic making the authors’ arguments evidence based. The book covers a variety of topics including: air quality, physical activity, water quality and more. The book is a little lengthy but only because it covers so many diverse and important topics. The authors’ conclude the book by suggesting answers to the problem of urban sprawl. This book is full of research and studies and serves as a good reference to have on hand. Our official recommendation is BUY.